| |
Small
Schools Close, Increasing Drop Outs in Sri Lanka
By Feizal Samath, Inter Press Service |
| |
 COLOMBO,
Mar 24 (IPS) - Dozens of small government schools across Sri
Lanka are set to close this year under a new scheme to maximise
the use of limited financial resources, while the students are
to be transferred to other schools. But, according to some educationists,
the children are more likely to drop out instead. |
| |
| The
government's 'School Rationalisation Programme' intends to shut
down schools with few students. A senior Education Ministry
official said the government was finding it difficult to pay
for the upkeep of some 2,650 schools with less than 100 pupils
each. |
| |
| ''The
whole idea,'' according to the official who declined to be named,
''is to provide quality education and at the same time give
maximum resources and benefits to all students.'' |
| |
|
To
the affected students and teachers alike the government's
plans, implemented this year, are counterproductive and contrary
to its commitment to the Education for All (EFA) goal. The
numbers of drop outs will only grow, they fear.
|
| |
| The
United Nation's childrens agency UNICEF has expressed concern
over the falling enrollment rates in Sri Lanka. More boys than
girls are stopping school -- a trend only prevalent in Sri Lanka
and the Maldives in the South Asia region. |
| |
| ''Earlier
this year I was asked not to admit new students to grades one
and two and to send them to another school. One boy who enrolled
there has already dropped out after just three months saying
he couldn't afford it,'' says the principal of a village school
of 25 children due to close. |
| |
| The
principal explained that though education was free in government
schools, poor students cannot afford the other ''hidden'' costs
that students are compelled to pay like contributions for a
sports meet or bus charges. ''This is one of the main problems.
When they have to incur these costs, however small, they (students)
opt to drop out of school,'' the principal, who has over 30
years of experience in schools across this island nation, said.
|
| |
| His
school has been targeted by the mayor to become a vocational
training centre. ''Politicians are interested in their political
career not on the social needs or welfare of the community.
What happens to these 25 children if the school is closed? They
may not want to go to school again,'' he says. |
| |
| This
has happened to schools like Subodhi College at Wellawatte in
a Colombo suburb which shut down earlier this year. The school,
in rundown premises overgrown with weeds, had a total of three
staff members and six students. For years it had received no
funds, apart from staff salaries. There was no teaching as a
result. The children played all day while the teachers, if they
were present, drank tea and chatted. |
| |
|
The school was closed under the government's new scheme, and
the teachers transferred to other schools. The students were
offered admission in nearby schools, a local education official
said, but not one has come forward. |
| |
| While
the abandoned school is now being eyed by a local government
politician for one of her grandiose projects, six more children
have joined the ranks of school drop outs in Sri Lanka. |
| |
| Sri
Lanka, with an admirable literacy rate of 90 percent, has a
schoolgoing population of 4.3 million. The country's education
policy is committed to providing a primary school within two
kilometres of the home of every child in the six to 10 age group,
and a secondary school within 5 kms of children over 11 years.
|
| |
| Education
authorities say they are willing to release funds for providing
basic facilities and teaching aids to schools as long as there
are sufficient numbers of students enrolled. |
| |
| Yet
parents complain that they are forced to send their children
to schools far from their homes due to the lack of facilities
in village schools. As a result there is a serious problem of
overcrowding in the bigger schools with 45-55 students packed
into classrooms that should be between 20 and 30. |
| |
| ''It
is a Catch 22 situation. Parents don't want to send children
to schools with limited facilities while education officials
don't want to upgrade these schools unless there are sufficient
students,'' one official observed. |
| |
| K.C.
Wijesinghe, a director at the Colombo education office, said
the new scheme will maximise resources and make effective use
of not only school buildings and space but also teachers. |
| |
| All
primary schools with just a few students will be asked to close
and students absorbed into other schools within a radius of
one km, while small secondary schools will close only if there
is another school within a 4-km radius where students can be
admitted, he said. |
| |
| The
school in Oruthota village, about 33 kms north of Colombo, is
famous for producing doctors, public servants and school principals.
Yet it closed this year due to a shortage of students. In the
early 1980s, there were 400 students on the rolls. When it closed,
there were only six. |
| |
| Sixteen-
year-old Asoka Priyadarshini, a student who completed her O-level
examination last year, is furious over the closure of the school
which is right next door to her home. ''It is a vicious circle.
Because facilities were not being improved parents stopped admitting
children. Some parents including mine appealed to the education
officers to improve the facilities at the school. But it was
too late,'' she said. |
| |
| Now
her mother has to take her two siblings to a school which is
five km away every day. ''The village school was closer and
much better,'' Priyadarshini laments. |
| |
| This
article is free of copyright restrictions and can be reproduced
provided that Inter Press Service is credited. |
| |
