We have a COVID education crisis; do not turn it into a catastrophe

Originally appeared on The Daily FT

By Dr. Sujata Gamage

We may recover from the health impact or the economic impact, but the impact of lost years of education for children or children lost to the system due to dropping out will present a COVID education catastrophe with long-term implications

Schools have been closed for more than 16 months. News of school closures and brief re-openings have dominated the news. Success at holding examinations gives us a false sense of achievement. The Minister of Education has been heard to say that online education is continuing despite school closings. Such statements show a complete lack of understanding of the ground situation.

At the ground level, yes, teachers have been reaching out to students as best as they can. According to a survey carried out by the Education Forum Sri Lanka in November 2020, almost all teachers have used social media such as WhatsApp to reach out to their students, but they have been able to connect to only 45% of the students on average. Of those only ~5% were reached via software such as Zoom or Teams which give a real-time online education experience. Even for the 45% total who were contacted by schools, the mode of education is really a repeat of the usual chalk-talk education, but now in distance mode. The objective is to ‘cover’ the syllabus.

However, more important than covering the syllabus is having the school contact each child to inquire after his/her situation. We all know that it is difficult for children to be trapped inside. But in addition, not every home is a safe place for children. Domestic disputes affect the kids. These disputes can turn violent. In some homes, children are abused. Some disadvantaged children who receive school lunches could go hungry when schools are closed. 

 Warnings by experts

At a recent policy dialogue by the Education Forum Sri Lanka, Dr. Tara de Mel warned that we may recover from the health impact or the economic impact, but the impact of lost years of education for children or children lost to the system due to dropping out will present a COVID education catastrophe with long-term implications. She made a plea for short-term remedies to reach out to each child, and for planning NOW to reopen schools as soon as the present third COVID-19 wave subsides. 

Weerasinghe, the Director of Education responsible for the Vavuniya South Education Division, echoed Dr. de Mel’s sentiments saying that the Vavuniya South division he represents has a diverse community from farmers in the interior to fishermen in the coastal areas, and children of such communities were difficult to contact. These children may have dropped out of education altogether.

Weerasinghe further said that during the lockdowns in 2020 rural schools gained somewhat on urban schools presumably because the small rural schools were able to work under the radar to bring children to school under health guidelines of local medical authorities. That is not possible now because the Ministry of Education has issued an all-encompassing closure of schools. Weerasinghe questioned the logic of applying equality of policies to a widely diverse set of schools. 

For example, policies regarding school openings are made with crowded urban schools with students from across the country in mind, when smaller schools serving a contained community could well stay open. We need school-based solutions, he emphasised. Further he noted that we need to give pride of place to teachers and expect them to take responsibility for the education of children under their charge and supporting the teachers to do their job.

Renuka Peiris, former Director of Health and Nutrition at the Ministry of Education, noted that children are now expected to learn in a home environment which is quite different from the school environment. To compensate, they need to be given a timetable appropriate for self-study in a home setting and teachers need access to model lessons. 

The teacher-student interactions should be tracked randomly to make sure that teachers are adapting well to the new mode. The focus in distance education is only on educational achievement and the three national examinations. Is that the objective of education, she asked?

There was consensus that there must be equal emphasis on student educational achievements, their social-emotional learning, and their health and well-being. In distance education the focus has entirely been on transmitting educational content, missing all three purposes of education.

Decentralising education management

Regarding decentralising education management allowing schools to make decisions about opening or closing of schools, Renuka Herath said that by statute the Director General of Health is the ultimate authority for all decisions related to a pandemic, but that power is delegated to Medical Officers of Health (MoH) at divisional level. At the school level, the principal may make the decisions in consultation with the MoH for the area, if power to make such a decision is delegated to the school level by the Ministry of Education. 

There is indeed a circular from the Ministry that authorises schools to just that (Circular 2020/15) but when the ministry decides that all schools, say in the Western Province, should be closed, school-based committees cannot override such a directive. The Ministry of Education should make decisions on school opening or closing with sensitivity to children attending smaller schools serving small communities.

Time to act

Taking the ground reality into consideration, the Education Forum Sri Lanka has called upon the Ministry of Education and Provincial Departments of Education to recognise and act on the following without delay:

1. Content delivered over TV, WhatsApp or in print form is not education: The archaic transmission mode of education practiced in the Sri Lankan education system came to the fore during COVID-19. Teachers sent PDF files over WhatsApp to parents with smartphones, clogging their phones and forcing them to get pages and pages of notes printed. Learning happens not in transmission but in the engagement of the child with the content under the guidance of a teacher. Teachers need only send instructions to use existing textbooks and workbooks which should have been made available free to students at the beginning of the year.

