ThaiVisa notes that these new rules are expected to be extended to other Immigration offices around the country, but the Phuket Immigration offices were closed today, so it was impossible to confirm whether this will be the case.
The rules for general educational institutions, such as elementary schools, secondary schools and universities are unchanged, ThaiVisa reports.
There are significant changes, however, for non-formal schools (religious schools, art and sports schools, vocational school, tutoring schools, skill development schools and – probably – language schools).
People studying at such schools may now get an extension of stay for only 90 days maximum at a time, and the duration of the stay based on the study may not be longer than one year from date of entry into Thailand.
“For most non-formal schools the 90 day extension is of course nothing new,” ThaiVisa notes, “but some immigration offices tended to give longer extensions than 90 days to these students. That is no longer possible.
“A big change is that you are only allowed to study up to one year from date of entry into Thailand. That means that after one year you have to leave the country and maybe apply for a new ED-visa.”
Another major big change, ThaiVisa says, is that the study requirements will be raised from a minimum of four hours a week to a minimum of eight hours a week.
Students are expected to attend school four days a week for two hours a day. “It remains to be seen if going to school for two days a week for four hours each day will be acceptable.”
A consequences of the eight-hour requirement will be that a course that is currently approved as a three-year course will now only have a value for 18 months. Another aspect is that the tuition fees now will have to be raised because of the extra teaching and the prices for a course will go up.
“Again,” ThaiVisa notes, “this last is now only for Bangkok but will possibly soon be for the whole country.”
Read the original post and thread here.