Did You Know?
by Life In Taprobane (wijitha.blogspot.com)
photo by flickr.com/photos/txd
Early this year, we were looking for an English Medium boarding school for my son. We found boarding schools. We found English medium schools. But there are no English Medium boarding schools in Sri Lanka.
In other words, if your child does not speak either Sinhala or Tamil, he cannot study in any government or private school in Sri Lanka. He would only be able to study in an “international” school – the kind that operates under business licences and not monitored or regulated by the ministry of education.
So why would schools such as Royal, St. Thomas’, St Joseph’s, Trinity or Museaus claim they have an “English” medium when half the subjects are taught in one of the native languages? What would someone who doesn’t speak Sinhala or Tamil do – go back to where they came from?
They say that the quality of a country’s workforce is a direct reflection of the standard of education. Ours, is in shambles. We boast of very high literacy rate, but send our kids overseas for higher education. As a country, we spend too much money in “purchasing knowledge” from the US, UK, Australia and Singapore (now India, Malaysia) etc, when, as a whole, we could have built fabulous universities with that money, right here, in our own land so that more and more generations could have reaped the results.
Our aging education module needs desperate change. It is the 21st century, yet we still don’t breed certain skill sets that are needed for today’s world. For example, the advertising industry needs creative professionals – but none of the universities actually produce them. I would love to hire a few art directors or graphic designers for our network overseas, but unfortunately, the Sri Lankans are not on par with the rest of the world.
Planners, stylists, animators and touch-point marketers etc will never come out of our universities. Jobs we do today should have been in our education system 10 years ago, not 10 year later.
Tthe top 10 in-demand jobs in 2010 did not exist in 2004. The radio took 38 years to reach an audience of 50 million, while Facebook did it in 2 years.
The number of internet devices in 1984 was 1,000. In 1992 it was a million and in 2008 it was a billion. Increased by a million times in just 24 years. When the world is moving at such speed, why are we stuck in yesteryear?
How will Sri Lanka cope when 2030 dawns..? Are we future ready..?
More details: wijitha.blogspot.com
yOU ARE NOT THE ONLY PARENT WHO IS FACING THIS SITUATION. ALMOST EVERY ONE WHO AT LEAST LIVED ABROAD AWHILE IS IN THE SAME SITUATION. I TOO HAD THE SAME ISSUE AND PUT MY CHILDREN AT A LEADING INTERNATIONAL SCHOOL, THE CHAIRMAN OF THIS SCHOOL IS A RENOWNED EDUCATIONISTS WHO STUDIED UNDER THE LAMP POST AND OBTAINED FREE EDUCATION ( HE TELLS THIS STORY TO EVERY PARENT AND STUDENT ), BUT INCREASES THE FEES AT LEAST BY 8K EVERY YEAR WITH NO IMPROVEMENT IN THE QUALITY OF EDUCATION. I WAS FORCED TO TAKE OUT MY CHILDREN AS I COULDNT AFFORD TO PAY 62K PLUS PER TERM FOR A A/L STUDENT. SO I ADVISE YOU 2 TEACH YOUR CHILDREN SINHALA/TAMIL IF THEY ARE STILL SMALL AND PUT THEM TO GOVERNMENT SCHOOLS .
To this writer Wijitha
The Govt must restructure the Education System which needs immediate attention, but the universities should not be privatised depriving the poor rural students.
If privatization allowed they will suck all our local professors & lecturers thus depriving govt universities.