2. Parents cannot replace teachers. Schools are responsible for keeping home-bound students engaged 7:30 a.m. to 1:30 p.m. on designated school days: A bi-weekly self-learning plan should be provided for each child and a teacher should follow-up with him/her at least once a day. Ninety six per cent of households in Sri Lanka have access to a mobile phone. Teleconferencing is possible with analogue phones. There is a teacher for every 16 students on average. There is no excuse for not reaching out to every child.

3. A reduced curriculum covering the essential learning outcomes in language and math, for example should be provided and teachers given the freedom to integrate learning outcomes in other subjects. The Academic Council of Bhutan, for example The Royal Education Council of Bhutan, for example, released an Education in Emergency (EiE) Prioritised and Adapted Curriculum as early as July 2020. National Institute of Education Sri Lanka has already identified ELC for primary education. 

4. Diagnostic tests to identify the “learning lags” in essential competencies should be made for Grades 5 onwards for use by students for self-assessment or by teachers for keeping track. These can be developed and administered by Provincial, Zonal or Divisional directorate level.

5. Modalities for engaging in learning should be entrusted to schools, with supervision by closest authority and subject to schools covering essential competencies: On average only 50% of students engage ‘online’ learning. If the curriculum is reduced, teachers can use the time saved to reach out to those unreached using offline methods suitable for each locality.

6. School attendance committees at GND Level should be reactivated to monitor and support home-bound children: Children’s anxieties and mental health issues, abusive homes, poor nutrition are other critical issues. Regulation 1005/5 of 1997 mandated School Attendance Committees comprising principals, school development society representatives, and education health, and welfare authorities in each GND to keep track of families with school-age children. These committees should be reactivated immediately. 

7. Decisions regarding school opening/closures should be delegated to authorities as close as possible to the affected communities: Schools in low-risk areas should be allowed to keep open. Even in high-risk areas, principals, and teachers in consultation with relevant committees can decide on appropriate school re-opening schedules and isolation modalities. Strategic plans for a more permanent way of keeping schools open should be developed with vaccinations and testing underpinning such plans. 

8. Teachers are frontline workers. They should receive priority in vaccination: When health-care-workers are considered as frontline workers deserving immediate vaccination, the same should follow for teachers considering the repercussions of school closures across the society and the economy. 

9. Personnel and students in schools in high-risk areas should be tested regularly: A cost-effective testing system should be designed so that teachers and students are tested regularly. If a student or a teacher is tested positive, individual classrooms or groups of students should be isolated, instead of closing the entire school. 

10. Blended learning should be adopted as the norm when schools are in session so that teachers and students can transition smoothly to home-based learning during an emergency. Best-practices in this regard can be sourced from countries which have already adopted this kind of learning.

Dr Sujata Gamage is a Senior Research Fellow at LIRNEasia, a regional think tank based in Colombo, Sri Lanka. She specializes in planning, evaluation and capacity building in education, ICT in education, research and research networks, and public sector performance using data analytics, institutional research, scoping studies, systematic reviews, statistical methods and simulations. She is also an advisor to the Advocata Institute.

Our public universities need more scrutiny, not blind endorsements

Originally appeared on The Daily FT

By Dr. Sujata Gamage

Dr. W. A. Wijewardena recently published an article on the technology campus of the Sri Jayewardenepura University. I looked forward to new information on the State technology education, but I was sorely disappointed. His column was essentially a pitch for the Acting Vice-Chancellor of Sri Jayewardenepura. Interestingly, there have been several such pitches recently for the university itself. On a positive note, it is good that a university tries to justify the public expenditure incurred on it, but in the absence of a counter assessment, these advertorials could be window dressing for a rotten system. 

There are serious issues in education confronting the country today. Our priority from a development perspective should be the preparedness of 360,000 or so youth who turn 18 every year. They should be prepared for living and working in the 21st century. The rest is details, I would say, because it is well established that the economic or social impact of education almost exclusively rests on school education, according to an extensive review of the literature by Alison Wolf in her 2003 book ‘Does Education Matter?: Myths About Education and Economic Growth’. While a highly educated few may contribute to innovation in the economy or society, mass higher education has no impact. A World Bank (WB) study of the same subject has shown that private benefits to higher education are many times greater than public benefits (WB, 2015). 

Yet, our education system is designed to define education as success at receiving three passes for a paper and pen test at the end of 13 years of education. Then we select 10% or less of a cohort of such students for a free-of-charge education at public universities, leaving other 90% off the radar of policymakers or the public. The Tertiary and Vocational Education and Training (TVET) sector admitted 35,599 students (CBSL, 2018). Yet, I would include those attending the TVET institutions within 90% who are ‘off the radar’ because the TVET sector which is a distant poor cousin to the university sector is barely visible. 

