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Address by the chief guest, Dr. Tara de Mel, Secretary, Ministry of Education at the convocation of the Sri Lanka Institute of Marketing, 2004 held on October 6

Dr. Tara de Mel

As I speak today to this group of young men and women who will seek their destinies in the employment market, nearly 250,000 18 year olds who sat the GCE Advanced Level Examinations in April 2004, are anxiously waiting to know what the future holds for them.

In August this year, when the results of the GCE Advanced Level were released 93,353 qualified at the Advanced Level with adequate marks to gain admission to the State Universities of this country. But sadly, only about 14,000 of that group will get placements in the 12 traditional Universities.

Therefore, the balance 79,353 will be left out of our University system. This is purely because we (i.e. the State) have deprived them of that facility. In addition, we also have more than 100,000 students who did not qualify for University entry at Advanced Level, and who leave the Senior School having such aspirations as you have today.

This brings me to a very important point which I would like to consider to be the theme of my address at this convocation.

The output of the Sri Lankan secondary school system annually, amounts to nearly 250,000 students. These students are referred to as our future. But we must never forget that they are also our present. And their expectations of us, are huge.

In a primarily state funded education system in Sri Lanka, from Grade I to University the Government's allocation for education is less than 3% of GNP.

In fact last year the allocation was just 2.6% of GNP, whereas the average for South Asia is 3.2% of GNP and countries like Thailand allocate as much as 5.4% GNP. In the case of government expenditure for 2004, Sri Lanka spent 6.8% on education, while the norm for South Asia was more than 11.2%. Countries like Thailand spend as much as 31%.

On top of this poor resource allocation we have to admit to our disappointing results in learning achievements in the primary and secondary school systems.

This points a direct finger at the weaknesses in the quality of our education. Cognitive achievements among primary school children for instance, show substantial shortfalls in mastery of basic language and numeracy skills. This is with regard to the mother tongue, let alone mastery levels in English.

Similarly, low pass rates at the GCE Ordinary Level and Advanced Level suggest poor quality at secondary schools. It is disappointing to note that more than 70% of our students failed Maths at the last December Ordinary Level Examination.

In addition, there is the general trend in primary and secondary school systems, for children to fear Maths and for teachers to shun teaching it. Such an alarming phenomenon is critical for us to take note of. This is primarily because Maths is the key to logical and analytical thinking and it should be a core area in any discipline, whether it is economics, medicine, social sciences or the humanities.

In service delivery, the poor allocation of resources, (human and physical in addition to financial) add to this burden. The paucity of good quality trained teachers who will teach with dedication and commitment are hard to come by. The ability for the State to provide welfare facilities, good quality accommodation and an attractive remuneration and reward package to teachers has not been realized.

How can we expect teachers to serve their students with passion and dedication under circumstances where the majority of teachers have to trek many miles to school under harsh and trying conditions? Often teachers serve in schools where there is no water, toilets or electricity. We must not be ashamed to admit that from among 800,000 public servants, teachers are the most poorly paid.

Our curriculum and course content are still not in keeping with world standards.

Exposure of school children, teachers and Principals to modernization and global demands, through the internet, by promoting the interest in reading and making available new and current books and journals and other methods for widely gaining competence in English and foreign languages, is much in want.

Our legacy, our rich culture and heritage will not be meaningful much longer, if we do not rapidly learn to understand the dynamic global changes around us which are growing at lightning speed.

If we take a cold and hard look at the university sector the picture is far more dismal.

We cannot deny that we are in a crisis, where parents and the public at large have lost confidence in us as managers of the university system and in the institutions themselves. There is no faith in the academic programs conducted by the universities.

Also, it is rare to have academic programs conducted without interruption today. The university teachers, the academics themselves, - talented, qualified and trained people are feeling the strain. They are feeling the strain of not being able to pursue research and advancement in knowledge and technology. Their own career development suffers.

Academics have ceased to recognize universities as being citadels of wealth in knowledge and intellectual development and research and advancement in Science and Technology. This has prompted some of our most able academics to leave our shores for greener pastures overseas.

The brain drain certainly is growing at a phenomenal pace. And unless we, at the helm of affairs arrest the problems that I have listed, the brain drain will overtake us and soon we will be left with just a handful of university teachers with us.

Student unrest has taken a very nasty turn, and student discipline is deteriorating daily. At the same time we have not put in place effectively and rapidly, welfare measures for students. In the university system where hostel accommodation intended initially for 200 students now has to mandatorily cater for sometimes more than 500 students.

