Abstract:
This thesis aims to study King Rama VIs thoughts on the educational enhancement of the youths gentlemanliness. The findings of this study indicate that the Kings thoughts were meant to bring up the students to be qualified youths, to love the nation, the religion and the king, to be unified, to be humanistic, to have discipline, honesty, responsibility, sportsmanship, perservance, hospitality, unselfishness, courage, gratefulness, etc. Therefore, His Majesty the King had established four schools under the royal patronage, namely the Royal Pages College which aimed to turn out graduates who would become civil servants, royal servants, or the Courts royal pages; the Kings College School aimed to instill its students with the knowledge of foreign languages, especially English, including familiarizing the students with western culture which was the foundation for studying abroad and for working in various ministries. The Phran Lung School was founded to foster drama and music and to provide the education of ordinary subjects to the civil servants of the Royal Entertainment Department together with the learning of drama courses and the training of Thai dramatic skills, and the Chiang Mai Royal Pages College was the second branch of the Royal Page College in Bangkok, Actually those four schools upheld a common purpose: they built up the youth to be gentlemen through the educational administration and the training techniques according to the Kings thoughts, that is, the pattern of the school was similar to that of an English public school and integrated it with the Thai style of training the youth. In this way, the youth would be educated in various academic subjects, would be religious and would have behavioral principles. The youth would be young gentlemen, i.e., would have a good personality and a good character. The educational administration according to the royal thoughts resulted in the product of qualified men equipped with gentlemanliness as desired by the King. These graduates could earn their living in different professions profitable for their society and their country.