17.2.5 Collaboration with NGOs for SDGs

Partnering with Civil Society for Quality Education and Social Impact: SWU's Collaboration with NGOs for the SDGs

In 2025, Srinakharinwirot University (SWU) continued to work with
non-governmental organisations (NGOs) and civil society organisations to advance the Sustainable Development Goals. SWU works with NGOs in three ways: student volunteering programmes, research programmes and the development of educational resources. In each partnership, SWU brings its academic expertise, students and staff, while the NGO partner brings funding, networks and knowledge of the communities it serves. In 2025, SWU's work with NGOs covered all three areas:

• Development of educational resources with the Suthirat Yoovidhya Foundation, to raise the quality of teaching and learning in a small rural school and create a model for other small schools (SDG 4).

• A research programme on social value and impact measurement with Social Value Thailand, to build SWU's capacity to measure the social return of its research and community work, and to jointly evaluate the social impact of projects across the university, in line with SWU's mission of being committed to creating a sustainable society (SDG 17 and related SDGs).

• A student volunteering programme, the 26th Phet Asa Community Development Camp, in which more than two hundred SWU students improved sanitation and learning environments at two under-resourced rural schools, working with a government agency, the Internal Security Operations Command (ISOC), and with local public and private schools (SDG 4, 6).

• A student volunteering programme with the Sikkha Asia Foundation, in which Thai and Japanese students ran a campus food market and raised scholarship funds for students, with the Foundation taking part from planning to follow-up and the partnership set to continue in 2027 (SDG 4, 17).

• A research programme on climate justice in urban communities with the Siam Society under Royal Patronage and Thai Climate Justice for All, in which SWU and its partners collected data on climate impacts and adaptation in the Asok area, and extended this learning to SWU students (SDG 11, 13, 17).

1. Development of educational resources: SWU and the Suthirat Yoovidhya Foundation for small schools

SWU's Innovative Learning Center team with teachers at Wat Khao Yisan (Pramuk Wetkit) School (top), and a learning activity with students (bottom).

From June 2024 to July 2025, SWU's Innovative Learning Center (ILC) worked with the Suthirat Yoovidhya Foundation on the “Education System Development Project to Raise Academic Quality and Serve as a Model for Small Schools.” The project was carried out at Wat Khao Yisan (Pramuk Wetkit) School, Yisan Subdistrict, Amphawa District, Samut Songkhram Province, and was led by Dr. Jitsupa Kitipadung and Dr. Ronnayut Euatriratana.

The partnership is a clear example of SWU collaborating with an NGO to tackle the SDGs through the development of educational resources. Its goals were to improve teaching and learning, build teachers' capacity, strengthen students' academic skills, and develop teaching approaches that other small schools can adapt to their own settings.

SWU ran workshops and learning activities that gave teachers practical resources they could use in class: teaching techniques, methods for measurement and assessment, and techniques for preparing students for national tests. The project also focused on English for teachers and students. Activities created a lively learning environment, helped teachers feel more confident using English, and showed them how to bring English into the subjects they teach. Together, these resources widened the range of materials, methods and learning experiences available to students.

SWU did not stop at training. It also followed up on how the resources were used in practice. On 4 April 2025, the ILC team visited the school to meet the teaching staff and interview teachers and students about the results of the project. The follow-up showed that trained teachers were using the new teaching techniques and test-preparation approaches more often in their lessons. Students said they took a more active part in class, enjoyed learning more, and felt more motivated to improve their own results.

The partnership contributes to SDG 4 (Quality Education) by building teachers' capacity, developing learning resources and teaching approaches, enriching students' learning experience, and raising the quality of education in a small-school setting. The approach is documented so that it can serve as a model for other small schools.– view source

2. Research programme: SWU and Social Value Thailand on social value and SROI for the SDGs

SWU's Social Service Office meeting with Social Value Thailand and Social Value Accelerator (SVA) to plan the “University for Social Value” partnership, 8 December 2025.

On 8 December 2025, SWU met with Social Value Thailand (the Thai Social Value Assessment Association), a professional non-profit association, together with Social Value Accelerator (SVA), to plan a partnership that will help SWU become a “University for Social Value.” The meeting laid the foundation for the SWU SVA Partnership Program 2026.

This partnership is a research programme on measuring social value. It builds SWU's capacity to assess social outcomes and social value, and to apply Social Return on Investment (SROI) analysis, so that the University can measure the impact of its research, academic services and community work in a systematic, evidence-based way. Robust impact measurement shows which interventions actually move SDG outcomes, and it allows SWU and its partners to direct resources to the work that delivers the most value for communities.

