A path to the top for the gifted student

Example, as the saying goes, is better than precept and no less a person than President Mahinda Rajapaksa has given the public an object lesson in caring for the deserving and the less fortunate. Our front page picture yesterday of the President presenting Yuresha Buddhini, an Year 8 student of Balangoda Maithreye National School, with a bursary to further her studies, we hope, will inspire the state education authorities of this country and other concerned quarters, into practising the principle of equity in the provision of opportunities for our school-going population.

Interestingly, the President's gesture coincides with the issuing of an Education Ministry circular to the effect that a National School cannot enrol from schools of the same category, those students whose educational performances in the higher grades are considered exceptionally good. For instance, if the student of a National School fares brilliantly at the GCE OL and seeks admission to another more reputed National School on the strength of these results, it would be illegal for the authorities of the latter school to effect the admission.

The rationale underlying the directive is to provide more opportunities for gifted but underprivileged students from the provinces, in particular, to enter these National Schools which are seen as reputed and to successfully pursue a career there. If not, given the trend of the more gifted students of National Schools successfully seeking admission to other National Schools which are considered more reputed, the chances are that capable but deprived students from underprivileged areas would not be in a position to gain admission to National Schools, which are seen as good, and pursue an AL education in them.

While measures, such as those outlined in the education circular, could help to a degree in implementing the principle of equity in school admissions, they do not constitute a complete answer to the current issues in this area of concern. We see as a comprehensive answer to the problem, the increasing establishment of National Schools all over the country. This would be a major step in the direction of not only equity in the provision of educational opportunity but also a substantial and positive move towards social justice. Accordingly, we urge the state to give complete and serious attention to this policy initiative.

An important and positive outcome from the establishment of National Schools throughout the country would be the elimination of the current, widespread fixation with 'prestigious schools.' It is this obsession which accounts for the scramble for 'good' schools among most parents and elders. As is well known, this scramble has today taken on the ugly complexion of a rat race which badly bruises all concerned, besides giving rise to the shaming blight of sleaze and corruption in Year One school admissions. The most practicable solution to the crisis is the setting-up in increasing numbers of fully equipped National Schools which would meet the totality of the secondary students' needs and aspirations. We were given to understand some time back that the state was thinking very seriously of launching more and more National Schools in this country and we urge them to speed-up this scheme, since it is certainly a wise measure which would benefit the majority of our students.

Meanwhile, it is also important to think in terms of giving our secondary and undergraduate students as liberal an education as possible. They need to be not only proficient in Science and Commerce subjects, but in the Arts too. A good grounding in the Arts would balance the current proclivity to stress the Sciences and Commerce and lay the basis for the formation of well-rounded personalities who would be emotionally mature, besides being intelligent and perceptive about the material world.

Educational projects of great magnitude, to work out well, need dedicated teachers who would place the students' interests above theirs. Currently, this tribe of professionals is fast dwindling in the state sector and the relative ease with which teachers obtain transfers from 'difficult areas' in particular, to more 'habitable climes', is not proving helpful at all. We urge that this gamut of issues is addressed and resolved fast.