Criterion 6 – Student Support Services

Criterion 6 – Student Support Services

Operational Result

6.1 The student intake policy, admission criteria, and admission procedures to the programme are shown to be clearly defined, communicated, published, and up-to-date.

The prospective potential candidates of the program have been identified and recruited via 4 approaches: 1) Different bachelor programs’ alumni of the university, 2) online announcement via the Department’s website and social media (e.g., Facebook), 3) Marketing team’s visit to difference provinces to recruit students (for both bachelor and master level), and 4) National and International Education Expo.

The criteria for the selection of students are determined and published in the online admission announcement and the brochure of Master of Business Administration program. The student intake policy, admission, and selection criteria are reviewed and updated every 5 years.

Instructions for application and links to the application form and the submission system are on the University’s website. Prospective applicants are instructed to fill out application for admissions. After submission, the registration department forward the details to the program committee. Applicants who meet the admission requirements are then evaluated by interview.

The number of student intake, performance of students, teaching and learning approach and fulfilment of expected learning outcomes are also considered for deciding the level of achievement of entering students. 

6.2 Both short-term and long-term planning of academic and non-academic support services are shown to be carried out to ensure sufficiency and quality of support services for teaching, research, and community service.

The MBA program, along with the college, has a both short-term and long-term planning for student support system. Currently the program offers following facilities and periodically review them for upgradation:

Academic supports:

Library: STIC library is a two storied building, offering academic materials, textbooks, journals, electronic journal databases and study area, in addition to services from the university; opening hours 8.00 am – 5.00 pm Monday to Saturday.

WiFi: WiFi is available in all faculty buildings and dormitory areas, (in COVID-19 pandemic situation, the FBA upgraded every classroom to be well-equipped classrooms for online learning, capable for online learning access with options of google meet.)

Co-studying space: Several co-working spaces, available at dormitory, library and faculty building for working groups.

Non-academic support services, FBA provides:

Dormitory: There are eight dormitory buildings in proximity to the university, a five-minute walk

distance from the library; offering full facilities such as cafeteria, laundry, convenient store, activity room and leisure room, with wireless network covering the whole building.

Prayer room: Chapel for Christian students and a prayer room for Muslim students. Religious

Sport club: Club for indoor games, and outdoor activities

Play ground: For football, volleyball, basketball and badminton

Gymnasium with swimming pool: A gym with modern equipment and a specious swimming pool

Advisor-Advisee system: To advise student regarding their academic and personal life.

To ensure sufficiency and quality of support services for teaching, research and service, the Department has planned to strengthen program’s manpower, methods, materials, and managements for supporting short- and long-term academic and non-academic services of the program.

6.3 An adequate system is shown to exist for student progress, academic performance, and workload monitoring. Student progress, academic performance, and workload are shown to be systematically recorded and monitored. Feedback to students and corrective actions are made where necessary.

The program has set up the time plan of academic activities and monitoring the students’ progress. A general advisor has been assigned to each student when the first semester starts to support academic and non-academic activities before the thesis advisor is assigned. For the course work, the participation of the students in each class is observed and discussed in the program committee’s meeting. Student’s scores of the examination for all courses are discussed and assessed. For the thesis work, there are two methods to monitor the student progress and academic performance: progress report submitted by the student and progress observation by the thesis supervisor. All current students must submit the progress report every semester and the reports are discussed and evaluated by the curriculum committee in the meeting and kept in the recording system. In addition, the student’s progress is presented by the thesis supervisor which obtains from the communication between student and supervisor via e-mails for progress of data collection or individual discussion during data analysis and manuscript/thesis preparation. The progress of students in this monitoring system used to determine the situation of students for study and graduation can be planned and evaluated whether the indicator performance will be achieved or more efforts or close monitoring are needed. Apart from evaluation of the students, the students also provide the feedback and evaluation of the courses to the program

The credit point system is used to evaluate the academic performance and study achievement. The credit of course work is 24 credits. A total of thesis credit is 12 credits (Plan A2) which are calculated as 3 credits for proposal defense and first three chapters, 3 credits for data collection and analysis, 3 credits for a publication and  3 credits for final defense and five chapter submission (with approval). The study load is divided equally over and within the academic years by 24-credit course work in the first year, 12-credit thesis work in the second year. Based on this plan timeline, the average years which the student complete the program are 2 years.

Lecturers regularly discuss about performing students to find the solution to motivate students together. The major advisor has a responsibility to be a good mentor and take care of their advisee directly. Support staff will help students who have problems concerning course options, change of options, interruption or termination of studies follows the University regulations. Therefore, all lecturers can know study progress of all students. The University regulation defines the study period for MBA students (Plan A2) as not more than 4 years; however, they are expected to complete in 2 years as following study plan.