University education captures a lion’s share of education funding and media attention. Apparently, a discussion on amending universities have resurfaced as it does periodically. Such a discussion is like trying to change the deck chairs while the tertiary education ship is sinking. 

The University Grants Commission regulates 15 public universities and associated institutes. The Technical and Vocation Education oversees 500+ state institutes (not counting 700+ private institutes) enrolling 35,000+ students for short or long courses, graduated about 26,024 National vocational Qualification (NVQ) certificate holders. These institutions receive Government funding no matter their performance. 

What we need is a new commission which is a caretaker for all school leavers seeking a tertiary education and or training, not gatekeepers or apologists for underperforming institutions. These reforms will not happen unless the government overrides the interests of the higher education lobby. 

Overly influential higher education lobby

Education funding in this country is driven by three powerful lobbies, The GMOA, the University Community, and Inter-University Federation of University Students, a political arm of the JVP and/or the Peratugami Party. They serve to keep spreading the myth that free-of-charge education to a select few youth is free education, and policymakers and the media swallow the myth wholesale.

Their solution for the other 90% of youth is more and more public spending for education. Yes, it’s true that our education funding is way below international standards. As UNESCO noted: The Education 2030 Framework for Action proposed two benchmarks as ‘crucial reference points’: allocate at least 4% to 6% of GDP to education, and/or allocate at least 15% to 20% of public expenditure to education. Globally, countries spend 4.7% of GDP on education and allocate 14.2% of public expenditure to education; 35 countries spend less than 4% of GDP and allocate less than 15% of public expenditure to education (GEM Report, UNESCO)

Higher education interest groups lobbied for increased in education funding. However, the benefits did not go school education or the TVET sector because education funding formula is unduly tilted towards higher education at the expense of school education or TVET. The result is that university teachers are well remunerated now, and schoolteachers remain some of the poorest paid public servants.

Over-funding of universities

Our universities indeed receive a lion’s share of education funding in relation to international practices in education funding. As far back as 2002, the World Bank (WB) noted that our funding is unduly tilted toward universities. 

By international standards, average recurrent education expenditures per student in Sri Lanka are modest at primary and secondary education levels, but high at the tertiary education level. Average recurrent education expenditure per student as a share of national income per capita on primary and secondary education, at about 9% and 11% respectively, are among the lowest in South Asia and East Asia. In contrast, average tertiary education expenditure per student as a share of national income per capita, [set] at 100%, is slightly higher than India, and substantially above the level in East Asian countries such as South Korea, Singapore, Malaysia, Thailand, Indonesia and the Philippines. The main reason for the high share of public recurrent spending on tertiary education is the large unit cost of government universities. Overall, the pattern of average recurrent expenditure across education levels suggests that, in contrast to high performing East Asian countries, the balance of public resources in Sri Lanka may be tilted unduly in favour of tertiary education, at the expense of primary and secondary schooling (WB, 2005, Sec 16).

The internal efficiency of primary schooling (grades 1-5) and junior secondary schooling (grades 6-9), measured in terms of flow rates, are high (WB, 2005, Section 18). 

Public university education in Sri Lanka is expensive, with high unit operating costs in comparison to other developing countries. In addition, there are wide differences in unit costs among public universities, ranging from about 40,000-120,000 rupees per student per year (WB, 2005, Section 20). 

If education funding was titled in favour of university education in 2002, it is no better in 2019, according to our estimates.

The distribution of gross funding for education across the three sectors has widened since 2002. In 2002 Higher education received 14% of education funding. In 2019, this share increased to 38%. Funding for TVET sector too increased while the share for school education reduced to 50%.

It is true that new admissions to higher education have increased from 12,144 in 2002 to 31,451 in 2018, and new admissions to school education have slightly decreased from 328,632 in 2002 to 325,667 in 2018. We are still in the process of calculating the recurrent education expenditure per student as a share of national income per capita for 2018, in order to reassess funding situation vis-à-vis WB assessment published in 2005. However, a quick calculation of per-student funding for universities v. schooling shows that per capita spending remains as tilted as reported by WB in 2005. 

The problem lies in misplaced priorities. First, education achievement after 13 years of schooling is defined by the ability of a student to obtain passes for any three subjects in a national examination. As tuition teachers have revealed, a student can study for six months to obtain the necessary passes. Further, the government indirectly admitted that education is driven by private tuition by bending over backwards to change health regulation to suit private tuition needs. 

Next, we increase funding for higher education to accommodate these students deemed suitable for higher education by a faulty indicator. In fact, we are trying to find solutions to a poor output at the end of the pipeline without investing adequately in the pipeline.

