The Udonthani branch of the A.U.A. Language Center opened in 1991 on the campus of the Udonthani Teachers’ College (now the Rajabhat University, Udonthani). This situation came about because before this ime, the American Consulate in Udonthani had received many request from local businesses and the populace about the possibility of an A.U.A. branch being established in the city. This information was relayed to the A.U.A. office in Bangkok and after a series of meetings between A.U.A. Head office personnel and the President of the Udonthani Teacher’s College during 1990, the third floor of Building Number 7 on the U.T.C. campus was allocated for A.U.A.’s use. The area on the third floor consisted of two rooms, each approximately 10 feet by 40 feet, which had previously been used as storage space.
The staff at A.U.A. Udonthani when it opened consisted of two teachers- Mr.Jim Mose, who was also the manager, and Mr. John Pough. Classes were conducted in the evenings and on the weekends. The evening schedule consisted of one-hour lessons from 5 to 6 PM, 6 to 7 PM, and 7 to 8 PM. The weekend classes ran for 2 hours thus: 8 to 10 AM, 10-12 AM, 1 to 3 PM, and 3 to 5 PM.
A good working relationship between A.U.A. Udonthani and the staff of U.T.C. was established early on, each assisting and helping the other when requested or needed and participating in each other’s school functions. This continued for more than seven years, after which A.U.A. Udonthani relocated to it’s present ste at the former U.S. Consulate Building on the shores of Nong Prajak in the north-west part of the city. This move was overseen by A.U.A.’s second manager, Mr. Gary McGowan.
Gary took over as manager of te branch in 1992 and continued to develop A.U.A.’s reputation in the region as a quality provider of English tuition. The move to the old Consulate Building in September 1997, Provided further scope for the expansion of the branch’s activities, as it had four rooms available to be used as classrooms. The weekday eveing and weekend schedules were maintained with some minor adjustments-weekday classes were now run from Monday through Thursday I two tim aslots, 5 to 6:15 PM and 7 to 8:15 PM.- and the branch was closed on Fridays.
The next major change to occur at A.U.A. Udonthani was the installation of a new management team at the start of 2001. Mr. Alastair Downie relocated from his previous position as manager of the A.U.A. branch at Bangsaen to become te A.U.A. Udonthani manager, and Associate Professor Dr. Jaruk Pechjarus, a former President of Rajabhat Udonthani Institute, became the Headmaster of A.U.A. Udonthani. Together, Ajaan Jaruk and Alastair saw some changes to the operation of the branch . New staff were hired and a computerized student database was implemented in early 2001, and building and renovation work was completed to upgrade the facilities and install an additional classroom, bringing the total to five. The class timetable was revamped to enable three evening weekday periods and three weekend periods, for a total of 30 hours class time in a term for both programs.
July, 2001 ushered in a significant milestone for A.U.A. Udonthani when, on the twenty fifth, local dignitaries, citizens, and students along with A.U.A. personnel from Bangkok gathered at the branch to witness it’s official opening by the President of the American University Alumni Associaton, Mr. Korn Dabbarangsi. This event became possible after the branch was granted a license to operate as a school by the Udonthani Eduction Office on 20 June, 2001.
In December 2005 Alastair Downie left AUA to take his family to live in Australia, leaving way for the new Manager, Mr. Nicholas Dunning to take over in February 2006. Nicholas was the Lead Teacher at AUA Hua Mark, Bangkok and had been with AUA for 4 years.
2006 saw a lot of changes at AUA Udonthani under the new management. An aggressive marketing campaign was instigated which involved advertising on the local radio, magazine, around town and on samlors. Also leafleting was done at all the local high schools and universities. The result was a significant increase in student numbers with Term 4 and 5 getting a record 350 students per term – an all time high for Udonthani.
In 2006 the Thai Language program was introduced to AUA Udonthani by the new manager. This has been very successful with classes opening every term. We now have 4 levels of Thai with Beginners, Intermediate, Advanced and Writing. Other courses which have been started include a beginners English conversation course and a three week accelerated course. Both have been very popular with students and teachers alike. AUA Udothani also sent teachers to teach the Education Department Administrators in a 10 week course of English at Udonthnai and Nong Khai.
Also in 2006 significant renovations were made to the branch. This included a new teachers’room, manager’s office, headmaster’s office, recetion/office building, storeroom, two toilet blocks and a new classroom. AUA Udonthani now has 6 classrooms in total. All 6 rooms were used for the first time in 2007 during the Summer School.
2007 saw the rise in tuition from 1600 Baht to 1800 Baht for weekday, and from 1700 baht to 2000 Baht for the weekend. This affected student numbers somewhat However, AUA Udonthani had a very successful summer program with over 200 students studying in summer 1, and 150 in summer 2.
The branch has maintained a regular time schedule throughout with weekday classes at 5.00 – 6.15 and 6.25 – 7.40, Tuesday to Friday, and weekend classes at 9.00 – 11.30, 12.15 – 2.45 and 3.00 – 5.30, Saturday and Sunday. There is also an afternoon slot from 1.00 – 3.30 for daytime English conversation.
AUA Udonthani has also been involved in several sponsorship programs and events in the last year and a half. One of our students entered into Miss Roy Kratong 2006 and came third, sponsored by AUA. She also enetered into a major beauty contest- ‘Miss Udon Thani’ and came in the top ten. AUA Udonthani also sponsors the Udonthani Royal Tourist Police’ who study at AUA. Finally, during Songkran festival 2007 AUA Udonthani sponsored the aerobic dance group. All these have been good publicity for AUA Language Center.
The future is looking very excitin for AUA Udonthani. We plan to promote AUA via predsentations to the local shcools and colleges etc. We also plan to develop one of our classrooms into a student ‘multi-room’ with a book corner, movies for borrowing and possibly student computers. Finally, one day it would be nice to have a conference room built on the land. This would enable us to have large placement tests, seminars and would be used for large classes.