The consequences are frightening. A hostel room that accommodated a maximum of 2 students in the past, now sometimes has to accommodate 4 - 6. In addition we find that cooking, other domestic chores and even clothes drying is done in these stifling and uncomfortable conditions. Often water and basic sanitary facilities are seriously in want.

On a foundation of this nature, follows rapidly dissent, disenchantment and discontent. On a foundation like this builds avenues and opportunities for groups with vested interests to take a grip of this vulnerable student community, often for destructive and damaging purposes.

Our constant rhetoric about providing a good quality education fails miserably under such circumstances. Our policies have been visionary. Our goals laudable. But we are still far away from showing visible impact of the Education Reform initiative of 1997, which was comprehensive, progressive and indeed forward thinking.

Today, continuing what we started then - (1) We have put in place a program to rapidly develop our rural schools. The Navodya Program, where at least one model school is to be developed in every Divisional Secretariat Division is one example.

(2) The Kannangara Central Schools Revival Program is another.

(3) Special programs for developing the plantation schools and the programs for school development in the North and East are in our agenda. This is just one way of promoting equal access to good quality school education.

(4) We are trying our best to maintain a healthy teacher : student ratio. In international forums we boast of a 26:1 ratio but this is a spurious statistic. We all know that in urbanized, popular schools class rooms are bursting at their seams with uncontrollable numbers. The teacher : student ratio is sometimes 50:1.

This is a tragedy for the child as well as the teacher, since no amount of activity-based, child- centred learning can occur under such circumstances although this was the proposition through the Education Reforms.

Our new policy of restricting class size to 40 this year and eventually reducing it further, once the rural school development takes effect, is aimed at addressing this situation.

(5) We are developing programs to recruit and retain good quality teachers. Our pre-service teacher education programs through the National Colleges of Education are being modernized and reorganized. Continuing Teacher Education will be made mandatory and Training Colleges belonging to the Ministry of Education which were closing down, are being re-opened, refurbished and developed to accommodate these programs.

We are aiming at making our teachers, a number close to 200,000, to teach their children with passion and purpose like our teachers did, when we went to school. This is by motivation, encouragement and monetary benefit.

Already decisions have been taken to allocate a significant allowance to those serving in very rural and disadvantaged areas. Other teacher welfare measures are also in the pipeline.

(6) The Ministry of Education has taken a decision to rapidly move towards School Based Management, where schools will be managed through School Development Committees and not by the Ministry or its officials. We are looking at Principals becoming true managers and leaders of a "Living & Learning Organization" - which is a school. Principals who are at present running their schools purely as per the dictates of the Ministry will cease.

We will encourage them to be creative, innovative and develop their own management and administrative structure in accordance with the culture and ethos of each school. We expect to reward good Principals and to encourage them to develop new ideas that will make their school and their class rooms a joy to be in.

(7) We are moving towards making our education curriculum economically relevant.

The emphasis on English and Information Technology has already started. English teacher training is being strengthened and there are new facilities created through the Peradeniya Teacher Training College which commenced work on the 1st of September this year. Teachers teaching in the English medium are being trained in batches in a qualitative manner.

The English medium initiative introduced in 2001 is presently being strengthened and developed so that by next year we can expand the number of schools involved and extend this initiative to other grades as well.

Information Technology has been introduced into the curriculum for the first time at Grade 12. The lack of personal computers and Information Technology Labs in our schools prevents us from rapidly expanding the IT curriculum initiative to all grades although we are supported extensively through the World Bank and the ADB funded projects and through our own consolidated fund.

Our aim is to institutionalize IT in the senior schools first and then in the junior and primary schools, by swiftly placing computers in as many schools as possible, and by accelerating teacher training. We also intend starting IT education as per the school syllabus, via TV.

The Ministry is placing new emphasis on Science, Technology and Maths promotion. In this context I must apprise this audience of a very important fact. Out of about 2500 schools that offer Advanced Level classes, it is only 530 schools that provide education in the Science subjects such as Chemistry, Physics, Biology and Maths.

Consequently the large majority of children who leave school enter the Arts, Commerce and Management courses in the University. Very few are able to join Science courses. Naturally the university products from our system are largely liberal Arts graduates since only a few students can enter university from the Science stream.

Until such time we are able to provide all our Advanced Level classes in 2500 schools, good quality Science laboratories, trained Science teachers and the necessary resource material, we will continue to have more and more Arts students entering our universities and thereby more and more Arts graduates leaving our universities - often unemployable.

In order to keep up with the present employment market and the demands of the private sector such as competence in IT, English, Science and Technology, serious changes are being made in the school system.

