COVID 19 impact on Education Sector in Sri Lanka

2020-05-07 14935

WORLD TREND

(Professor Kennedy D. Gunawardena)

The United Nations recently reported that 166 countries closed schools and universities to limit the spread of the coronavirus. One and a half billion children and young people are affected, representing 87 percent of the enrolled population.

With few exceptions, schools are now closed countrywide across Africa, Asia, and Latin America, putting additional stress on education systems in developing countries, many of which are struggling to provide quality education for all.

Most education systems in low- and middle-income countries were grossly underfinanced even before the coronavirus crisis. The Education Commission, convened by Gordon Brown, had called for increases in domestic resources, foreign aid, and private and philanthropic efforts. The Commission’s “Learning Generation” report estimated that spending on education in low- and middle-income countries must more than double between 2015 and 2030, from approximately $1.25 trillion per year to nearly $3 trillion.

Countries that depend heavily on trade, tourism, or commodity exports may be at especially high risk right now, as raising domestic resources will be difficult. For example, the price of oil has fallen from $63 per barrel in early January to $20 per barrel today, a shock to budgets in countries with large proportions of young people ranging from Timor-Leste to Nigeria. Many other lower-income countries have acquired significant debt in recent years, making them especially vulnerable to economic shocks. According to the IMF, two-fifths of low-income countries are at risk of, or in, debt distress.

In poorer countries, education finance depends much more heavily on households than it does in wealthier countries. (Private expenditure accounts for 38 percent of spending on education in low- and middle-income countries versus 19 percent in high-income countries). Poor families make extraordinary efforts to support their children in school. If a coronavirus-induced recession leads to loss of jobs and income, consideration must be given to protecting poor families—shielding them from the potentially tragic dilemma of choosing between school or work, health care, and even food for children.

Winning the long game will require protecting and even continuing to increase e-ducation financing from domestic and international sources. The coronavirus will impact budgets, but it will not change this basic demographic fact: Education systems must continue to grow and improve in low- and middle-income countries, whose young people will profoundly shape the world.

e-Sri LANAKA INITIATIVE

Sri Lanka’s Former Prime Minister Ranil Wickremesinghe has initiated the path of becoming an attractive place for business in South Asia and one of the fastest growing regions in the world. Under this theme, intelligent leader of Former PM Ranil made foundation to start e-Sri Lanka concept in 2005 The flagship ICT programme of the Government of Sri Lanka, known as the e‐Sri Lanka initiative, was launched under the PM Ranil’s idea. Partially funded by a US$53 million grant by the International Development Association (IDA), the e‐Sri Lanka initiative focuses on the use of IT to improve governance, reduce poverty and improve the quality of life of all Sri Lankans. The objective of this roadmap is to take the dividends of ICT to every village, citizen and business and also transform the way the Government works.
It is clearly stated in the Roadmap that in order to use of ICT as a key lever for economic and social development, telecentres and other forms of public access to information and communication services will be established in the future. As a result, e‐Sri Lanka's Telecentre Development Programme (TDP), which is called “Global Knowledge Centres” (GKCs) was launched in 2005. This is a long‐term plan to connect every village in Sri Lanka to the internet. The TDP is expected to produce the following benefits for the residents of small rural communities, who are the predominant target group:

ESTABLISHMENT OF 1,000 "Telecentres" or “Nanasalas”

ICTA has incorporated GKCs under the “Nanasala” label to introduce several models of telecentres to be established in all parts of Sri‐Lanka to spread ICT services to the rural and semi‐urban population. The aim of the project is to meet the infrastructure requirements in order to address the information and communication needs of rural areas in all parts of the country through the establishment of Nanasalas, and the provision of ICT‐based services.

The objectives of the Nanasala (RKCs) programme is to establish multi‐service community information centres which provide access to the internet, e‐mail, telephones, fax, photocopy, computer training classes and other ICT services as well to act as a hub of local, national and global information resources to provide a catalytic effect for rural communities in poverty reduction, social and economic development and peace building while aiming at providing these services in a long‐term, sustainable manner. In Phase One it was estimated that 100 centres would be created in the South and North East region, which have little or no access to ICT. These centres follow an entrepreneur‐owned model, where eligible owners who reside within the community can apply and are selected in a transparent and competitive evaluation process, and are given intensive training in how to run a sustainable Telecentre for the benefit of the owner as well as the local community.

e‐Library is a smaller version of the RKCs but follows a community model where some services are provided free with a few paid services to maintain the sustainability of the centre. These centres have telephones and computers with high‐speed internet to access national, international and local information. Computer‐based training (CBT) media are available to use off‐line in Sinhala, Tamil and English. There is also a large e‐library of books and periodicals for the use of students of all ages. These centres are in the process of being established in the centre of villages, mainly in places of worship, public libraries and community centers. IT‐trained clergy will also be used as instructors. Eight hundred of these Nanasala e‐Libraries will be opened within the next two to three years. There were around 150 Nanasalas (RKCs) and e‐libraries open by the end of 2005, predominately within the deep South and North East regions of Sri Lanka.

Distance and e‐learning centres will have all infrastructure facilities such as a video conferencing room, a multimedia computer laboratory and a playback room. The overall objective of the DeL Centre project is to provide new information sharing and learning opportunities to a large spectrum of users in the country.