The evidence is strong that mass higher education does NOT contribute to development. Only research-driven higher universities have an impact. Hence, the priorities for government spending is clear. Quality school education, some further education or training for all youth, and research-based or inquiry-based higher education for a select few. 

Unaccountable

University teachers who justify the expansion of public higher education point out that all higher education in developed countries are provided by the state. This is true indeed. In Canada or the UK, almost all universities are publicly owned. In the US, private institutions co-exist but the federal government supports the education of all students, though loan schemes. 

The comparison ends there because in Sri Lanka students are brought to the doorsteps of the universities. They come with public funds assured for their education, but there are no performance requirements for universities. Universities decide what courses to offer, how they teach, and they refuse to be held accountable for unemployability of graduates or the attitudes of these graduates. In US, USA, or Canada, public institutions receive funding based on enrolment and additional performance criteria. Retention and graduation rates of students are some such criteria. In Sri Lanka, a shockingly high percent of students dropout and the government does not to track that. 

Further, in public higher education in other countries, the students pay a share of the cost of education. For example, at Ohio State University where I worked as a strategic planning specialist, the budget consists of roughly about one-third of cost recovered through student tuition fees, another one third though state subsidy, and the other one third through income generated through research funding, alumni giving etc. In the UK and Canada too, students pay a share of the cost of higher education, giving universities another good reason to be accountable. 

UGC – a commission past its time? 

The University Grants Commission was established in 1978 in the tradition of granting agencies in UK and India. The University Grants Commission of India continues to function but similar commissions in UK and eve USA have changed their roles.

In the nineties, the role of the Ohio Board of regent (OBR) was essentially the same as the UGC. Later, the OBR increasingly took on more responsibility for colleges and community colleges in the state, and today it is reborn as The Ohio Department of Higher Education with the mandate to “make college more affordable for Ohioans and drive the state’s economic advancement through the public universities and colleges of Ohio, the state’s network of public universities, regional campuses, community colleges, and adult workforce and adult education centres”. 

The UK has gone a step further:

The Higher Education Funding Council for England (HEFCE) distributed public money for teaching and research to universities and colleges. It closed on 1 April 2018. [It was] replaced by UK Research and Innovation [Agency] and the Office for Students.

This move in the UK is very significant. It is an acknowledgement that research and innovation and mass higher education do not belong together and that higher education agencies should serve the potential and current students, not the provider institutions. 

Need a commission for students, not gatekeepers for institutions

The UGC of has 15 institutions and 19 other associated institutes. These institutions awarded 26,024 basic degrees in 2018. The Tertiary and Vocational Education Commission (TVEC) is responsible for the registration and accreditation of TVET institutions. TVEC reported 582 public institutions and 50,215 National Vocational Certificate awardees for 2019 from public institutions. We have 350,000 +school lavers who have left school at various points. Taken together these institutions cater to needs of about 20% of a youth cohort. What about education and training for others? The government may offer merit-based opportunities for some, but there should some accountability for others. What we have is a government that allows the higher education lobby to disrupt the education for the other 80%. 

The present government is on the right track, more or less

As I pointed out, our universities receive an undue share of public funding thanks to a powerful higher education lobby. This situation must be corrected. Any additional funding for education should be directed to school education and 1-2-year colleges offering diplomas or advanced diplomas while holding funding for universities at present levels. On the other hand, funding for research and innovation should be increased with centres of excellence within or outside of universities getting additional funding from the research and innovation budget. 

In the present government, the higher education, technology and innovation portfolios are brought together. Bundling technology and innovation with higher education is unwise because higher education priorities are driven by a self-inflicted responsibility to find slots for students obtaining three passes from an outdated assessment system. New programs like the technology campus at Sri Jayewardenepura will not be able to perform miracles to produce innovators. They will more likely than not produce more job seekers. 

However, it is encouraging that the President has inquired about the feasibility of bringing all education functions under one ministry. This is good news. What we need is a ministry of education that oversees the education for all from early childhood to tertiary education, and a separate ministry of science, technology and innovation that funds centres of excellence in universities and elsewhere and nurture and award scholarships to select set of promising youth for a research-based or inquiry-based university education.

Dr Sujata Gamage is a Senior Research Fellow at LIRNEasia, a regional think tank based in Colombo, Sri Lanka. She specializes in planning, evaluation and capacity building in education, ICT in education, research and research networks, and public sector performance using data analytics, institutional research, scoping studies, systematic reviews, statistical methods and simulations. She is also an advisor to the Advocata Institute.

Ragging is responsible for the misogynistic and anti-intellectual culture in our universities

Originally appeared on The Daily FT

By Dr. Sujata Gamage

When universities closed on 15 March, Pasindu Hirushan, a fresher at the Faculty of Management in the University of Sri Jayewardenepura, was in intensive care. He was hit by a heavy tyre rolled down the stairs during an event organised by the student union. This was allowed to happen despite the recent memory of Samantha Withanage, a student opposed to ragging in the same university who was murdered by raggers.

