Solution to English teacher shortage

Solution to English teacher shortage

The Higher Education Ministry is planning to modernize the Higher National Diploma in English course conducted by the Sri Lanka Technology Education Institute to deploy students following the course to teach in Government schools as a solution to the shortage of English Teachers in Government schools.

Higher Education Minister S B Dissanayake addressing a function held in connection with shifting into a new venue by the Sri Lanka Higher Technological Education Institute, said that action would be taken to deploy students who follow the Higher National Diploma in Information Technology to solve the teacher shortage problem to teach Information Technology in Government schools.

Minister Dissanayake explained that the Technological Education Institute and the Open University were very useful as the trained service personnel needed to ensure the country is rapid development.

Higher Education Ministry Secretary Dr Sunil Jayantha Navaratne and Higher Technological Education Institute Director General Professor Kapila Perera were present.

Undergrads to face new English aptitude test

Undergrads to face new English aptitude test

The Higher Education Ministry had decided to conduct a separate examination to check the English language skills of students who sat for the Advanced Level Examination last year before being selected to universities, officials said yesterday.

Ministry Secretary Dr. Sunil Jayantha Navaratne said that the students would have to undergo a three-month English course prior to university admission based on the results of this exam. He said that this was a one-off exam as most students had not sat for the General English paper at the 2010 A/L exam last year. However, he said that it would be made compulsory for all the students to sit for this paper from 2011 onwards. “Those who do not sit for this paper would not be admitted to any university. There are schools with no English teachers. Students of those schools should also sit for the paper. We only want to check their English knowledge before entering them to university,” he said.

Are foreign educational institutions a must for Lankan students?

Are foreign educational institutions a must for Lankan students?

by Ananda KANNANGARA

Sundayobserver.lk

The number of Sri Lankan youth studying in foreign educational institutions has significantly increased during the past four years. Even some parents are of the opinion that their children could find better jobs only if they do their higher studies in foreign countries.

When the Sunday Observer interviewed educationist, intellectuals and the general public on this issue, former student of Maliyadeva College, Kurunegala now employed as a computer hardware engineer, Dr. Lakshitha Wijegunawardana said that he had never studied in a foreign country.

“Since I was unable to become a medical doctor, I focused my attention towards IT education and I entered a local institution which has their parent body in Melbourne, Australia, thereafter without going to Australia I completed my studies here,” he said.

Dr. Wijegunawardana further said that facilities are ample to prepare and sit for many foreign examinations in Sri Lanka today and urged young Lankans not to go to foreign counties for higher education.

Former Central Province Education Minister and present Deputy Minister of Justice and Law Reforms, V. Puththirasigamoney said that local academics and intellectuals must make drastic changes in our education system to attract students. “If not more Lankan students will leave the country in the future to study in foreign countries,”.

He also urged the Minister in-charge of higher education, politicians, academics and other concerned parties to discuss this matter further and take steps to set up higher educational institutions in our country with foreign collaboration.

The Deputy Minister further said a fair number of Lankan students still go to foreign medical colleges and thereafter coming back to Sri Lanka seek employment in government hospitals. “He therefore urged authorities to set up private medical colleges here and it will help Sri Lanka to save millions of valuable foreign exchange,” he said. He also suggested the setting up with foreign collaboration

engineering colleges to stop local engineering students leaving for studies in foreign soil.

Founder, “Pragnapradeepa Concept”, Dr. Jayantha de Silva said that studying in foreign educational institutions by Lankan children has become a menace today.

“At present we have better educational institutions which are conducted with foreign collaboration and therefore attending to foreign educational institutions for higher studies is a waste of money,” he said.

He also blamed certain local employers who give preference to overseas educated in preference to localy educated ones.

Dr. de Silva also urged the Government not to open international universities here since it will adversely affect the majority poor children engaged in higher education in the Sinhala medium in local universities.

Dr. De Silva appealed to higher educational authorities to take immediate steps to upgrade English language education and the knowledge of Information Technology of children from Advanced Level to the university level.

“Lack of knowledge in these subjects has become an obstacle for our children to find better jobs although they have excellent academic qualifications,” he added.

Director, Business Development and Education, Gwendoline Kuhatheva said that due to lack of educational institutions with foreign collaborations many children are going to study in foreign countries.

“Therefore, I urge educational authorities to encourage interested parties to open branches of foreign universities here,”.

However, she said when comparing to the 1980s, our students have now got better opportunities to do their higher studies here since many international study courses are being conducted, in Sri Lanka with foreign collaboration.

Mercantile sector Executive, Susila Gunasekara said that our children studying in foreign countries cannot be stopped unless more branches of foreign educational institutions are set up here. “I wish that educational authorities must discuss this matter further and pave the way for Lankans to have their entire education in our country as the students of India,”.

Student at IPM, Thushani Kularathne wanted the Government to appoint foreign lecturers in local universities, so that our children will be able to acquire upto date international knowledge from them without going to foreign countries.

She said the poor knowledge of English of our younger generation has also become a big problem for them to find jobs.

School teacher, Gamini Punchihewa of Ratmalana did not blame local

students who study medicine going abroad for higher studies.

“If we have private medical colleges as in many countries, our students would never enter foreign medical colleges by paying exorbitant charges,”.

