The University of Life: Empowering a Community Through Alternative Education

In Thailand, the privatization of land has been the cause of difficulty and a prohibiting factor in access to resources, including education, for many people. However, in some cases, it has been a prod for marginalized villagers to create their own access.

Many children in the slum communities located near the railroad tracks on land owned by the State Railroad of Thailand in Khon Kaen are not granted the opportunity to go to school. While elementary school is free, there is tuition for junior high and high school. Moreover, the costs of transportation, books and uniforms are often more than the families in the slums can afford. Furthermore, in order to have a valid ID card, one must have a valid housing registration. A child born to a parent without ID will not be granted a birth register, and therefore no right to education (along with health care and voting rights). For those living illegally on SRT land, a lease agreement, either temporary or permanent, must be gained before receiving a house registration. These factors have all contributed to the fact that the majority of slum dwellers do not attend school past fourth grade despite the fact that school is legally mandatory through ninth.

In the sala of Theperak 5 slum community, the villagers have decided to take matters into their own hands. With the aid of professors from Bangkok, funding from Community Organizations Development Institute (CODI) and the municipality and donations from all communities in the Khon Kaen Slum Network, the University of Life was founded. At the University of Life, also known as the Learning Center, villagers can receive primary, secondary, undergraduate or masters degrees. The diplomas come from a university in Bangkok and are a widely recognized degree, though a student who gets their primary and secondary education from the Learning Center could not attend a state university like Khon Kaen University. This is because the Learning Center is strongly rooted in community education rather than public curriculum.

A primary and secondary education is free of charge except for books and extracurriculars due to the funding from CODI, the municipality and the donations; however a bachelors or masters degree generally has tuition of about 700,000 Baht. There is a standing government policy which states that any university student under 45 years old can take out a student loan. However, since the change of government earlier this year, this program has been dormant. Nevertheless, the municipality does provide funding for books, notebooks, chairs, projectors and computers. Student loans through private banks are also hard to get due to the low income earned by the students at the Learning Center and thereby no regular bank statements. The irony lies in the fact that were a student able to get a degree, they would have an easier time finding a higher paying job and would be able to pay off the loan they cannot get in the first place. The university in Bangkok that helped to organize the program at the Learning Center, though, is also helping to organize students to take out group loans with low interest.

The students getting their degrees at the University of Life have a choice of three majors within the realm of social studies, humanities, social science, liberal arts and local development. Various other universities are taking a cue from the university in Bangkok and opening up informal branches such as this one. The goal is for a community as a whole to become educated to further sustainable community development and to provide new opportunities to community members who were not granted access to education due sometimes to the privatization of land.

--Margo Silverman, Bates College