Beyond building capacity, SWU and Social Value Thailand work together as research partners. Under the partnership, they jointly evaluate research projects carried out by SWU researchers and academic staff, using social value and SROI methods to assess how far each project has changed outcomes for communities and society, and how much it contributes to the SDGs. Each evaluation identifies the stakeholders affected by a project, maps the changes they experience and places a value on those changes, so that evidence of impact comes from the people the research is meant to serve rather than from counts of outputs alone. The results show SWU which research delivers the greatest social return and guide how the University designs, supports and scales its research for the SDGs.

The partnership also goes beyond single research projects. SWU and Social Value Thailand jointly evaluate a range of projects run by the University's faculties and units, including community development, academic service, student volunteering and research projects, using one shared social value framework. Looking at these projects together lets SWU show, with evidence, that its work makes a real difference to society, instead of reporting each project on its own. This joint evaluation follows SWU's mission of being committed to creating a sustainable society. It gives SWU a way to check whether its projects deliver on that promise, and to learn which kinds of work create the most value for communities.

The 2025 discussions also began the SWU Impact Roadmap 2026–2027, which has three strands:

• Social Engagement – widening the impact of SWU's academic services and work with communities;

• Research Utilization – encouraging the use of research to create economic, social and environmental value;

• University Stewardship – bringing ESG and SDG principles into the University's management and impact reporting.

The partnership also lays the groundwork for building staff skills in Social Value and SROI, impact assessment, and a university-wide impact data system. This will make SWU's reporting of social outcomes transparent, verifiable and aligned with international Social Value standards. In 2025, the partnership set up the collaboration, the assessment framework and the approach to measuring SDG-related impact; the training, the SWU SROI Hub and the Impact Project Sandbox are planned for 2026–2027.

The partnership directly supports SDG 17 (Partnerships for the Goals) and creates a mechanism that will help SWU assess the impact of its research, academic services and community work across the SDGs. – view source

3. Student volunteering programme: the 26th Phet Asa Community Development Camp

In academic year 2025, SWU's Faculty of Education ran the 26th Phet Asa Community Development Camp, a student volunteering programme that the Faculty has run for more than two decades. 212 student volunteers took part. They were third-year students and volunteers from the Phet Nai Tom project, and they worked at two under-resourced rural schools:

• Ban Nam Mong Bang Sa School, Pha To Subdistrict, Tha Wang Pha District, Nan Province; and

• Ban Non Ka Long Noi School, Ban Mae Subdistrict, Buntharik District, Ubon Ratchathani Province.

The 26th camp divided the students into two teams, one in the North (Nan) and one in the Northeast (Ubon Ratchathani), so that every student had a full and active role. The camp was also run as a partnership across sectors. The Internal Security Operations Command (ISOC), a government agency, and local social enterprises worked with the camp team to coordinate with local authorities, NGOs, and communities and supported the volunteers in the field. Local public and private schools in both areas also took part: they joined the host schools in planning the work, shared local knowledge and resources, and took part in activities with the SWU students. By bringing together a university, a government agency and local public and private schools around the same schools, the camp achieved more than any one partner could alone, and made the improvements part of a wider local effort to support children's learning.

Publicity Posters for the 26th Phet Asa Community Development Camp: the North team in Nan (top) and the Northeast team in Ubon Ratchathani (bottom). 

The students built toilets for the schools, improved the school grounds and surroundings, and worked side by side with teachers and local people on hands-on construction. Through the camp, they built relationships with the communities, learned to work as a team, and gained first-hand experience of the challenges faced by schools in remote areas. For future teachers, this experience links their professional training to service in the communities they will one day serve.

SWU students building a new toilet block and improving the school grounds (top), and a gathering with pupils, teachers and local guests at a host school (bottom), 26th Phet Asa Community Development Camp.

The camp gives children in these schools safer, cleaner facilities and a better place to learn. It contributes to SDG 4 (Quality Education), especially target 4.a on safe and inclusive learning environments, SDG 6 (Clean Water and Sanitation), especially target 6.2 on access to adequate sanitation, and SDG 17 (Partnerships for the Goals). – view source

4. Student volunteering programme: Thai and Japanese students with the Sikkha Asia Foundation raising scholarship funds

Thai and Japanese students running their food booths at the SWU market, 14 and 18 August 2025.

In August 2025, 24 students took part in a volunteer food-market project carried out with the Sikkha Asia Foundation, a non-governmental organisation that works to widen educational opportunity and improve the quality of life of children, young people and disadvantaged groups. The volunteers were 8 Thai students majoring in Japanese and 16 Japanese students. Working in two mixed teams, they developed and tested their own dishes, designed the menus, set the prices and ran food booths at the SWU market on 14 and 18 August 2025. Team A sold ice-cream floats, soft drinks and French fries; Team B sold takoyaki.

The two teams raised 20,745 baht in total (Team A 10,355 baht; Team B 10,390 baht). After the teams closed their accounts, the proceeds were divided into two equal shares of 10,373 baht each as support funds. On 21 August 2025, a handover ceremony presented the funds to SWU's Faculty of Humanities as scholarship support for students.

