Schools & universities in Chumphon.

A full K-12 international school inside the provincial capital, at 13/4 Bang Luek subdistrict, Mueang Chumphon, on 088 632 7181. It describes itself as a fully accredited international Christian school and teaches an English-immersion programme end to end: a play-based kindergarten combining an American curriculum with Finnish-inspired early-years practice, a primary school (G.1–5) built on reading, writing, Singapore Mathematics, coding and robotics, and a secondary school (G.6–12) running AP courses, SAT and PSAT preparation, IELTS preparation, portfolio development and university counselling, alongside Thai and Chinese language programmes. Its published Class of 2026 outcome is 100% university placement, with offers from the international programmes at Chulalongkorn, Mahidol, Thammasat and Kasetsart, and enrolments taken up at Chulalongkorn's Politics and Global Studies double degree and the Thammasat School of Engineering.

An American-curriculum international school on the edge of the provincial town, which the school places about six kilometres from the centre and a kilometre off the national highway, near the Tesco Lotus, Big C, Makro and HomePro cluster and roughly fifteen kilometres from both Thung Wua Laen and Hat Sai Ri. English is the medium of instruction in the core subjects, taught by American or native-English-speaking staff, with Thai and Chinese taught alongside it on an explicitly trilingual model. It publishes early-childhood, elementary and high-school divisions, Cambridge provision, SAT and ACT preparation, an after-school programme and boarding. It also holds a memorandum of understanding and academic cooperation agreement with KMITL's Prince of Chumphon Campus and with Chengdu University. The school's own account of its founding is worth knowing: it was started because a Chumphon mother had to send her first child to a private school in Surat Thani.

The provincial flagship, at 149 Phisit Phayaban Road, Tambon Tha Taphao, Mueang Chumphon 86000 — school ID 1086110284, an extra-large state secondary under the Secondary Educational Service Area Office for Surat Thani and Chumphon. It is the answer to the question most foreign parents actually ask, because alongside its ordinary matthayom intake it runs four selective special-classroom streams: SMTE (science, mathematics, technology and environment), SMT (a computer-gifted science and mathematics room), IEP — its English-excellence programme — and EIS, which teaches science, mathematics and English together. Both English-medium streams are live rather than historical: the school published its M.1 special-classroom selection results for the 2569 (2026) intake and runs a dedicated online admissions system for that year. Sriyaphai 2, a separate school at Moo 3, Ban Hu Ro, Tambon Na Cha-ang in the same district, serves the town's northern edge.

The school this guide left out until September 2026, and on the specific question foreign parents ask it is the stronger of the two. Sa-at Phadoem Wittaya is at 196 Phisit Phayaban Road, Tambon Tha Taphao, Mueang Chumphon 86000, on 077 511014 — the same street as Sriyaphai. It was founded in 1924 by Phraya Phiphit Amphon Wimon Phakdi (Phaderm Angsusingha), then governor of Chumphon, as a memorial to his wife Khunying Sa-at Angsusingha, and received its name by royal grant; it was the province's girls' school from 1932, admitted boys to upper secondary in 1973 and only became fully co-educational at lower secondary in 1997. What matters now is the English provision, because it is not a special room bolted onto a Thai timetable but a full English Programme — the Ministry of Education curriculum taught in English — approved at M.1 in 2001 and extended to upper secondary in 2015. The school's own published structure for the 2568 (2025) intake is six EP classrooms across M.1–3 and three across M.4–6, six EIS rooms teaching science, mathematics and computing in English at lower secondary, SMTE and ESC science rooms, and three English–Chinese and three English–Japanese/Korean rooms at upper secondary, inside 66 classrooms in total. It is also Ramkhamhaeng University's regional examination centre for the province.

