Thailand’s oldest uni scraps mandatory uniforms for law students
The law faculty of Thailand’s oldest university has given its verdict in a dispute that has split the country’s education authorities.
Chulalongkorn University’s Faculty of Law will now permit students to wear their own clothes instead of uniforms to attend classes. The move could set a precedent for universities across Thailand, where mandatory uniforms are the norm.
Lifting of the mandatory uniform rule for law students was announced by Chula lecturer Ponson Liengboonlertchai in a Facebook post on Monday.
Ponson said that all 14 Chula law lecturers had signed a letter addressed to the faculty’s dean, permitting students to wear their own clothes to attend classes as long as they dressed politely.
“In summary, the letter says that all the lecturers agreed students should be free to dress as they like, which is a freedom guaranteed by the Constitution,” Ponson said.
The absence of uniforms would not affect students’ ability to study, he explained.
He added that he and his colleagues believed that the effectiveness of teaching and learning in classes had nothing to do with uniforms.
“As a result, all 14 lecturers of the Chulalongkorn University Law Faculty, including me, jointly drafted the memo permitting undergraduate students to wear either uniforms or polite clothes to attend lectures,” Ponson said.
The post drew over 580 likes, 130 shares and 17 comments in four hours.
Chulalongkorn University was founded in 1917. Its uniforms have long been the model for uniforms adopted in universities across Thailand.
