Editing: research/abstract_eng/678.txt

���������������������������������������������������� Research� Abstract� No.79 ������������������������������������������������ A Study of Collective Opinions Regarding some �������������������������������� Aspects of Childcare Center� Management in Thailand ���������������������������� Assoc. prof. Dr. Dusadee� Yoelao ��������������������������� Assist. Prof� laddawan Kasemnet ������������������������������������ Assist. Prof� Prateep Jinnge ����������� Executive Summary �������������������� The objectives� of this study were to find� collective opinions about childcare centers services regarding the following: 1) purposes of childcare centers and goals of child development, 2) the main organization responsible for coordinating childcare centers, 3) roles of community, private organization, and government� in childcare centers services, and 4) activities for quality control and evaluation of� childcare centers services. ������������������� Sample consisted of� four groups of� people. The first group consisted of academics, politicians,� chief executives of� private� and governmental organizations� providing childcare services.� The� second group consisted of officials coordinating between central� government� and local organizations providing the services in Chiengmai, Khonkan, Songhkla, Chonburi, and Bangkok .� The third group consisted of� workers� at� childcare centers from top level such as heads of schools to bottom level such as care providers.� The last group consisted of� parents of children at the childcare centers.� The total subjects were 1,663. �������������������� Findings and implementations were as follows.� There was a� collective agreement on the purposes of the childcare centers.� They� were� to promote the correct practices of� child development ,and to provide basic social habit training for children .�� The results showed also the collective agreement� on goals of� child development for the 0-3, and 3-6 years children.� These� were� good physical health, balance� of psychological, emotional, and social development, and happiness.� Moreover� creative thinking� was selected as child development goal for the 3-6 years old children.� As a result, we recommended that the government should� take� actions in� collecting ideas from experts and practitioners on standard of practices for childcare centers in order to achieve the above purposes and goals.� At the same time childcare centers,� related organizations, the general public, and other stakeholders should� be informed.� Their roles and functions should also be identified. ������������������� Concerning main organizations responsible for childcare centers, it was agreed that the ministries of education and public health should be responsible for the 0-3 years old age group childcare centers such as the ministries of interior, defense, and university affairs to establish common policies, goals, purposes and practices. ������������������� As to the roles of community, private organization and government in child services, the collective opinion was that they should form a working group to write a manual.� However no agreement was found between academics and politicians in the area of cooperation among these various organizations. A seminar was recommended so that opinions could be exchanged, discussed and finalized. ������������������� About activities for quality control and evaluation of childcare centers services, it was found that working standards were urgently needed and should be distributed to all centers.� Incentives for these centers to conform to the standards were suggested to quicken the pace of development. ������������������ Collective agreement was found among academics for 27 indices in checking the quality of childcare centers. These should be the starting point for research and development in quality control for each childcare centers.� Indices that were agreed upon by parents should also be considered as they were service recipients. ������������������ Finally, the childcare centers should use the data for their own internal quality control to assess whether their work process-planning, executing, evaluating, and improving-task into account information from the various sources and various sources and various methods of execution available. �� | SWU |���� | BSRI |