A School Lunch Increase Policy for Pre-School Age to Prathom Sueksa Six Students in Proportion with School Size: A Case Study of the Child Development Centers in Nakhon Chai Si District, Nakhon Pathom Province

Abstract

In this thesis, the researcher examines a school lunch increase policy for pre-school age to Prathom Sueksa Six students in proportion with school size and analyzes the administration policy as well as the problems regarding the management of the child development centers in Nakhon Chai Si district, Nakhon Pathom province as they are operated according to the policy. The qualitative research approach was employed with the focus on the public policy, incremental policy formulation, policy implementation according to organizational competency, and a management model. This resulted in the understanding of the operational problems caused by the policy according to the eight factors determining success or failure research by Supachai Yawapraphat (2014, pp 101). The research data were collected through structured interviews from a purposive sample. The findings showed that the child development centers in Nakhon Chai Si district, Nakhon Pathom province were competent in three areas: organizational structure, budgeting, and locations. However, the findings also showed that the child development centers experience failure in the following manner: 1) in regard to the policy, an efficiency problem was accounted from requests to improve the allocation rate; 2) in regard to technical feasibility or relating theory to practice, technical problems occurred while using the Thai School Lunch program; 3) in regard to resources, there was a lack of personnel who were efficient at operating the Thai School Lunch program. These issues demand policy adjustment by improving the allocation rate and appointing personnel efficient in operating Thai School Lunch program.