Thursday 28th November, 2024
The JVP-led NPP government has disappointed its detractors, who expected it to act like a bull in a china shop, after capturing state power. It has chosen to act with restraint, and cross the river by feeling the stones, as legendary Chinese leader Deng Xiaoping said. So, Cabinet Spokesman and Minister Dr. Nalinda Jayatissa’s assurance, on Tuesday, that the incumbent government would not ban private tuition came as no surprise. However, in saying so, he placed shadow education in the spotlight. At this early juncture, the new administration may not be able to reveal how it will handle issues concerning private tuition, but it will have to treat them as a high-priority policy concern and act accordingly.
Since its ascension to power, the JVP has demonstrated that it is no longer a dyed-in-the-wool Marxist outfit; its prolonged stay in electoral politics and numerous honeymoons with the non-Marxist parties along the way have had a mellowing effect on its revolutionary ideology. At present, its policies arguably reflect a blend of left liberalism, libertarian socialism, and some elements of Marxism. So, the captains of the shadow education industry, as it were, need not worry about a ban. Above all, they themselves campaigned very hard for the JVP-led NPP’s victory’, didn’t they?
Shadow education is not a phenomenon limited to Sri Lanka. The International Handbook on Education Development in Asia-Pacific (2022) informs us that private tuition is prevalent in several rich countries of East Asia, notably Japan and South Korea as well as in lower-income countries in South and Southeast Asia, such as India, Sri Lanka and Cambodia; it is also flourishing in Kazakhstan, Myanmar, etc. Private supplementary tutoring market is reportedly expanding in Australia as well. Increasing access to the Internet has given a big fillip to the growth of shadow education.
In Sri Lanka, private tutoring services that mimic curricula prescribed for public schools has been taken for granted all these years just like sidewalk hawking. They lack accountability and are free to charge fees, according to their whims and fancies. No serious effort has been made by successive governments to regulate shadow education despite its educational, social and economic implications. Researchers such as Achala Gupta and W. Dawson have pointed out that private tuition centres reproduce social class inequality created by a formal education system. Besides, in Sri Lanka, shadow education takes a huge chunk out of household income. According to available data, 65% of urban households and 62% of rural ones invest in private tutoring in this country, which takes pride in its free education system!
A ban on shadow education is uncalled for, but if action is taken to ensure that the state sector teachers carry out their duties and functions properly, there will be no need for private coaching, which is an indictment of the public school system. We have witnessed countless teachers’ protests, demanding better pay, etc., during the past several years. Some leaders and members of teachers’ trade unions have entered Parliament from the NPP. If the new government is keen to develop the public education sector and restore the people’s trust therein, it will have to ensure that teachers in state-run schools and universities work harder to raise the standards of their institutions.
President Anura Kumara Dissanayake has announced that students will be given an allowance for purchasing school supplies. This scheme will stand most parents in good stead amidst the current economic crisis, but one hopes that it will be properly targeted so that the needy students will benefit therefrom and it will not lead to a waste of state funds. However, the President can render a bigger service by giving the public education sector a radical shake-up and ensuring that schools provide a better education so that students will be less dependent on unregulated private supplementary coaching, which takes a heavy toll on their physical and mental wellbeing, and aggravates their parents’ pecuniary woes.