Our indignation over these crimes may rise with each incident, but a greater crime is taking place every day for every penny we spend on these universities. It is the perpetuation of a political ideology which is anti-intellectual, coercive, and misogynistic. Administrators and university teachers are responsible, some directly and others by their silence.

In this column I draw from reports, research papers, and first-hand accounts from credible individuals, to bring to the attention of the public, the damage done to our higher education institutions by ragging and the associated political agenda.

Universities receive 75% of post-secondary funding, to serve 7% of youth

According to the 2019 Budget estimates, the total allocation tertiary education including higher education, technical and vocational education and youth services was Rs. 110 billion. Of this allocation, 75% goes to universities which serve only 7% of a given youth cohort. 

To put this percentages into perspective, Government budgets 40 times more for a student attending university than for a youth in the neglected 93%.

The responsibility of universities is that much bigger

The taxpaying public do not oppose this anomaly of a small fraction of a youth cohort receiving a lion’s share of scarce public resources. They believe that our system gives opportunities to all youth to attend school but sends the cream of the cream to the universities where they would make a great contribution to national development. Both assumptions must be questioned, but my focus is on the latter. 

Our public universities are a national asset. The contribution of a university to society is through teaching, research, and service. Our universities, which are essentially undergraduate colleges, may not produce cutting-edge research, but they have a responsibility to synthesise existing knowledge and guide students to be informed and inquiring consumers of knowledge. 

Being anti-intellectual is the anti-thesis of a university. But that is exactly what is happening in our universities because they have been captured by ‘a political ideology’ with the complicity of academics, intentional or otherwise. 

Ragging as an instrument of political indoctrination

As we try to make our campuses safe for students, we must understand the forces behind the ragging. A study commissioned by the National Education Commission (NEC) in 2014 stated:

“The lacunae in university administration and teaching have given occasion for entry of national-level political parties and organisations outside the university to encroach on and usurp duties that should properly fall within the purview of university administrations. These lacunae also serve as opportunities for political parties to recruit new members, mobilise students for protests and demonstrations, and use them as instruments for enlarging the party revenues and activities. One party in particular, namely, the JVP, has followed a systematic method to recruit and indoctrinate new batches of enthusiastic supporters and a hard core of activists every year, the party is also assured of a continuous supply of new entrants with the commencement of the academic year at all three universities [included in the study]. The most vulnerable students are, therefore, those who are in their first year at the university.”

Unfortunately, these observations have not been published, let alone acted upon. The Vice Chancellor of the University of Ruhuna was the first academic leader to appear on popular media to put ragging in the context of its political reality. To quote from the interview:

“Annually, university freshers are subjected to extremely inhumane harassments. These rituals are called by different names in different universities, but they involve violence and even sexual harassment. These acts are carried out by the senior students who are led by the student unions, who in turn are led by the Inter University Federation of Students (IUFS). The objective is to make these new entrants to think the way the IUFS want, behave the way they want and even to eat, dress and walk the way they want. This IUFS is led by political parties – in fact, it is one political party. …Ragging is a political enterprise. It is just not a one-or-two-week event. Ragging is used by a certain political Party to gain recruits for demonstrations, picketing, etc. This political party also uses university students to raise funds for their politics. At least once a month these students are sent out across to all corners of the island to ‘shake the till’ and collect money.”

What political party is this? The 2014 NEC report names the Janatha Vimukthi Peramuna (JVP) as the party responsible. Since then, the Peratugami Party, a breakaway of the JVP, is thought to be a force, but overall it seems to be a complex interplay of the two.

Indoctrination leads to anti-intellectualism – the antithesis of a university 

A few faculty members have spoken at length about the impact of ragging on our universities. There are some research reports as well. For example, a survey on ragging in universities was commissioned by the University Grants Commission (UGC) chaired by Prof. Mohan de Silva with funding from the UNICEF. Though the results are yet to be released, I quote from an unofficial copy of a presentation in the public interest.

The survey used the UGC Complaints Database, university records and responses from a representative sample of 1,986 students and 1,551 staff. The results lead to the conclusion that “Ragging is pervasive, multifaceted, debilitating, and disrupts learning and critical engagement and it normalises violence even in non-ragging interactions”. The survey also reveals that one of the consequences of the ragging is the “promotion of an unhealthy campus environment, by way of discouraging individual initiative, idealising mediocrity and gender stereotypes and distancing staff from students, and silencing some students”.

