Moulding Sri Lanka’s graduates into leaders: suggestion for National Service

Shenali Waduge

As customary there is much hue and cry over the grand initiative to provide a phased out three-week leadership training for 22,000 undergraduates with food, lodging (separate for males and females) and attire that will include 171 periods of learning. So when a government in a country that has been enslaved by numerous aid packages given often with agreement to structurally adjust state services continues to provide free education upto tertiary level and is presently allocating Rs 200 million for an exercise that would really change the mind set of university entrants for the better through a series of well-planned and designed programmes, why would anyone choose to complain and on what grounds?

In reality all Sri Lankans should show gratitude to the state and a programme of National Service as done in many parts of the world would be perfect and timely.

Corporate world

The government spends 2.8 percent of GDP on education which covers free school uniforms, free breakfast for students in underprivileged schools, free textbooks from Grade One to Grade 11. Yet youth unemployment is high and poses a major problem. Less than six percent gain admission to one of 15 universities in Sri Lanka. Graduates are unemployed because there is little demand for the degrees they have completed.

They need to then have a set of skills that would help them absorb themselves into industries and sectors that they could find employment in and with time be able to qualify further as well. Even though the degrees may not match market requirements, undergraduates need to at least learn the soft skills needed to eventually fit into the corporate world.

Despite a literacy of 92.3 percent the majority amongst us find emerging leaders and adults of the future lacking what is essential for the corporate world. That responsibility must first fall upon all successive governments and their lacklustre education policies, academics who have not been initiative enough to project a force upon policy makers to enforce the need to change curricular to suit the changing needs of the world, students themselves for not realizing the real status of affairs and attempting themselves to come out of the tendency to fall into the vacuum that politically motivated students devise for them.

Student unions

Politically motivated student unions would like students to be failures for it would mean a strength to their numbers and their demands. Frustrated unemployed graduates would help to inflate their political will amongst the masses and against a government that is the major reason why the present students unions are opposing the leadership training.

The seniors of these student unions most of whom have been consistently failing their exams yet hold these portfolios on the strength of their ability to push their weight amongst the freshers and with the backing they receive from political parties. Moreover, given the mental torture most university entrants are subject to no sooner they enter university straight from the innocence of their homes, the three weeks of training would be a welcome departure! This initiative is obviously a subtle way of overcoming the ragging problem and the commitment of university authorities to end ragging.

Economic growth

Purely because the residential training is located throughout 28 military facilities (18 Army, two Naval, two Air Force, four cadet and Police camps) around Sri Lanka is a very lame and unfair argument to use by those who are presently opposing the initiative. We should instead think positively since we are in agreement that present day graduates do not make the mark of suitability for corporate employment and the corporate sector is what steers the engine of economic growth. We cannot produce students just to show off their qualifications. They must be able to utilize this not only for themselves but the betterment of the nation.

Can any of these university entrants be able to obtain training in leadership skills, conceptual skills, strategic management skills, conflict resolution skills, human skills, psychology, social etiquettes, time management, sports, laws pertaining to the country and personal hygiene, without paying for it if they wanted to learn these to further enhance their ability to gain employment? How much would a private institute charge for these subject matter?

English and IT skills

What’s more, the Ministry of Higher Education has plans to offer laptops on a pay later basis, WiFi facility in university premises and dongals to students while special programmes in English and IT is also expected to be conducted for the freshers. Therefore, why would anyone want to deny these youth the chance to learn something that would be of benefit to moulding their personalities on the one hand and eventually using these to uplift the status of service once in employment? This initiative is something that is much in need of to help them breakaway from the psychological pressures that most students suffer from since the majority does suffer an inferiority complex due to their humble upbringing.

Therefore, at the outset we must understand that we belong to the global village where international trade will continue to dictate how we function. Though education is provided free, only parents will know the toil they go through to ensure that their children receive sufficient learning to compete in schools. Today, the business of education has made sure a substantial amount of parents’ earnings go towards tuition in the ultimate desire to have one’s child continue to pursue higher learning.