The project is a clear example of SWU collaborating with an NGO to tackle the SDGs through student volunteering. The Sikkha Asia Foundation contributed resource support and volunteer engagement, while SWU provided the students, the venue and the academic setting. For the students, the project combined communication in Japanese and English with teamwork, decision-making and problem-solving in a real business setting. Students reported that they used Japanese and English more often and learned how to plan, price and sell food from direct experience. The project also built friendships across language and cultural boundaries, and turned the students' work into scholarship resources for their peers.

The Sikkha Asia Foundation's role in the project has grown over time. The food market is part of the Samurai Curry Project, a long-running partnership between SWU's Faculty of Humanities, Spice Up (Thailand) Co., Ltd., students from universities in Japan, and the Foundation. In the 2025 round, the eighth since the project began, the Foundation was involved from planning to follow-up. It helped shape the project around a social purpose, encouraged and supported the student volunteers, drew on its experience of working with children and disadvantaged young people to help students understand how their work would be used, and took part in directing the proceeds toward educational support. The partners already plan to run the project again in March 2027, which shows that the partnership with the Foundation is ongoing rather than a one-off event.

The partnership contributes to SDG 4 (Quality Education), by raising scholarship funds that support students' access to education, and to SDG 17 (Partnerships for the Goals), by bringing together a university, an NGO, a private company and students from two countries around a shared social purpose. view source

Table 1. Food sales by team, SWU market, August 2025 (Thai baht)

Team	Products and prices	Day 1 14 Aug	Day 2 18 Aug	Total
Team A	Ice-cream float – 50 Soft drink – 30 French fries – 30	4,400	5,955	10,355
Team B	Takoyaki – 30 (4 pcs) / 40 (6 pcs)	4,130	6,260	10,390
Total		8,530	12,215	20,745

Proceeds of 20,745 baht were divided into two equal shares as scholarship support.

5. Research programme: SWU, the Siam Society and Thai Climate Justice for All on climate justice in urban communities

On 15 February 2025, SWU joined the first walking survey of the project "Climate Justice in the Cultural Dimension of Urban Communities", led by the Siam Society under Royal Patronage, an NGO, together with Thai Climate Justice for All (TCJA), Thai PBS and Hear and Found. The partners collected information on urban communities, climate impacts and adaptation along two routes in the Asok area. The project aims to build community knowledge on coping with climate change and to extend this learning to SWU students. It contributes to SDG 11 (Sustainable Cities and Communities) and SDG 13 (Climate Action).

The Siam Society under Royal Patronage is a non-governmental, non-profit organisation, and Thai Climate Justice for All (TCJA) is a civil-society climate justice network. Thai PBS, a public broadcaster, and Hear and Found were also project partners, and the Local Development Institute joined the walk. The two survey routes were Soi Nana, the Makkasan railway housing and the Nana and Asok piers; and Sukhumvit Soi 21 (Asok Montri) to Soi SWU (Sukhumvit 23).

Climate justice research walk with NGO partners at a canal-side community in the Asok area, 15 February 2025.

Source: Social Service Office, Office of the President, Srinakharinwirot University

NGO partners, SWU and participants on the climate justice research walk in the Asok area, 15 February 2025.

Source: Social Service Office, Office of the President, Srinakharinwirot University

Discussion with community members about climate impacts on urban life, 15 February 2025.

Source: Social Service Office, Office of the President, Srinakharinwirot University

The project is an example of SWU collaborating with NGOs to tackle the SDGs through a research programme. The Siam Society and TCJA led the project and brought their networks and experience of working with urban communities, while SWU took part as a university partner based in the Asok area and links what was learned to its students. Together, the partners gathered first-hand information on how climate change affects urban communities and how these communities adapt, and the project aims to pass this knowledge on to community members and young people. The partnership contributes to SDG 11 (Sustainable Cities and Communities), SDG 13 (Climate Action) and SDG 17 (Partnerships for the Goals).

Conclusion

Together, these partnerships demonstrate SWU's holistic approach to sustainable development. By integrating student volunteering, research and the development of educational resources through strong partnerships with NGOs, SWU brings its academic expertise to work alongside civil society, builds capacity, follows up on results, and develops evidence-based ways to measure impact. This reflects SWU's ongoing commitment to collaborate with NGOs to tackle the SDGs, locally and beyond. In 2025, SWU also worked with the Siam Society under Royal Patronage and Thai Climate Justice for All on research into climate impacts and adaptation in urban communities in the Asok area, which extends its NGO partnerships to climate action. Beyond NGOs, these partnerships also bring in a government agency, local public and private schools and a private company, and their results are evaluated together for social impact, in line with SWU's mission of being committed to creating a sustainable society.