Interdisciplinary research agenda in education for national development

Abstract

     The National Research Council of Thailand has placed a high priority on conducting urgently integrated educational research which would have repercussions on national development. Consequently, this research project was strongly supported with the objective to identify the integrated educational research agenda for national development. Three research methods were used: (1) document studies, (2) expert interviews, (3) brainstorming of small groups of researchers, educators, expert, and research monitoring committee. The results revealed that the integrated educational research agenda for national development must involve interdisciplinary research that integrates theories from disciplines related to national economic and social development such as economics, sociology, political science, and public administration. These comprised five clusters of research programs to develop the power of education: (1) to enhance national competitiveness, (2) to enhance national sustainable development, (3) to enhance social capital, quality of life, and poverty reduction, (4) to enhance national security, foreign affairs, and justice, and (5) to enhance national governance. The five clusters of research programs comprised 18 research programs, and 227 research projects. Of the research projects, 215 projects (94.71%) were normative studies, while 12 projects (5.29%) were positive studies.