6.4 Co-curricular activities, student competition, and other student support services are shown to be available to improve learning experience and employability.

To improve students’ learning experiences, the faculty allocates budget to support student club activities, industry visit, moral and ethics activities and 21^st century skills development.

The university student affair office (SAO) maintains various clubs to run the necessary co-curricular activities. Students can join and actively participate in different activities organized by the clubs. Besides, TOEIC practice sessions and language lab supports students to be a true global graduate.

The FBA supported students to improve employability. Annually, the FBA organizes employment seminar for graduating students. To make the future graduates ready for their workplaces, different skills are taught during that seminar.

During academic year 2023 the Program arranged a study tour to Ayutthaiya historical park along with Faculty of Education. The students experienced business model of small businesses at floating market. Besides, the students gather multicultural group experience which will help them to survive in the diverse workplace.

The career prospects of the students are provided to all students in the class during the course work and supervision by the main advisor on thesis works. Further training, scholarship and job opportunity are announced to current students and alumni through e-mail, department website and Facebook. Other extracurricular activities to promote social and cultural exchanges and communication skills are conducted at program, faculty and university level such as New Year festival, teacher day, or celebration, International Cultural Night or Cultural tour.

6.5 The competences of the support staff rendering student services are shown to be identified for recruitment and deployment. These competences are shown to be evaluated to ensure their continued relevance to stakeholders needs. Roles and relationships are shown to be well-defined to ensure smooth delivery of the services.

For the deployment, all support staff know their roles of work based on their standard operating procedures relevant to their competency. Additional training and academic improvement are available along with the employment. The meeting among academic staff and support staff is organized once in every year to share the experiences and challenges that they face in their works to identify the solutions and suggestions. Our program uses the University’s competency criteria for evaluating the support staff including core and functional competencies which have been updated. Same core competencies are applied for all support staff but the functional competencies are different depend on positions as following details. They all know that their performances are evaluated using the competency and functional performances and by peer assessment annually. The rubric system of competency assessment is additionally constructed by the program committee to standardize the evaluation and indicate the need of support services of the program.

Table Competency criteria of support staff

Core Competency	Functional Competency
1. Ethics and social responsibility	1. Ethical values 2. Information security 3. Respect for others
2. Professionalism	1. Relevant professional skills in responsible job description 2. Learning ability 3. Problem solving 4. Creative thinking and continuous learning 5. Attention to detail 6. Hardware and software skill 7. Network skill
3. Unity	1. Liaison ability 2. Team work 3. Cultural diversity orientation 4. Sharing mindset

Minimum 3 functional competency depending on the type of work

6.6 Student support services are shown to be subjected to evaluation, benchmarking, and enhancement.

The student support services of Master of Business Administration program are evaluated by the students and peer assessments. Logistics and administration of curricular activities performed by the support staff and those in connection between teaching staff and students as well as teaching and coaching performances of academic staff were also assessed by the students annually. For co-curricular activities on special event were assessed by the participants. The evaluation scores of all activities were shown to be satisfactory.

All support staff have also the opportunity to express their feeling and satisfaction once in a year when the feedback of competency and functional performance is conducted on one-to-one basis with the Dean. The support staff evaluation process has been monitored by the Faculty of Business Administration. Apart from the support to current students throughout the whole study periods, the Master of Business Administration program also supports the alumni after graduation for education and research. Currently, the communication or coordination is informally held between graduate and individual academic staff, but now the program is planning to do that in a systematic manner to compliment the support services.

Evidence

ID_Evidence	Name_Evidence
6.1-1	Program brochure
6.1-2	Marketing campaign
6.2-1	Faculty facility development plan and budget
6.4-1	SAO report
6.4-2	Ayutthaya Trip
6.6-1	Student satisfaction survey (support services)

Self-Assessment

Requirements	Result	Score
6.1 The student intake policy, admission criteria, and admission procedures to the programme are shown to be clearly defined, communicated, published, and up-to-date.	/	1
6.2 Both short-term and long-term planning of academic and non-academic support services are shown to be carried out to ensure sufficiency and quality of support services for teaching, research, and community service.	/	1
6.4 Co-curricular activities, student competition, and other student support services are shown to be available to improve learning experience and employability.	/
6.3 An adequate system is shown to exist for student progress, academic performance, and workload monitoring. Student progress, academic performance, and workload are shown to be systematically recorded and monitored. Feedback to students and corrective actions are made where necessary.	/	1
6.5 The competences of the support staff rendering student services are shown to be identified for recruitment and deployment. These competences are shown to be evaluated to ensure their continued relevance to stakeholders needs. Roles and relationships are shown to be well-defined to ensure smooth delivery of the services.	/	1
6.6 Student support services are shown to be subjected to evaluation, benchmarking, and enhancement.	/	1
Overall		5