| Institution Name | Sukhothai Thammathirat Open University |
| Contact details | Chaengwattana Rd. Bangpood, Pakkret Nonthaburi 11120 Thailand |
| Website/URL | http://www.stou.ac.th/eng/ |
| Brief Overview | Sukhothai Thammathirat Open University (STOU) was officially established by Royal Charter on 5 September 1978 as Thailand’s
eleventh state university. His Majesty King Bhumibol Adulyadej (King Rama IX) graciously bestowed the university its name
in honor of King Prajadhipok (King Rama VII), who once held the title “Prince Sukhothai Thammaracha” prior to his accession
to the throne. On 24 October 1978, His Majesty issued royal mandates appointing the first University Council and appointing
Professor Dr. Wichit Srisa-an as the first president, effective from January 1978. After approximately two years of preparation,
STOU received its first academic class on 1 December 1980. STOU began with three schools of study: Educational Studies, Liberal
Arts and Management Science. From 1979 to 1984, STOU had no home campus, so it had to share space with such agencies as the National Education Commission, Thai Airways, the Faculty of Economics of Chulalongkorn University, and the Ministry of University Affairs. In 1981, Mr. Mongkol Kanjanapas donated a 30-rai section of land located in Pakkret district of Nonthaburi province. The university then bought more land, bringing the total to approximately 135 rai. Construction at this site began in 1982, and the university began operating from the new location on 9 December 1984. STOU was the first university in Southeast Asia to use the distance learning system. This new system of learning expanded the role of higher education in Thailand by engaging learners who previously had no opportunity to further their education. Since its establishment, STOU has enabled the development of individuals and communities throughout Thailand and beyond. There are 12 schools of study in the university:
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| Distance Education History | STOU was founded in 1978 and began teaching students in 1980. From its beginnings, the university has been entirely focused
on distance education. The main teaching media are printed materials that are mailed to students. Radio, TV and various other
audiovisual media have always been an important part of STOU’s programs as well, and in 1985, the idea of e-learning arrived,
which at that time was understood as the use of computers in education. A collaboration with the University of Guelph (Canada)
led to the production of CAI packages using VITAL (Videotext Integrated Teaching and Learning system). The production process
proved very time-consuming. Fewer than 20 courses were supplemented with CAI media, and this effort had little lasting tangible
impact. In 1997, STOU started an online learning project called Virtual University, but implementation was limited and certain elements of the project were too specialized for STOU needs. In 2000, STOU Plan 2000, a new master plan for teaching and learning (including e-learning) was adopted. The plan outlines two approaches to delivering STOU courses—online and offline. 2005 marked the first large-scale online learning project at STOU. ATutor was chosen as the Learning Management System (LMS). Over the next four years, it remained supplementary, but grew in significance and relevance to our programs. In 2009, D4L was introduced as another LMS option. In 2010, a decision was made to increase the role of online learning. After this, all graduate courses (which usually have 2-3 weekend seminars during the semester) were required to substitute one seminar with an online seminar. |
Teaching and Learning Profile
| Degree level focus | Bachelor, Masters & PhD focus Bachelor: 55% Masters: 35% PhDs: 10% |
| Expenditure on teaching | not reported |
| Orientation of degrees | non-regulated/ licensed career-oriented focus 88% |
| Range of subjects | comprehensive 10 disciplines |
Student Profile
| Distance learning students | predominant 100% |
| Mature students | predominant 49% |
| Part-time students | not reported |
| Size of student body | very large |
Research Involvement
| Doctorate production | major |
| Expenditure on research | not reported |
| Peer reviewed publications | some 0.12 |
Involvement in Knowledge Exchange
| Cultural activities | 24 |
| Income | not reported |
| Patent applications | not reported |
| Start-up firms | not reported |
Regional Engagement
| 1st year bachelor from region | major 99% |
| Graduates working in region | major 99% |
| Importance of local/regional income sources | major 99% |
International Orientation
| Foreign degree seeking students | not reported |
| Importance of int'l income | none |
| Incoming students | not reported |
| International academic staff | 3 |
| Outgoing on exchange | not reported |
DE-related Institutional Information
| Number of Students | 161,032 |
| Number of Students by DE mode | 161,032 |
| Number of Academic Staff | 338 |
| Summary of External Quality Assurance Processes | The external QA process is under the Office for National Education Standards and Quality Assessment (ONESQA). ONESQA is the
only public organization responsible for overseeing external QA and accreditation of educational institutions at all levels.
