Free education budget not spent: study

AS MUCH AS 20 per cent of the state budget of Bt40 billion for the government’s free-education initiative remains unspent at schools, a study has revealed. 
“It is probably because schools lack adequate skills to manage the budget efficiently and because officials from central agencies check the schools just once a year,” Assoc Prof Dr Chaiyuth Punyasavatsut of the Thammasat University said yesterday. 
The university joined hands with the Office of Basic Education Commission (Obec) and United Nations International Children’s Emergency Fund to conduct the study on spending related to the government’s project to provide 15 years of free education. 
The project offers free education by allocating a budget for tuition, textbooks, student uniforms, learning materials and student improvement. 
Obec deputy secretary-general Narong Paewpolsong said the project covered 6.2 million students. 
Conducted among 250 schools across the country, the study has detected several problems related to state spending. 
“The textbook budget arrives about 24 days after the new semester starts. Schools distribute learning materials long after the start of the semester, 17 days for the first semester and 37 days for the second semester on average,” Chaiyuth said. 
He added that by the end of the second fiscal year, the project had Bt8.2billion still remaining in the hands of schools. 
Obec allocated the budget based on information provided by schools, he said. 
“The lack of a proper checks-and-balances mechanism causes ethical issues,” Chaiyuth said.
The study recommended that schools release information on the budget and student performance to communities to promote greater transparency. 
Chaiyuth said the lack of an integrated educational-information database was also to blame for the budget problem and a redundant student name list. 
In a related development, Prime Minister General Prayut Chan-o-cha complained that when the educational sector lacked an integrated IT system, there were problems with redundancies.
“Students may have already moved to a new school, but their old school still uses their names to claim a budget,” he said after chairing a meeting of the education-reform committee yesterday.
Established under the new constitution, the committee has been tasked with reforming the country’s education sector.
Prayut said there were several educational problems, including teachers’ production, and processes in teaching, learning and testing.
“We need to pay attention to budget usage. We need to find out whether the budget really goes to what it is meant for. We need to check if there is redundancy when we plan education budgets as well,” he said.
Prayut also said he hoped education reform would deliver tangible results within a year or during the remaining term of his government. 
The priority, he said, should go to a structural overhaul and serious problems. 
“Other parts of the reform may be prescribed in the country’s education master plan,” Prayut said.