According to "UK to make academic research available free on the net", UK has to face the huge cost of academic research every year, "the state currently spent about £5bn a year funding university studies"(¶6). The education plan which stops the excessive expense is the free of charge through the internet. The people will have full-right to create their academic research from massive source. The university will decrease the cost of research source, "UK's higher education spent about £200m a year accessing UK-based and international research"(¶15). However, this is only limited benefits, this project can apply only UK's academic research, about 6% of the world's research. Finally, UK will bare this approach cost to the rest of the world.
I agree with these UK plans. I am one of the persons who face this problem when I did the postgraduate project. The source of information for my research is limited, not enough journals and databases. The insufficient research which I can't find more sources to support my ideas.
Many universities in Thailand spend a lot of money on education especially, academic research but some universities can't support too much because they have to spent on other purposes, building facilities and employing professor. I think this is the reasons why Thai universities are not ranked 50th in the world.
Although this UK plan will less reduce the cost of academic research, UK will be the first country which lead others to follow. In one day, when every country support the people by making academic research available free on the internet. The truly new era of education will become.
__________
References
Film makes some good points, points which are directly relevant to what do in an academic reading and writing course. But I'm not sure that I entirely agree either with the UK proposal or with all of Film's responses. But such discussion of freely stated ideas is why academic freedom, the right to state and support any opinion on a topic, is always a necessary condition for knowledge and essential to become a high quality, high ranked university. What academics do, in journal articles, in seminars, in research, in essays, and so on is argue for and against ideas. It's the same in every academic field.
ReplyDeleteGetting back to Film's article, as his source also notes, implementing the UK's plan must be done in such a way that the publishers of peer reviewed articles can still make a profit. If they can't, the system will fail, which is why further study is required, for which Dame Janet Finch, at The University of Manchester, has been invited "to draw up a report recommending how best to proceed" (¶ 13).
The main beneficiaries would be university libraries and students, who now have to pay a lot for access to new research.
I think it's fair that users do pay: when students and libraries can access other people's research, it helps them a lot, and it's fair that they pay for the benefit that they receive. However, since, as Film points out, the government pays for a lot of the research ($5 billion / year), it also seems reasonable that it be made freely available to the public, which includes university libraries and students.
Why are Thai universities not highly ranked?
I think the reason has more to do with an environment that fails to encourage healthy argument, and a free, uncensored sharing of ideas. But I think things are getting better. My personal observation, which might not be accurate on a larger scale, is that Thai universities like Mahidol are now actively pushing higher academic standards, and are in fact better than some of the traditionally highly regarded Thai universities, where traditional ideas might in fact be obstacles to improved academic performance.
I don't think that there is anything wrong with Thai students - just with some traditional cultural habits which are not consistent with academic excellence.
And that's my 5 minutes or so of response writing on Film's post.
Another thought that occurred to me at the start of my response above, but which I forgot and didn't get back to, is that there might be some confusion over the meaning of the word research, and as we've already seen several times in class, such confusion about what a word or term means can quickly result in a very messy discussion.
DeleteSo it might be worth asking for a definition: What does research mean? And what doesn't this commonly used term mean? (I'm sure we have all been using the word regularly for years.)
What do you think?
yes,I strongly agree with you, Flim. This plan should use in Thailand . And if they(the government) can, there should have a free test too! At least, Entrance exam. I and other M6 students really suffer from this.
ReplyDeleteFor me, my parent have to pay lots of money for CU-AAT, CU-TEP ,SAT,and TU-GET which have taken every month.I know that it's for my future and my parents are willing to pay it.But is it really right to pay 800 bath for about 20 pages of paper exam? How about others?some of students of Thailand can't handle the price of GAT-PAT exam. If you want to be a doctor, you have to pay at least 700 bath for the test.This money isn't too much for some people but for some... it's too hard to handle it.
If these test is really being the path for the future of the country, why we didn't support it? there're still lots of great student who lack of money.What they can do is hoping that some day someone will give them this opportunity.
anyway, about your article, I like your respond writing.But i think that if you can give more details about your example, It'll be better :-) As a student, your topic really interest me. And after I read it ,never regret, that's a wonderful plan which is really useful. Glad that you wrote it. This should be the article that Thai's government should read! :-P
DeleteCherry,
DeleteI like your response to Films post. It's thoughtful, and adds new ideas and questions for us to think about.
And it looks about the right amount for 5 minutes of continuous response writing.
I like Film's article as it gives us a warning to think about how much money you have to spend on higher education. Particularly, when you enter into university and it is not a matter that you have to spend lots of money on doing your research. I am one who would like to encourage the government sector to look after this issue. If research studies are published free on line, it's really helpful for learners.
ReplyDelete