This is so even in rural Sri Lanka. For the affluent the means to obtain foreign education has been a preferred option. The marking methodology ensures that the majority of students that eventually enter universities come from humble homes. In fact over 80 percent of university entrants are from beyond towns and cities yet as proud parents they would somehow try to find means to ensure their children are sent something extra as pocket money.

University students

Most of these students lack even basic English knowledge skills, other social traits would also be lacking. Apart from what is taught free they would be financially unable to bridge their weaknesses unless corporates through their corporate responsibility programmes and other such private or non-government initiatives are made available to them. These programmes however cannot entertain all university students and are not consistent as a lot of financial commitment is involved.

The general objection is that the training is in military camps and thus the assumption that the training given is military training. This is certainly an unfair and unjust assumption and the course syllabus itself will reveal how customized the course is to suit university entrants with nothing close to the training a military recruit will receive.

With the military often maintaining a distance from civil life it is naturally for anyone to feel a sense of fear nevertheless we have seen for ourselves the manner in which the military today stands transformed from how it had been perceived and how it had functioned previously. Anyone stopped by the military at a security post will immediately see the difference in the courtesies shown by military personnel as against police personnel! Holding the training in these military centres makes logistical sense as these centres are all well equipped, they have the necessary facilities and expertise. The programme is very similar to that which is commercially conducted through outbound training though there is very limited physical effort in the present programme and certainly not what military personnel have to undergo.

Practical experiences

A similar exercise had been conducted for the Sri Jayawardenapura University with the collaboration of the army with much success. Everyone needs to accept that this is a remarkable move, it is timely and farsighted and should be considered to extend beyond the proposed three weeks. It is not difficult to comprehend that apart from the soft skills training through the personality and leadership development programme many other changes need to take place in the university system.

Curriculums need to match the contemporary world, resources to enable new technology, practical experiences combined to theoretical study, departing from the trend to memorize and write answers as encouraged by most lecturers who insist their tutorials are repeated word for word, lecturers need to continuously upgrade their own knowledge, assessment system must give more weight to application, medium of instruction where possible needs to be in English, library services and IT access need to be made available to all and text books should include home-examples are just a few that is vocalized by most university students.

Tuition fees

Sri Lankans and in particular university students themselves need to understand that education is an expensive investment. For a developing country such as Sri Lanka to continue to provide free education upto tertiary level is commendable. Education in fee-levying countries is very expensive and increases annually. In US tuition fees vary from $ 5,000 to $ 30,000 per year (about $ 9,000 for a resident student). In Canada average tuition fees are $ 9,000 while international tuition is $25,500.

EU countries charge 5,000 euros to 8,000 euros, while in the UK, a citizen would have to spend on an average Sterling Pounds 3,000. In France, which has 1.5m students all are public and no tuition fees and undergraduate enrolment is just 165. Lecturers are civil servants. German universities charge 1,000 euros as enrolment fee annually (for EU and non-EU countries) while in Australia free education was given until 1988, but today full time and post-graduate degrees cost between AUD 10,000 to 20,000 per year.

Free education

It is perhaps now opportune to create a system whereby Sri Lankans can show gratitude to the state for providing free education. Compulsory or Voluntary National Service (different name tags will be used in different countries) are very much in vogue and provide those serving the nation a means to show their gratitude as well as feel they too have done their share for the nation.

In a time where much is being spoken about reconciliation and reform, it would be prudent for policy makers to think about drafting a scheme that would entail all graduates and non-graduates to serve the Nation either voluntarily or through a compulsory scheme (for a year with a stipend) and divide the national service in to categories that would cover the following areas: health, education, environment, entrepreneurship, national security, administration, transportation...so that key areas are covered and the youth will be able to provide excellent leadership in these areas.

Such an initiative would create a National Service Obligation because it is wrong to believe that living in a free society entails little or no obligations. Whatever rights we have should not predate our social contract, our rights are only a privilege of living society and not an entitlement, which means we need to contribute to society and creating a national service system would be another way to change the mindset of the people and start building up our nation towards prosperity.