Letter From Alumni

Alumni in Thailand

Pokpong Songmuang Lecturer at Department of Computer Science, Faculty of Science and Technology, Thammasat University (TU), Pathumthani, Thailand

I studied for my doctorate at the Graduate School of Information Systems under the supervision of Professor Maomi Ueno and received the degree in 2010. My research at UEC was supported by a Japanese government scholarship.

I studied information systems and the design and development of e-Testing systems. I designed and developed several systems for supporting automated test construction, collaborative test construction, response data analysis, and so on in order to improve the quality of large-scale high stake tests. I proposed system generating test form that consist of different item sets but have equivalent quality (average score, standard error, test information and so on). Two papers from this research were accepted by the leading journal, IEEE Transactions on Learning Technology, Computer Science Society and another two papers were accepted by IEICE Transaction on Information Systems.

I also presented the results of my research at many conferences in Japan and abroad such as the highly acclaimed conferences AAAI, EDM 2010, USA (photograph). Since I came from a small country and had no experience of travelling abroad, I learnt a lot from attending conferences to present my research and made many new friends. All of my travels to present my research were supported by UEC and my supervisor's research grants. I really appreciate all the support and I hope that all students at UEC will have similar opportunities. At that time, several organizations were interested in the e-Testing systems including the Information-technology Promotion Agency (IPA at Ministry of economy, trade, and industry in Japan) and they planed to transfer tests from paper-based to computer-based formats. Therefore, when I was a third year student in the doctoral course, the Ueno laboratory was asked by IPA to develop a prototype of the e-Testing system. I had a hard time with this project while continuing my dissertation but it was a valuable experience for me. In the following year, IPA opened a large test center and the e-Testing system of IPA (Jouhoushori gijyutsusha shiken in Japanese) was established based on our prototype system. This made me proud of my research since my supervisor and UEC not only taught me to do research but also to contribute to the betterment of society. Moreover, this project opened me up to a new world to work in Japan as a researcher.

After I graduated, I worked at a research institute for educational measurement for one year. I had a good time at the institute and learned a lot about Japanese industry and business culture. Before I went back to my home country, I had an opportunity to work at Waseda University as an assistant professor for several years. All the wonderful opportunities of my working life are a result of my research at UEC and excellent advice from my supervisor. I really appreciate my supervisor's support and UEC's efforts in providing a wonderful environment for a foreign student like me.

Recently, I became a lecture at Thammasat University (TU) and want to form a closer relationship between TU and UEC by visiting UEC every year with my colleagues and continuing the process of proposing a Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) between TU and UEC. I hope in near the future, UEC and TU will conduct collaborative activities such as workshop, exchange student program, research, and so on.