Fake certificate frauds warned by Education Ministry

 ONE of popular online topics throughout the past week was Facebook pages advertising copycat certificates for many education levels ranging from junior secondary to master’s degrees in exchange for 2,500 to 7,000 baht respectively.

Though the pages are now understandably closed, Chaipreuk Sereerak, permanent secretary for education, said on Friday that these pages were aiming to sell to job-seekers who needed to apply for a new job and claimed fast mail delivery after money transfer.

“Such [Facebook] pages selling fake certificates are opened and then closed endlessly. It’s fraud. I would like to warn students not to use the services because they would waste their money and face criminal action for using fake documents,” said Chaipreuk.

Request was already sent from the Education Ministry to the Ministry of Digital Economy and Society to track down these online sellers.

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Top: A website advertising the sale of fake certificates. Photo: www.manager.co.th

Latest PISA score shows Thailand still has a long way to go

THE recently announced 2015 PISA scores showed the academic performance of Thai students still lagged way behind our Southeast Asian neighboring countries such as Singapore and Vietnam. From all 72 countries, Thai students only ranked 54th in science and math and 57th in reading.

PISA (Program for International Student Assessment) is a part of many programs offered by the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) where about half a million students, with 28 million being 15-year-olds in 72 countries and economies, took the internationally agreed two-hour test to be assessed in science, mathematics, reading, collaborative problem solving and financial literacy.

Pattamawadee Pochanukul, the deputy director of Thailand Research Fund (TRF) and lecturer at Thammasat University’s Faculty of Economics, said research revealed that schools failed to foster critical thinking, analytical skills and logic among students. Financial disparity was also another factor affecting the developing of these skills in the students.

“The finding also showed that high grade students tend to have lower analytical and logical thinking skills,” said Pattamawadee.

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Inset: A global map showing how participating countries performed in PISA tests. Photo: www.oecd.org/pisa/

 Public warned of a jump in influenza cases next year

DISEASE control department said, according to historical data, 2017 will be a year of countrywide outbreak of influenza especially in Ayutthaya, Bangkok, Chiang Mai, Lampang, Phuket, Phayao and Rayong where the disease was detected for the past three years.

A set of data from a specific period used in time series analysis gave out a trend of an increasing case of seasonal influenza from 160,505 cases this year to around 320,000 cases next year. The cold weather is also another supporting factor for the virus to spread easily.

The department director-general Jessada Chokdamrongsuk suggests people protect themselves by covering their mouth and nose when coughing, always keep their hands clean and avoid contact with a patient as preventive measures.

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Below: A woman suffering from influenza is warmly wrapped up in bed. Photo: www.9thaihealth.com

By Piboon Awasdaruharote

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