He therefore proposed to the Government to set up medical and engineering colleges here as it is the only way to stop our children going for overseas education.

Chitrangani Samuel of Ratmalana said. “Although we have about nine State owned universities, the current education methods in our country are not suitable to equip them for better employment,”

“This could be clearly seen when thousands of graduates every year demand the Government to provide them employment,”

She said that she has never seen graduates in countries such as India, Australia, Canada, America, China or England engage in demonstrations over employment.

“Therefore, under such circumstances, I think no one should be blamed for seeking foreign education,”

But, if authorities want to stop Lankans going to foreign countries for higher eduction then the education of our universities as well as advanced level classes must be changed to meet the demand of the current job market.

SWEDEN

SWEDEN***********************************

---

The Nation*****

The Middle Ages

The Middle Ages

-- The Nation***

Education system in crisis - The Nation

Education system in crisis



Inter University Students Federation protest: The education system appears to be in crisis with no ready solution in sight, and university students are more on the streets than in their campuses Pic by Nissanka Wijerathne

Mishaps in educational policy can have far reaching and devastating consequences. Some would go so far as to say that the ‘district basis’ policy of university admissions introduced in the seventies gave rise to the northern insurrection which has erupted into the menace of terrorism today and that argument is not without its merits.

Sri Lanka in its post-independent era has for long taken pride in the social luxuries it provides for its people; most notably, free healthcare and free education that it offers, no matter what financial constraints successive governments have been faced with. Of these two services, it is education that has been hogging the headlines in recent weeks – and for all the wrong reasons too.
The education system appears to be in crisis with no ready solution in sight: university students are more on the streets than in their campuses with their capital expenses slashed in half; teachers are on strike refusing to mark advanced level answer scripts; and most infamously, new admissions to national schools are bogged down in a protracted legal wrangle that is rapidly snowballing into a showdown between the legislature and the judiciary.
Seemingly Sri Lanka should be a country cited as a role model in education: there is universal access to free education right through to the university level, and at primary and secondary levels, not only is education free, students are provided uniforms and text books free of charge as well. What more could one ask from the state?
Yet, the recent unrest in the education sector suggests otherwise. That there is this much discontent indicates that while education is free in principle, the planning and resources that have been afforded to this vital sector have been inadequate.
And make no mistake; mishaps in educational policy can have far reaching and devastating consequences. Some would go so far as to say that the ‘district basis’ policy of university admissions introduced in the seventies gave rise to the northern insurrection which has erupted into the menace of terrorism today and that argument is not without its merits.
That was a decision taken for political expediency to satiate the aspirations of the majority community – and win votes in the process. What it meant was that ‘educationally backward’ areas were given concessions for university admissions instead of such opportunities being decided solely on merit.
That concept is laudable in that it addresses the issue of social inequality between regions but it should have been followed by an aggressive programme to uplift the educational standards of the so-called ‘educationally backward’ regions. That sadly did not happen, the district basis for university admissions continue unto this day and the quality of the university undergraduate has fallen drastically.
Then there was that infamous experiment with private medical education in the early eighties. That was when foreigners came to this country to study for a medical degree, bringing in valuable foreign exchange and in effect, subsiding their local colleagues.
That came to a grinding halt in the face of virulent opposition from academia as well as leftist political forces but the baby was thrown away with the bathwater and now, Sri Lankan parents are struggling to send their offspring overseas for medical education!
Obviously unchastened by this experience, international schools have sprung up, mushroom-like, not only in the capital but in every suburban and provincial city. Again the concept may be laudable but there is absolutely no regulation in its implementation: no one is responsible for the quality or qualifications of their teachers who are let loose on an unsuspecting student population naïve enough to fall for the name board of an international school. Admittedly, there are reputed institutions among them which maintain standards but the point is there is no process to assure that such standards are maintained at every such institution of learning.
All this while, the state education sector has gone from bare maintenance to neglect and dereliction. Education is not a fashionable outlet to channel funds into as its outcome is not instant and its funding has not been accorded due priority in recent times. The sector’s human resources – teachers, lecturers – have been lured by higher salaries offered by the private sector. And state-sponsored education is stuttering from one crisis to another. The grade one admissions fiasco is only a symptom of this larger malady.
The admissions issue is of course politically loaded. Admittedly, the previous system was open to corruption and abuse. The highest courts of the law opined that the system was also fundamentally flawed in that it did not afford equal opportunities for every child and that the prospect of admission was instead dependent on other extraneous factors.
But the issue has now escalated into a full scale battle between the legislature and the judiciary. Parliament, in a rare show of unity, agreed that it will formulate its own guidelines for admission which ostensibly were different from what the courts of law desired. In the meantime though, parents are being pushed from pillar to post, from distraught to desperate.
Neither the Education Minister nor the government as a whole appear to be competent to resolve this in a manner acceptable to all and the danger is that some ad hoc policy will be put in place given the politically sensitive nature of the issue. And yet another educational crisis will be brewing with potentially explosive long-term consequences.
It will take the collective wisdom of all the stakeholders in education – parents, students, teachers, university academics, educationists not to mention the politicians – to avert such a disaster. But sadly, such an attempt has not been made and does not seem to be on the horizon either. And it is highly unlikely that a few pearls of wisdom from the highest judiciary will redress the issue adequately.

****