Some recent undergraduate dissertations provide an intimate look at the day-to-day life of an undergraduate in the University of Peradeniya. One study reveals that freshers are forced to memorise the names and deeds of student “heroes” and sing the student hero song at events. Many of these heroes died in the 1988-89 uprising after they had left the university. Those like Samantha Withanage who resisted ragging and were brutally murdered on campus are not mentioned. 

The outputs of the majority of students in the Faculties of Arts do not display much scholarship. When anybody applies for a research position it is customary to ask for a sample of writing. During the last twenty years I have requested for and received samples of writing form university graduates. A typical arts faculty dissertation is written by hand and cites only material written in Sinhala. The purpose of the university is to open the minds of students, no matter their origin, to a larger world in order to re-examine accepted notions. How can our students do that if they cannot consult the global literature on any topic

Raggers actively prevent freshers from learning English according to studies from the Universities of Ruhuna and Sabaragamuwa. Student leaders not only stop freshers from attending English classes, but ‘not using English’ is proudly claimed to be a part of the so-called sub-culture. An undergraduate thesis on student factions notes the same. Professor Sunethra Weerakoon too notes the “politicised suppression of English language in the Faculty of Applied Sciences of the University of Sri Jayewardenepura” in her memoir.

English is not just another foreign language in Sri Lanka. In fact, in a column published in 2015, I argued that the English-Speaking Elite (ESE) in Sri Lanka, intentionally or not, have created a cultural divide which also serves as an economic divide. There has to be a healthy debate about the place of English in our society, but you cannot begin a dialogue on English related issues or any issue by allowing a student faction to tie the hands of our future intellectuals. This anti-English stance of the student unions is a stark manifestation of anti-intellectualism in our universities.

Misogyny and marginalisation of women

According to the 2018 University Statistics report from the UGC, women comprise 64% of the total enrolment in our universities. In the Faculties of Arts, the percent of women can be as high as 80-90%.

What is experienced by these undergraduates?

A 2011 study by Ruwanpura based on fieldwork at the University of Kelaniya finds that sexuality of female students continues to be constrained by a reiteration of social and cultural expectations which are contrary to the setting which is ostensibly liberating and progressive). In a 2011 study of relationships in campuses, Gunawardene, et al. note that “male dominance within relationships resulting in coercion seems to be common in undergraduate relationships though such behaviour was unacceptable to females”. 

The subjugation and denigration of women by men who are in the minority is shocking, as revealed in an undergraduate thesis on student life at the University of Peradeniya. The researcher, having interviewed men and women from both ‘rag’ and ‘anti-rag’ factions notes: 

“Exclusion of women students from leadership positions is a characteristic feature of student politics. Women students experience an inferior position vis-à-vis male students and have to perform such tasks as taking down notes on behalf of male student activists who keep away from lectures, wash and iron the latter’s clothes including underwear, and, once they have found a partner, satisfy the male partner’s sexual needs. This pattern runs similar to that found in the hierarchical relationships between males and females in the rural social context and therefore appears to be replicated on such patterns in the so-called liberal context of university life.

“The subculture slang identifies every male student as a (pora) which suggests machismo and female students by the terms, hitch eka, baduwa, kokka, toiya, which are derogatory and objectifies female students by either relating them to males who befriend them in a potential sexual relationship or to their appearance. The boys’ residential hostels are called “palaces” while girls’ hostels are called “female genital stores” which translates to an expletive in Sinhala, and these terms are handed down to every new batch as part of the subculture credo. The girls are not allowed to do posters or set foot in the wala or the open-air theatre in fear that they would “desecrate” the “sacred” performance space. During the literary festival preparations, the girls are “kept in their place” and are assigned the duty of serving tea when their male counterparts get on scaffolds and engage in “manly” tasks.”

A machismo culture existed in the University of Peradeniya when I was student there in the seventies. One would have expected some progression by now. What is actually happening now is imposition of a regressive culture by coercion.

If universities perpetuate such a culture, what hope is there for curtailing harassment of women in public transport and in other public and private spaces? 

Leadership of the Vice-Chancellors

The Vice Chancellor is the chief executive officer of the university. The prime responsibility of a VC is not only that of providing a safe environment for the students, but to maintain an intellectual environment conducive to education. So far, we have heard from Prof. Sujeewa Amarasena, the VC at Ruhuna, speaking up on the dire situation in our universities and what he is doing to correct it. Though some may view his comments as hurting the image of the university, his interview conveyed the positive message that the faculty and students in our institutions are ready to cooperate with leaders who are genuine and committed.

Unfortunately, the complicity of some of the leaders is evident in the following summary of student views gathered by the UGC survey: (a) Students view staff and administration as disinterested and complicit to ragging (b) [Weak] reactions to ragging hinder the enforcement of a zero-tolerance policy (c) Culture of fear, silence and acceptance prevails surrounding ragging, and (d) The [University] Councils are disengaged from the process of addressing the issue of ragging.