In the university system the situation is more complicated, complexed and more demanding. I remember in 1998 when the Presidential Task Force on University Education Reforms and the National Education Commission recommended to promote extensive and comprehensive review of the entire university system, we expected much to happen.

But sadly only a few of those reforms are actually happening inside the university.

We are trying to devolve power and to decentralize the admissions of universities like we are trying to do in the school system. This is to help them govern and manage themselves, to encourage them to generate their own income and be institutionally independent.

Instead of micro managing university admissions and centralizing our functioning system, we are eager to move towards diversification and independence. While emerging economics like China and India are heavily investing in higher education and going in for progressive innovations, we are still grappling with a uniform, nationalized formula.

The reform and revision of the Universities Act, had it taken place at the time we envisaged, would have enabled all this to happen without a problem.

Not only would it have created autonomous, academic institutes of standing but it would have also helped us to effectively introduce Quality Assurance for State Universities.

Higher Education Authorities in developed and developing countries certainly have Quality Assurance systems in-built to their system. In our own way we have started it small in the school system.

In national schools Quality Assurance is being done in a systematic manner for about 4 to 6 weeks now, in accordance with the criteria that we carefully developed. Similarly an attempt is being made to develop a system for international schools to which a large number of Sri Lankan children are going.

If we can rapidly introduce Quality Assurance and Benchmarking for State Universities, and also introduce accreditation of institutions outside the umbrella of the UGC, then we have achieved much.

We are extremely weary of private institutions of sub-optimal quality giving primary, secondary and tertiary education on a purely commercial basis. We encourage and support recognized institutions giving a good quality education to Sri Lankan children.

I am also very pleased to see many recognized overseas universities coming into partnerships with tertiary education institutions of Sri Lanka, thus enabling Sri Lankan students to obtain good quality degrees locally, without having to spend large sums of foreign exchange traveling overseas.

Constructive and good quality partnerships and collaboration with the corporate sector and the non government sector and with recognized, comparable international organizations is indeed a policy of the Ministry.

We have established recently through an initiative of the National Council of Economic Development (NCED) of the present administration, a special cluster for Education. This cluster is predominantly represented by a cross section of the private sector.

The NCED education cluster will be a prominent think-tank of the Ministry.

We are looking for encouraging ideas, rich with innovation and progressive forward movement for our education sector.

In fact, we are moving towards encouraging our diaspora overseas to come back and serve in our Ministry for short spells and share with us their knowledge, experience and ideas.

Mr. Chairman, the Ministry of Education which I represent is perhaps the most critical in this government.

It is critical because it is the Ministry responsible for 4.3 million school children, more than 60,000 university students, nearly 200,000 teachers, about 10,000 principals and about 10,000 school leavers studying in the National Colleges of Education or in the Institutes of Advanced Technical Education in Sri Lanka.

Naturally, the problems we face are numerous, the challenges are unimaginable. It is also the most sensitive Ministry in the eyes of the public and also politically.

Having said that, I must now say that today we are also very fortunate. Fortunate because the Education Portfolio is held by the highest in the land and it has been afforded the highest priority on the national development agenda. Consequently for the first time it receives a lot of patronage from all and very particularly, it will receive substantial recognition in budgetary allocation.

But, in the final analysis we must understand that education development is not only about employment and not only about advancement in careers. Globalization of education and advancements in Science and Technology alone can never be meaningful unless we see it in the "human angle".

"Humanizing" Education or to view Education with a human face, is also about inculcating the necessary values, understanding and tolerance and the ability to integrate with all groups of people in a disciplined manner, which is beneficial to society. We must teach our children their social obligations. Not only their rights.

We are conscious of rebalancing our views and beliefs.

We are sensitive to the fact we do not leave behind the marginalized, the vulnerable and the poor.

Education development is about looking after the nearly 70% of our population which is rural, who do not have access to basics like water and toilets, let alone a good quality school and class room. Sadly, it is this same group of young people who often get left behind in our cycles of development.

It is often they who fall through the "cracks" of our well-articulated and well-polished education policies.

We, as responsible citizens, and particularly those of us holding responsible posts, must never forget that education is a basic and fundamental right and that no child should be deprived of it.

I will conclude Mr. Chairman by citing Prof. Amatya Sen in his keynote address at the Commonwealth Education Ministers' Conference in Edinburgh last year - quoting Adam Smith he said "Human history becomes more and more a race between education and catastrophe".

He continued; "if we continue to leave vast sections of our young people outside the orbit of education, not only do we make the world less just but we also make it less secure."

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