Reintroducing English Medium

EDUCATION: Having spent the first quarter of the year, in this column of reminiscences, on my own house and family, I thought I should move for a while to something more public.

I hope that the more limited area also has some wider implications, but since these may not be obvious, I will concentrate for a few weeks on a subject that should necessarily be of interest to everyone.

I refer to education, which I was asked to cover recently for a CIMA meeting at which the Government’s development plan was discussed. In studying that, in relation to both the Mahinda Chintanaya, and the structural changes that have taken place over the last few decades, though we had moved to a different economic system in 1977, we had not really changed our education system accordingly.

Indeed, during that period we have not had any significant educational reform, on the lines of those instituted by Kannangara when he realised the importance of high quality education in the modern world, or by Premadasa Udagama when he tried to introduce a broader concept of education than the academic concentration that had seemed sufficient for a society that did not understand the implications of Kannangara’s move towards greater equity.

There seemed general agreement at the meeting, from most of the other presenters too, that we have failed, not just with regard to equity, which may have been less important to them, but also with regard to providing not just the skills but even the knowledge is necessary for the modern world.

My own view is that, given the speed at which the world is developing, and the new knowledge and skills are necessary to keep up with it, we cannot succeed unless we broaden our working capacity in English.

That of course was clear to most members of the audience, and they have certainly made sure that their children have that capacity. But because they have been forced to seek this largely outside the national education system, that system has been left to those who do not appreciate the needs of a changing world.

English education

That explains why, despite much lip service, English education has continued to deteriorate over the years. I am not sure whether any remedy will work now, but certainly to go on and on in improving English as a second language makes no sense, given that so many initiatives in this regard have failed miserably, on the contrary, the only hope is to reintroduce the English medium, and make it accessible to students all over the country, not only in the towns.

The only important reform of the last few decades has been the reintroduction of English medium nationally. That is why I propose to devote a few columns to this. I may however be prejudiced, since I can claim - which will allow me to describe the process with greater knowledge than anyone else - that it happened entirely because of me.

Or, rather, I should say largely, because it also required tremendous political will and determination, and these were provided by Tara de Mel, who was Secretary to the Ministry of Education at the time.

She had long been mulling what was clearly an essential step, given the proliferation of private English medium schools all over the country, which made clear that parents at any rate wanted this badly.

However, she had to cope with the opposition of almost all officials in her Ministry and at the National Institute of Education, which by now had arrogated to itself unquestioned authority over the national curriculum.

Her solution was to move slowly, and by 2001, when I first met her - at a Workshop at the British Council, sometime in May - she had already officially started English Medium in Advanced Level Science classes. Talking to her afterwards, impressed by her presentation, I asked why she had not started English medium at secondary level.

Her response was that she wanted to, but there were insufficient teachers and it would not be easy to get the required materials ready. Her solution was to introduce it on an experimental basis in a couple of schools in Colombo and Kandy.

My view was that this would be disastrous, since it would confirm the impression that English medium was for the privileged. This was already claimed about the Advanced Level Science initiative.

Though Tara had been anxious to extend this to schools in the Provinces too, much greater take up had occurred in Colombo, while some of the Provincial schools that had taken up the challenge were finding it difficult. This had allowed those opposed to the initiative to claim that it perpetuated elitism.

Only hope

I told Tara that she should allow English medium in all schools, and try to ensure that at least one school in each District introduced it. Her response was that she would love to do this, but the practical difficulties she had mentioned seemed insuperable.

I argued however that producing materials was an easy matter, and that there were still teachers in at least 100 schools throughout the country who would not find it difficult to teach at least one or two grades in English. Once the Project started, training teachers would not be difficult.

Tara thought over the matter, and then rang to say that she would take the plunge if I would run the programme for her.

This was more than I had bargained for, but - given that I had begun to feel that this was the only hope for restoring at least some sort of quality to the education received by the vast majority of our citizens - I could not refuse. Encouraged by Jeevan Thiagarajah, who had initially predisposed me towards Tara before we ever met, through his account of her outstanding abilities, I agreed.

I had earlier argued that one of the most important reasons for reintroducing English medium was to provide a means whereby children of different communities could talk to each other. Using this argument in addition to more purely educational ones, we introduced the programme in terms of what were called Amity Schools, that would bring children of different communities together.

Tara and Jeevan and I met with Gamini Keerawella, then Secretary to the Ministry of National Integration, who was keen but cautious, and I was asked to draft a cabinet paper to offer the option of English medium in Grade 6 for all schools willing to undertake the programme. Though I was leaving Colombo that night,. Jeevan insisted I do it immediately, and give him a draft to take to Tara the very next day.

She was equally quick. The draft was fine-tuned after further discussion, which was approved by the two Ministers, and passed by the Cabinet within a month. Meanwhile Tara got the approval for my appointment to the Ministry, on a part-time basis, since I could not leave the university which was having its own problems at the time.

Tara, in her usual fashion, gave me a brief that included English in general, since she felt that this was an opportunity to improve English throughout the school system.