Professor Weerakoon, an eminent mathematician, describes “institutional and cultural corruption within public universities” in her memoir:

“[T]he single greatest issue confronting our public universities remains the high prevalence of ragging, which in many cases extends into intimidation, bullying, thuggery and assault. There is also a strong relationship between ragging and political extremism. At the University of Sri Jayewardenepura, sympathisers of extremist ideology on the academic staff – including at senior level - do not merely acquiesce to ragging but tacitly support it and use student thuggery as a means of consolidating their position and that of their extremist ideologies within university life.”

Professor Dangolla, a long-standing advocate for students’ right to a peaceful environment, summarises his frustrations as follows:

“I have served as the Proctor in the University of Peradeniya under four different Vice-Chancellors (VCs). On 08th December 2016, in the evening around 5 pm, I was called by a senior professor to settle a ragging related incident at the Faculty of Veterinary Sciences. This meeting between freshers and their immediate seniors had been coordinated by the senior professor without my knowledge. I was called in when it had turned into a brawl. I managed to settle the situation and send the freshers back to the hostel. Thereafter, I took down the curtains to the students’ common room to curtail future such incidents since as many academics know that is where the student union does organised ragging. The student union had complained to the VC about my intervention. A JVP parliamentarian had also inquired about this incident from the VC. Without consulting me, the VC went on media to announce that my services would be terminated and had told the same to the students. A preliminary inquiry barred me for four years from any administrative posts and examination work. In 2020, a formal inquiry exonerated me from all charges but the previous punishment (based on a preliminary inquiry) is still in effect. In my view, our administrators do not stand firm with miscreant students and they yield to politicians unnecessarily. If proper discipline is to be adopted within the University, the VC and the Proctor must work together. They should listen to students’ and even politicians’ concerns, but they need to have the integrity and the courage to do what is in the best interest of higher education.”

The Vice Chancellor of the University of Ruhuna has shown that with strong leadership ragging can be eliminated. I only hope that the recent counter-attack by the Acting Vice Chancellor of the University Sri Jayewardenepura, calling the VC of Ruhuna a crazy man, does not reflect the viewpoint of other VCs. 

The solution for ragging is in the hands of each Vice Chancellor. No doubt, they will benefit from a complete disengagement of the JVP and the Peratugami Party from the activities of the raggers, and the end of covert support from the authorities. As has been shown at the University of Ruhuna, with strong leadership, the university community is capable of eliminating the scourge of ragging on their own.

The opinions expressed are the author’s own views. They may not necessarily reflect the views of the Advocata Institute or anyone affiliated with the institute.

What did we learn about distant education during the lockdown?

Originally appeared on The Daily FT

By Dr. Sujata Gamage

With the sudden closure of schools on 12 March, the Sri Lankan education system plunged into a crisis. Overnight teachers had to gear themselves for on-line teaching and other methods of distance education. In contrast to higher education, distance education for school-age children is a new phenomenon.

The Government of Sri Lanka swiftly moved in to address the concerns of students preparing for Grade 5 Scholarship examination and Ordinary Level and Advanced level examinations, due to start from August, by telecasting lessons for those students. However, the schools were not at all prepared for a distance learning mode, and hence innovation became an urgent necessity to reach out to the full student population.

Further, COVID-19 is not going to be fully curtailed anytime soon. Even if schools start, we can expect sporadic disruptions due to new waves of the pandemic. Therefore, it is critical that we come up with short-term fixes as well as long-term solutions to the distance education of school children in the time of calamities.

Considering the need, the Education Forum Sri Lanka (EFSL) has initiated a series of virtual dialogues on ‘Distance Education in the time of Calamities and Beyond’ to identify good practices in distance education and make recommendations to policymakers. Twenty or more case studies gathered through a focus group of teachers and researchers and further contributions by the participants of our first dialogue revealed several issues.

More than 60% of households with school-age children have no internet

According to a comprehensive survey of mobile use in Sri Lanka by LIRNEasia, in 2018 only 34% of households in Sri Lanka with children aged five to 18 had an Internet connection. More than 90% of these connections are accessed through mobile networks using a smartphone. 

Of these households with internet access, an Online Realtime Classroom experience is enjoyed only by students attending a few select schools. This experience would be for about one to two hours per day, with a variety of self-learning educational materials supplementing the online experience. The percentage of children receiving such an online classroom experience seems negligible given that even some of the popular schools in Colombo have not been able to provide that kind of experience to their students.

