Abstract

The aim of this study is to explore the educational disparity of poor people living on the railway in the main cities within the northeast region of Thailand by using the in-depth interview method of five formal educational officers and forty key informants. The results show that formal education of the urban poor, who live in the railroad slum areas, graduated in the lower level of compulsory education. First, the demographic factors of these people are marked by being a part of a poorer family, have many siblings and divorced parents, illness affecting family members, and parents themselves with little education. Second, there is low access to educational opportunities, capital assets, and occupational inequality. Third, the rights of access to education, based their families, ignore the resignation to promote children access to formal education. Fourth, while education policy calls for free basic access to public school, parents still have to pay more than those policies state. Lastly, the value of choosing a popular school results in inequality of opportunity to manage the development of the quality of schools of different sizes.