ONESQA develops guidelines and methodology for conducting quality assessments and accreditation of educational institutions
by considering the goals, principles and approach to educational management at each level as stipulated in the National Education
Act, B.E.2542 (1999). Under the Education Act of 1999, educational institutions are subject to external accreditation once every five years and must present the results to relevant agencies and the general public. In this process, there are 18 key performance indicators, grouped into six standards. First Standard: Quality Standard of Graduates. (1) Percentage of graduates who can secure jobs within one year, including through self-employment; (2) The quality of bachelor's, master's and doctoral degree graduates in accordance with the Thai Qualifications Framework for Higher Education; (3) Number of published or disseminated articles by master’s graduates; (4) Number of published or disseminated articles by doctoral graduates. Second Standard: Research and Creative Work. (1) Percentage of published or disseminated research or innovation in proportion to the number of full-time instructors; (2) Percentage of research utilized at national and international levels in proportion to the number of full-time instructors; (3) Number of academic works that have received quality recognition. Third Standard: Academic Services to Society. (1) Application of knowledge and experiences gained from academic and professional services for improving teaching and learning processes or research; (2) Number of academic and professional service activities/projects responding to the needs for development and strengthening the society, community, and external organizations. Fourth Standard: Preservation of Art and Culture. (1) The total number of activities related to promotion and support of artistic and cultural identity; (2) Evidence of aesthetic development in the field of art and culture. Fifth Standard: Institutional and Human Resources Development. (1) Quality levels of the council of the university/institution; (2) Quality levels of the university/institution administrators; (3) Evidence of faculty development. Sixth Standard: Internal QAS: Quality development, monitoring and assessment. (1) Internal quality assessment certified by the institution's parent organization; (2) Evidence of developments that fulfil the philosophy, mission and goals specified at the institution’s establishment; (3) Evidence of developments that affirm the points of emphasis and distinctive traits that reflect the identity of the organization; (4) Evidence of utilized guidelines and solutions that address various social problems. One difficulty for STOU is that the external accreditation process does not take into account distance learning. The same regulations and criteria as for other universities in the country are used. For example, one indicator is the percentage of students who get a job after graduation, but most STOU students are already working while they are studying and are thus excluded. Consequently, the university has earned poor marks in this area, and the assessment is misinterpreted. |
| Summary of Quality Procedures | The quality procedures at STOU
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| Percentage of resources that are OER | 1-20% |
| Intellectual Property Rights Position | Owned by the institution but with some licensing back to staff (Comment - STOU stipulates in its regulations that the materials are the intellectual property of the university) |
| Expected changes for DE from the current strategy | In academic year 2012, the learning management system will be changed from ATutor to Moodle, integrated with D4L, in order to increase the variety of the university’s teaching and learning format. STOU is currently working to implement online systems in all programs. |
| Any future considerations for DE | STOU is working to provide educational services to students and the general public through new technologies, such as e-library and search engine for books and other types of educational services. In addition to existing public television, the university has launched the STOU Channel, the university’s own satellite TV channel, which will continue to develop as an important resource for students and the general public. STOU is also trying to increase the amount of interaction between lecturers and students through online media. |
| Summary of the impact of technology on distance education | STOU has developed its learning management system to better facilitate the needs of students and the general public. For assessment, STOU is starting to use online testing in some bachelor’s-level courses, allowing students to take the examination online at an approved testing location. Teaching and learning at STOU are also increasingly focused on using online systems as well as mobile learning. |
Technologies
| Technologies currently in use | Tools likely to be used more in 5 years time | |
| ASYNCHRONOUS COMMUNICATION | ||
| Blogs | ✔ | ✔ |
| ✔ | ✔ | |
| Microblogging (e.g. Twitter) | ✔ | |
| Online Forums / Threaded discussions | ✔ | ✔ |
| Personal Portals (e.g. iGoogle) | ✔ | |
| Podcasts | ||
| RSS feeds | ||
| Shared Calendars / Meeting Scheduling (e.g. Doodle) | ✔ | ✔ |
| SMS / MMS | ✔ | ✔ |
| Social Networking Utilities (e.g. Facebook, MySpace) | ✔ | ✔ |
| Vidcasts | ✔ | |
| Voicemail | ✔ | ✔ |
| Webinars | ✔ | |
| Website | ✔ | ✔ |
| Wikis | ✔ | |
| SYNCHRONOUS COMMUNICATION | ||
| Chatrooms | ✔ | ✔ |
| Instant messaging (e.g. ICQ, MSN) | ✔ | ✔ |
| Online forums (eg Eluminate) | ✔ | ✔ |
| Shared Whiteboards | ✔ | |
| Teleconferencing | ✔ | ✔ |
| Telephone | ✔ | ✔ |
| Video Conferencing | ✔ | ✔ |
| Virtual workspaces | ✔ | |
| Voice-over IP (e.g. Skype) | ✔ | ✔ |
| RESEARCH TOOLS | ||
| Citations/References (e.g. Endnote, Zotero) | ✔ | |
| News Sharing (e.g. DIGG) | ||
| Notification Services (e.g. Google Reader) | ||
| Online databases or directories | ✔ | ✔ |
| Search Engines (e.g. Google) | ✔ | ✔ |
| Social Bookmarking (e.g. del.icio.us) | ✔ | |
| Web Annotations (e.g. Diigo) | ||
| DOCUMENT SHARING & MANAGEMENT | ||
| Document Repositories / Management Systems | ✔ | |
| Document Sharing (e.g. Google Docs, Google Apps) | ✔ | ✔ |
| Grid/Cloud Computing | ✔ | |
| Learning Management System | ✔ | ✔ |
| Sharing Geographic Content (e.g. GoogleMaps) | ✔ | |
| Sharing Image Content (e.g. Flickr) | ✔ | |
| Sharing Presentation Content (e.g. Slideshare) | ✔ | ✔ |
| Sharing Textual Documents (e.g. GoogleDocs) | ✔ | ✔ |
| Video Sharing (e.g. YouTube, TeacherTube) | ✔ | |
| OTHER | ||
| Password Management (e.g. OpenID) | ✔ | ✔ |