Essentially, the primary mode of distance education for 34% of families with internet access is receiving notes or assignments over mobile apps like WhatsApp and Viber. For those families for whom the smartphone is the only device connected to the Internet, dedicating it to the use by one or more children, with or without adult supervision, is difficult. When large quantities of notes are sent, the situation becomes unmanageable. The other 60% remained unreached.

Notes and tutes sent over WhatsApp is not education

Parents cannot substitute for teachers. Even parents who are teachers find it difficult to teach your own child at home. Without adult guidance, notes and tutes do not make an education. Further, as parents are finding out, the problem is not technology.

The mode of education in Sri Lanka, where large quantities of facts are communicated to children in preparation for exams, is perhaps the biggest barrier to distance education. Students being used to spoon-feeding is also tied to this testing of facts through examinations.

Plan around the least privileged

The situation is not dire. Even those unconnected are not without resources. To quote Kagnarith Chea, a young social entrepreneur from Cambodia with whom I communicated recently:

“Distance education requires one of three things – Device (phone, tablet, computer, TV), Network (intranet or internet) and Content. In an ideal situation, all three should be available. In a no-choice situation where there is no internet, we can do without it. In fact, when we launched my educational programs through Edemy we did it without the internet. So long as there are devices and content, distance education is still possible. I believe that this is the best scenario for kids without access to the internet in the time of COVID-19. There are always limitations, but access with limitations is better than not having access at all.”

In Sri Lanka, textbooks are given free of charge for all subjects in Grade 6-11, making notes and tutes sent over WhatsApp somewhat redundant. Mail service is available for almost all homes. In a partial lockdown, VIP services can be arranged for school children. Broadcast TV and radio are other modes that are more widely available. As some tech experts have pointed out memory cards or micro-SD cards have a lot of potential for distributing content under no internet conditions. These limitations have their positive side too.

Benefits of a leaner and smarter education will accrue to all

Thinking of distance education under low resource conditions of the least privileged forces us to focus on parts of the curriculum which can be integrated and parts which need to be taught on their own, and ration content overall. If the content is less and students are guided to be self-directed, some of these non-internet solutions can in fact lead to a quality distance education. 

Although the lockdown may be eased, schools may not start for some time, and the necessity of communicating a leaner and smarter education to children without internet may benefit the education of all children irrespective of their level of access to technology. 

No-internet scenario with rationalised content

For example, if we decide that Math is a subject where children will suffer most if they get less schooling, the full focus during a pandemic-induced distance education can be on that subject while other subjects are integrated into a lesson plan where key concepts are threaded around one or more themes. 

For example, valuable contact time and content delivery mechanisms can be focused on teaching math. Since students already have textbooks, all additional content will be supplementary, providing entertaining ways for children to learn difficult to grasp concepts. 

DVDs could be prepared and provided ahead of time for families to play over their TVs. Micro-SD cards can be made available for each math lesson for each grade. Owning a smartphone to use supplementary learning materials is more likely than parents purchasing internet access for undefined content. 

Once school starts, home-based learning drills could include sessions where students try to learn on their own using supplementary materials while the teacher plays the role of a parent who is more involved in the logistical aspects. 

Now, how would one integrate other subjects around one or more themes in distance learning situations? For example, for Grade 16-9 there are 13 required subjects. If you take mathematics out, COVID-19 epidemic provided the best theme ever for bringing other subjects – language, science, history, geography, religion, aesthetics, citizenship, health and physical education practical and technological skills and IT subjects together. The average teacher would need help with theme-based teaching and teacher associations led by veteran teachers could lead the way by developing and sharing lesson plans. 

Overnight, we could go where Finland has reached after years of providing world-class education in a traditional mode. Finland recently announced they will not divide school time into subjects anymore and students will learn key concepts of several subjects woven together around selected themes. If in Sri Lanka we are forced by necessity to limit content through the integration of subjects around a theme, when our children return to school, they may want such education to continue.

But internet access for all should not be far away

Sri Lanka and most developing countries have come a long way from a situation where owning a phone was a luxury to where, for example in Sri Lanka, 97% of households have access to a mobile phone. However, access to the internet is available for less than 50% of households in Sri Lanka. 

If parents see the benefits of their children learning to learn using supplementary content and note that children with better access to the internet have more and better content, those parents will go the extra mile to secure internet access for their children.

According to the 2016 Household Income and Expenditure Survey of Sri Lanka, parents in Sri Lanka already spend 50% of their education expenditure on tuition. If the need for tuition is reduced through a fewer number of examinations to be faced by children and students are required to learn on their own supplementing textbooks with e-content, it could well be that education will be the driver of digitalisation of Sri Lanka.

The opinions expressed are the author’s own views. They may not necessarily reflect the views of the Advocata Institute or anyone affiliated with the institute.