Lankan students theoretically inclined

The following note was sent to our feature writer Chandani Jayathilake by Japanese Ambassador Akio Suda. We reproduce it on account of its national importance.

I read your article in the Daily News of Friday September 23, 2005 with great interest and wish to congratulate you on your thought-provoking and enlightening article entitled 'Sri Lanka - where only white collar jobs are 'good' jobs'.

The more such thinking as your article introduced are discussed in this country, the brighter prospects we can have for the future of social and economic development in Sri Lanka.

Your article reminded me of the experience of a Japanese professor of industrial pottery, who came to Sri Lanka a few years ago, to teach production of ceramics and pottery at an artifact school of a university in Sri Lanka. The students appreciated the lectures very much, but to the surprise and dismay of the Japanese professor the students refused to touch the clay when it came to the practicals.

They seemed to be of the view that touching clay (or 'mud' as they would call it) was below their social status. But with endurable persuasion by the Japanese professor the students began to practice moulding of pottery enjoying their new skills and eventually came up with a high level of artistic pottery works.

The professor told me that Sri Lankan students have great potential of skills and aesthetic sense to produce artifacts of high quality but have been receiving wrong education on the subject which puts value only on theoretical and historical studies and not much on practical learning.