For my retirement hobby, I am doing an MA-by-research at Khon Kaen University.
It is in the Social Sciences, as I never got to look at those during my schooldays of maths and sciences and my career (or careering around!) in engineering.

My 'topic' is how the villages may gain from the 'reverse migration' of couples retiring to them after a long period in the West. But another issue is how so many of the 'baby boom' generation are 'going back to college' in retirement in the USA and whether that may occur here (albeit in a much smaller way) in Thailand.

As far as I have found out, it seems that many of the baby boomers (born 1945 to 1970 approximately) are feeling that they want something a lot more stimulating than just watching tv when they have played their golf and done their gardening, or whatever. There seems to be a feeling that, for that generation, retirement should be different from what their parents did.

I would be very interested to hear views (in confidence, of course and by PM if preferred) of what those who will be retiring in the next twenty years think they might wish to get out of (and/or put into) their local University.

Doing a degree and a bit of research is an excellent idea. And your topic is one that is ripe for study. However, might I suggest that studying how communities "might gain" is almost stating the answer before you do the research? It might be better put as "Reasearch into the impact of . . . " as their may be negative social impacts. Hopefully not, but the research should be open to both possibilities?

Good luck and let us know how you get on.

If I did something similar, what really interests me in Thailand is the coexistence of different cultural groups in rural Thailand - e.g. Thai, Lao, Khmer, Chinese, Mon, etc..

Ian

Thank you for the reply, Ian.

Yes, "might gain" on its own does have an implication of assumption that "It will be a good thing" and that I see change as automatically being a 'bringer of better'.

Actually, the Proposal Document is more neutral, being simply entitled "Intended Return of Village Daughters" and giving due weight in the Objectives to looking at possible negatives as well as positives. (And even which is which of those lies only in the eye of the beholder!).

Your co-existence studies would be most revealing, I think. Not something that I could tackle, though, as I am partly tone-deaf and, so, quite inept at languages. Maybe some of the youngsters going to Uni from the co-existing communities could be got together on such topics. Maybe they already are. I must ask some of the farangs who teach English at KKU for their insights into what is happening in academia here.

So just to be clear, then, Martin, you are able to take an MA all in English at a Thai university?
I can't imagine pursuing any such lofty calling once I retire. I have thought once or twice about doing a TEFL course and then offering my services pro bono to a local school teaching English one or two days a week, as it were to put something into the community where I settle. But as I'm still on the UK treadmill I lack the willpower to do much about it at the moment, and I've never done any teaching.
I hope I will get some sort of dayboat to potter about on and go fishing. I guess once the local fishermen see my amateurish attempts they will not regard me as competition!

It is an MA-by-research (i.e. the old-fashioned sort of MA of fifty years ago, before 'taught Masters degrees' were started).

So I can do everything in English (though occasionally, in supervision meetings, my supervisors fall into a right good argument in Thai!).

I think that, for those of you who have an ear for language, there is a lot to be said for getting in with your local Uni, when you retire here, by seeing what they offer in the way of Thai-for-foreigners.
You may well find yourself being asked to help some Uni lecturers to 'smooth out' their translations into English of their articles about their research.
Local Universities are nice places to spend a day at. That is a lot less wearing than spending even half a day in a school.

quote:

Originally posted by Martin Allinson:
Local Universities are nice places to spend a day at. That is a lot less wearing than spending even half a day in a school.

I can second that!