New tweak proposed for TCAS 2019
The Association of the Council of University Presidents of Thailand has proposed new ways of submitting applications and screening students for the Central Admissions System (TCAS).
The proposal has been made, amid the latest glitch in the application system that has left scores of young applicants unable to get preferred placements, or any at all.
Proposals can be divided in four points, according to Prasert Kantamanon, secretary-general of the association.
The first proposal concerns a reduced time frame. The original timeline of the fiveround TCAS admission spans 10 months from October to July, which students found to be overly cumbersome as it takes too long for the results to show. The association suggested the process be curtailed to four months, from February to May.
The second suggestion relates to the third round of the process. Initially, students in this round were allowed to choose up to four departments without ranking them in order of preference. The association wants to introduce rankings.
The third solution was about the selection of medical schools. The association has called for the dismantling of the Consortium of Thai Medical Schools, which has been available as a single choice. Under the current system, any applicant who chooses one medical school will, if selected, be considered by all medical schools at various state universities under the consortium.
The association has now proposed that students must name a specific medical school as one choice.
The fourth suggestion is that students who have already earned a placement only be allowed to withdraw from their offers once.
Mr Prasert also sought more cooperation from universities to provide information about their quotas so students can be better informed when they rank their choices.
Suchatvee Suwansawat, president of the association, said all the proposals will be taken into consideration.
“The association needs cooperation with all relevant agencies such as the Ministry of Education and the National Institute of Educational Testing Services in order to standardise TCAS in a fair way,” he said.