Attributes to the efficient of the technical agriculture curriculum at the Rajamangala Institute of Technology, Surin, Thailand
Date
1989
Authors
Ampan Prombutr
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Abstract
This research undertaking aimed to assess the efficiency of the technical agriculture curriculum and the attributes related to it at the Rajamangala Institute of Technology, Surin, Thailand.
A total of 83 faculty members and administrators of the institute represented the respondents. A structured interview schedule was used in the data collection.
Majority of the respondents were males (73.5%) with a mean age of 37.93 years, single (78.3%) and have finished a bachelor's degree (56.6%). They were low income earners with a mean income of 56,266.24 bahts (approximately 45,000 pesos or 1780 US Dolalrs).
In general, they (56.6%) had short experience in the service, have been in their position either as faculty or administrator for quite a short time (68.7%), and could be considered relatively new in the curriculum (83.1%). Most of them (74.7%) had previous experience in curriculum planning and were partially involved in the curriculum as a whole.
Five aspects of institutionalized program support namely: development program, services provided, teaching facilities and materials, faculty development and fringe benefits were provided by the institute to boost the development of the curriculum.
The technical agriculture curriculum was generally acceptable as mchanism for expediting student development; for attaining the goal of the school to partake in the national development; and for the overall community development via its graduates. The objectives/ goals of the curriculum were almost all fully accomplished. Of the perceived productive accomplishments of the curriculum the improvement of the living condition was fully accomplished. Moreover, activities which would support their curriculum were less sufficient. The different services provided by the institution and teaching facilities and materials were both just sufficient to carry out and support their curriculum. Faculty development and fringe benefits were less sufficient.
The most important contribution of the curriculum was that knowledge, aptitude and practice/skills may be applied in agricultural communities.
In the planning stage of the curriculum, the primary problem encountered was the lack of finding out the actual problem in the communities. In the implementation stage, there was insufficient equipment and lack of budget. It was a common belief that there was no delegation of duties on the part of the manager re-daministration work in the management stage of the curriculum. No follow-up of the curriculum, that is, it was rarely evaluated and few administrators gave full attention to the curriculum's evaluation (67.5%) were the problem encountered in the evaluation stage of the curriculum. However, even with some weaknesses and negative perceptions rgarding the curriculum, faculty members as well as the administrators still hope for the continuation of the program.
Simple correlation analysis revealed that there was no relationship between the total independent variables, respondents' socio-economic characteristics as well as institutionalized program support with the total dependent variables, curriculum's efficiency and thus, both null hypotheses of the research were accepted. Apparently, both manpower and material support are not sufficient to attain a curriculum's desired efficiency. More importantly, it reflects the presence of some touchy problems not only from the administrators and faculty planning/managing/implementing/evaluating the curriculum but also from the technical agriculture curriculum itself.
On a per variable level, three socio-demographic variables namely: income, years of work experience and years with the curriculum were negatively correlated with the curriculum's efficiency. This means that junior faculty members who have lesser income and fewer years of work and curriculum involvement regarded the technical agriculture curriculum better and thus contributed more to the curriculum's efficiency.
For institutionalized program support, highly significant correlation was noted with some efficiency variables. Perceived sufficiency of institutionalized curriculum support was related to all support variables; performed targets were related to development program support services and faculty development.
These specified significant variables contributory to better curriculum efficiency should, therefore, be singled out for continuity and further improvement to attain a rosier picture of the Rajamangala Institute of Technology's technical agriculture curriculum's efficiency, in particular and development in general.