The province's own vocational education office lists seven institutions, and they map onto the local economy precisely. Chumphon Technical College at 138 Moo 8, Tambon Na Cha-ang, Mueang, which publishes its own switchboard as 077 510643 and 077 510644. Chumphon Vocational College at 146 Phisit Phayaban Road, Tambon Tha Taphao, Mueang (077 511234). Chumphon College of Agriculture and Technology at 1 Moo 8, Tambon Tako, Thung Tako district. Chumphon Khet Udomsakdi Fisheries College at 15 Moo 4, Tambon Pak Tako, Thung Tako — part of the Southern Agricultural Vocational Institute, and it teaches to bachelor's level as well as the two vocational certificates. Chumphon Industrial and Community Education College at 58 Chumphon–Ranong Road, Tambon Wang Phai, Mueang. Lang Suan Industrial and Community Education College at 1 Moo 10, Tambon Laem Sai, Lang Suan. And Tha Sae Industrial and Community Education College at 245/1 Moo 4, Tambon Hong Charoen, Tha Sae. These are Thai-language institutions, but the fisheries and agriculture colleges are a real part of why the coast and the durian country have skilled labour. One correction to what this page said before September 2026: the fisheries college is not the only one here that goes beyond the two vocational certificates. Chumphon Technical College is a member of the Institute of Vocational Education, Southern Region 1 — eleven colleges across Chumphon, Surat Thani, Nakhon Si Thammarat and Phatthalung, with its headquarters outside this province, at Nakhon Si Thammarat Technical College on Ratchadamnoen Road. The institute's published course list gives Chumphon Technical College exactly one degree subject, a Bachelor of Technology (ทล.บ.) in Automotive Technology, and the college's own course page confirms it teaches at ปวช., ปวส. and bachelor's level, with eight ปวช. and nine ปวส. programmes below the degree. It is the only Chumphon college in that institute, so the degree route here is one subject in one town rather than a general option.

King Mongkut's Institute of Technology Ladkrabang's second campus, at 17/1 Moo 6, Chum Kho subdistrict, Pathio. KMITL identified the Chumkho national forest land as its provincial expansion site in the early 1980s; the Ministry of Agriculture and Cooperatives granted the land in 1985, the first students were admitted in 1996 to a continuing bachelor's programme in technology management for plant production, and Princess Maha Chakri Sirindhorn formally opened the campus on 28 March 1998. It was renamed the Prince of Chumphon Campus in 2013. Its focus is engineering, agricultural technology and sustainable development, and it sits alongside the airport and the province's main beaches.

The province's second university campus, and the one almost every guide to Chumphon leaves out. Maejo's Chumphon campus sits in Lamae, in the far south of the province, and teaches full bachelor's degrees rather than extension courses: business administration and entrepreneurship, coastal aquaculture innovation, plant science, plant production technology, tourism and hospitality, and a political science degree in local politics and government. Most of those curricula were revised in 2566–2567 (2023–24). Its practical significance for a resident is geographic — it means the southern half of the province, which is otherwise the part people are warned about for distance, has a degree-awarding institution of its own.

Two national institutions that reach most provinces of this size have no campus here, and naming the absence is more useful than a reassurance. Ramkhamhaeng University, Thailand's main open university, publishes 23 regional campuses and Chumphon is not among them — the nearest in the south are Nakhon Si Thammarat, Trang, Songkhla and Phang Nga. The practical half of that answer is better than the headline, though: Chumphon is one of Ramkhamhaeng's 41 regional examination centres, centre 25, hosted at Sa-at Phadoem Wittaya School on 077 511014. A distance-learning student living here sits finals in the province rather than travelling out of it, which is not true of every province without a campus — our Tak guide describes the opposite case. Mahachulalongkornrajavidyalaya University, the larger of Thailand's two Buddhist universities, likewise lists neither a Buddhist college nor an academic service unit in Chumphon among its published units; the nearest is the Surat Thani Buddhist College. Neither gap changes daily life for a family with school-age children, but both change the answer for an adult planning to study part-time from here.

Below the flagship sits the standard Thai state structure — anuban, prathom and matthayom — across all eight districts, strongest in the two town municipalities of Chumphon and Lang Suan, with instruction in Thai. Foreign children can enrol and fees are low. For a family committed to the province but not to a full international fee, the realistic middle path is a Thai school with an English-medium stream — and in Chumphon that is two named schools on one road rather than a general possibility: Sriyaphai's IEP and EIS rooms at number 149, and Sa-at Phadoem Wittaya's full English Programme and EIS rooms at number 196. Availability and entry testing change year to year, so confirm with each school directly.