Bro. Leo expressed satisfaction with the progress made so far by Assumption University and acknowledged that the administrators were indeed proud of the performance of the faculty and staff members. He explained that teaching and instruction in the next century would be based primarily on the following principles enunciated as the four pillars of education in a special issued by the UNESCO

Learning to know
Learning to do
Learning to live together
Learning to be

The Vice President for Student Affairs then made a few suggestions for adoption on the threshold of the 3rd millenium. He said that from now on the administrators propose to apply the principle of participative management and invited senior academics such as deans, chairpersons and directors to join hands in running the various faculties departments and schools under their jurisdiction. He said all of us must strive to be competent, efficient, economical, industrious, honest at all times and be aware of the riles, regulations, procedures and practices that form part and parcel of he lofty ideal called the good governance. He dwelt in passing on the tendencies and attitudes of professors at the catholic University of Louven who he said-start work at 7 in the mornings, toil away at their chores till late in the evenings, are available to students at all times and who would be seen reading books during the short breaks in between-examples of superlative industriousness. He compared such admirable qualities with he capricious traits of many Thai people who merely wanted to make money and get rich quickly by hook or by crook without regard to probity, morality, fairness or equity. He emphasized the need to practise and hone ourselves in consistency, transparency and accountability, to work within the framework of our laws and the constitution, develop ethical, moral and spiritual values and prepare students to be responsible citizens who make creative contributions to society, wean them away from consumerism, materialistic exhibitionism and impregnate them with a high sense and significance of our culture, values and virtues.

Bro. Leo concluded by saying that his exhortations are meant to up-grade our skills and instill world class qualities in our faculty and staff members and if they succeed in the acquisition of these attributes remuneration and benefits are bound to follow till they become commensurate with the enhanced scales and rates obtaining in developed countries.

The Chairman, Rev. Bro. Martin then took over by introducing the following three personalities to the assemblage.

1. Dr. Sorachak Kasemsuwan Dean of the Faculty of Law who is leaving us on November 1, on being nominated for the prestigious and coveted position of the Director General of the Mass Communication Organisation of Thailand.
2. Professor Alan Maley who has joined Assumption University as the Dean of he Institute of English Language Education and who is regarded as an authority in the teaching of English as a second language. The Chairman said that Prof. Maley is a world class educator and that we were fortunate in being able to secure his services and that had taught in English, Singapore, Sri Lanka etc.
3. Rear Admiral Prasart Sribhudung, Associate Dean of the Faculty of Ecommerce which is a new department likely to assume greater importance apropos of the popular belief that "Internet will change everything and everything will converge on the Internet".

   Bro. Martin next showed slides of the University's mission and vision statements which he said represented the aims and objectives of the administrators and which therefore constituted important policy declarations of the institution.

Vision 2000

ASSUMPTION UNIVERSITY OF THAILAND ENVISIONS ITSELF AS

• an international community of scholars,
• enlivened by Christian inspiration,

  engaged in the pursuit of Truth and Knowledge,

• serving human society, especially through the creative use of interdisciplinary approaches and cybertechnology.

  STRATEGIES - Leadership (academic, social…Innovative Teaching, Research, etc.)

• Productivity
• Service

Vision 2000 for the AU Graduate

ASSUMPTION UNIVERSITY OF THAILAND ENVISIONS ITS GRADUATES AS

• healthy*(*mens sana in corpore sano) and open-minded persons, characterized by personal integrity, an independent mind and creative thinking,
• professionally competent, willing to exercise responsible leadership for economic progress in a just society
• able to communicate effectively with people from other nations and to participate in globalization.

STRATEGIES :

• Innovative student-centered teaching
• Participation in ongoing research
• Leadership training
• Professional ethics
• State-of-the art education in language and cybertechnology
• International environment
• Service activities

Bro. Martin next expressed the desire that faculties and departments should similarly coin their own mission and vision statements for incorporation in the bulletins issued by the University every year. He said this is one way of promoting our programs while at the same time impressing others about our literary standards and skills. The Chairman displayed the following mission and vision declaration of Nursing Faculty which he had scribbled the previous day and he said that this could be taken as a specimen by other faculties to produce their own statements.

Faculty of Nursing Science

Vision

Faculty of Nursing Science striving for excellence and national recognition in serving the country by producing highly qualified nurses knowledgeable in the practice of nursing profession and management, having ethical attitude and well versed in English.

Mission

1. To produce highly qualified nurses capable of meeting national and international academic standards of the nursing profession.
2. To educate nursing students to have right attitude and ethical principles in the health care services and nursing management practices.
3. To train nursing students to be well-versed in English, and capable of effectively communicating with colleagues and patients. Bro. Martin cautioned that it was possible to be carried away in writing vision and mission statements. He said some writers made such claims as "the best nursing school" or "the best college in the world" and that we must be realistic and avoid highfalutin phrases or clauses that will mislead people.

The Chairman then spoke about the position and predicament of state universities. He said that while state universities face the insurmountable problem of providing access to all aspiring students, institutions like ABAC have to orchestrate our plans so as to attract good quality students who can afford to pay the prescribed fees. He explained that ABAC is the only institution in Thailand that can right-fully flaunt a faculty roster comprising an international community of scholars with a fairly large complement of foreign students drawn from some 47 countries of the world. This enviable position often riles other institutions and many of them are now trying to snatch up international students to strengthen the base of their student body. And another sore point for our competitors is the fact that we are at the vanguard where development of information technology is concerned. We hold an undeniable lead in providing courses dealing with computer systems and Internet applications.

Bro. Martin also briefly dealt with the perfunctoriness of some Thai educators who imagined they know the essence of the 4 pillars of education propounded by UNESCO without reading the contents of the manifesto. He said he had personally found himself in situations in higher education circles where the ignorance of important principles was palpable. He explained that a case in point was when rte learning was condemned many academics drew the conclusion that the role of memory and memorisation was redundant. This is certainly a case of "reductio ad absurdum" considering what the UNESCO says : "Using the memory is a necessary antidote to being swamped by the instant information put out by the media. It would be dangerous to imagine that memory had become unnecessary because of the incredible capacity to store and circulate information now at our disposal. We must certainly be selective about what we learn by heart', but the specifically human faculty of memory by association, which cannot be reduced to a form of automatic functioning, must be carefully cultivated. All specialists agree hat the memory must be trained from childhood and that it is inappropriate to eliminate from schools certain traditional, supposedly boring, exercises."

Regarding Quality Assurance procedures the Chairman said that the Ministry of University Affairs was still undecided on the direction and substance of the policy initiatives and that they were still trying to crank up the most effective and realistic measures. He said that A.U. had set up our own committee to go onto Q.A. provisions that would be most beneficial and that Professor Adul, the chairman has already submitted the report and implementation would start soon enough to ensure that our standards are both viable and acceptable

The Chairman reported to the meeting that the Minister of Education of the Peoples Republic of China, who is on an official visit to Thailand, would visit the A.U. campus on 8/10/99 accompanied by M.U.A. officials. He said that it would be a historic visit and that probably, it was prompted by the presence of international students (including a good sprinkling of Chinese pupils) and that the distinguished minister would be welcomed and feted as befits such high ranking visitors.

The meeting concluded at 15.30 hrs with a vote of thanks from the Chair.