In order to provide ICT facilities for tsunami victims, ICTA established small computer kiosks or Nanasalas in welfare camps where people who have been displaced due to the tsunami reside. This programme is intended to provide much needed information on health, education, and other relevant content in local languages and to create a database of information on residents. All services to the camp residents are provided free of charge.

COVID 19 AND FORMER PM RANIL'S CONCEPT

The last few weeks have witnessed heightened awareness of the threat from the outbreak of COVID-19 (coronavirus). As the virus spreads around the world, we also need to understand what it means for the education systems and Business in Sri Lanka.

With the need to contain the virus, many countries are implementing measures to reduce gatherings of large crowds. Our schools are not immune to these actions, nor to the spread of the virus. Many countries have now implemented measures in their education systems – from banning gatherings to the temporary closing of schools.

"TAB" FOR STUDENTS

Again, former PM Ranil has initiated another hurdle for our students but no support from the parliament opposition and community to distribute TAB s to the student’s educational purpose. It became jock among Sri Lankan teachers and women. At this stage, this is important, however just that it is a different kind of teaching. Students are being educated remotely using technology. This is being done through a variety of online courses and electronic textbooks

To date, almost all countries in the Europe and Central Asia region have instructed their primary and secondary school systems to close completely or partially, to stop a possible virus spread among students and the general public. The question is, from an educational perspective, what do these students do when schools are closed?

In China, a massive effort is underway to make sure children keep learning. Technology seems to be the answer. We will only know how effective this is after the crisis, but it does seem to be a good use of children’s time. Home schooling might be an answer, but this option is not very widespread outside of the Sri Lanka

In Sri Lanka, we have a diverse set of countries at different levels of income and development. The spread, use and availability of technology is key, as is the availability of online learning materials, as well as devices and the level of internet connectivity at home.

At the same time, one more important question is: can students actually benefit from technology at home? Here we clearly have an equity issue. While financially well-off families can afford computers and multiple devices, students from struggling families can hardly afford simple devices and may likely not have the internet at home.

In terms of internet connectivity at school, most countries in the Europe and Central Asia region have the basic capabilities that enable schools to deliver instruction using technology. Only a few countries lack this capacity.

What is happening on the other end of the internet cable? In many countries in the region we see that home connectivity has become widespread and home internet connections may enable students to connect to different type of learning resources.

As many countries have been implementing computer equipment programs in the region over the last few decades, they are better positioned in terms of technological equipment in schools. For example, as per our assessment of the IT equipment and internet connectivity in schools, 20% of them have basic resources to ensure the minimum ability to deliver content.

At the same time, another 20% are in a position to provide good computers and networking with decent internet connectivity and robust security. Yet, with all this progress in a majority of countries, one-third are in the unenvious position of not being fully equipped nor fully connected to the internet.

Let’s look at educational content. Two-thirds of school systems do not use digital content in education. Another 20% of countries use some digital learning resources in teaching, but only in some schools. A mere 10 percent of countries have more robust digital learning capabilities with some of the educational content available outside of school. No country, according to our assessment, has universal curriculum-linked resources for teaching and learning, regardless of place and time.

At the same time, countries that lack access to good teaching in remote areas try to use this capability for education improvement, both by using the older and proven technologies such as radio and television broadcasting, and leveraging the potential of ICT. This is where teacher training with digital technologies and applications becomes important.

Media, and especially social media, can also be used to educate students about the virus itself and to teach basic hygiene. In Vietnam, for example, a cartoon musical video about handwashing and other precautionary measures to protect from the virus has gone viral.

Sri Lanka current education systems are designed for face-to-face teaching and learning, the lock-down and school closures may be accommodated if they happen in short periods of time. However, if the situation continues to last for months, it may need a dramatic change in delivery.

Many school systems are turning to technology as an alternative to in-school instruction. Classes have gone online, while many educators talk of “reimagining” education in ways that will shift it from a classroom- and teacher-centered model. however, is a simpler radio and television infrastructure. Rather than rushing into potentially expensive new education technology investments, school systems might consider rapidly scaling up educational radio and television programming, which has ready potential to reach a great number of students and educators.

TEACHERS

Teachers are the head and heart of the educational enterprise. Many developing countries have worked hard to build a qualified and motivated teaching force. At the same time, many have suffered setbacks due to conflicts, natural disasters, or long-term governance problems. It is an unfortunate sign of the times that disaster response and recovery is becoming a core business of governments and the international community.

The coronavirus may present explicit risks to the teaching force. Government budgets will be stressed. Some teachers may move from their posts to their hometowns or seek other work if school closings are prolonged. For example, Sierra Leone and Liberia faced considerable logistical challenges in repositioning teachers after conflicts in the early 2000s and again after the Ebola crisis a decade later.

In Sri Lanka the gap between the rich and poor is growing considerably, even though some may have connections to ICT, there are many others who have not even used a computer. The digital divide is also wide. According to the Department of Census and Statistics (2019) in Sri Lanka the literacy rate of urban sector households is 31.1% as compared to the estate sector which has a literacy rate of 8.4%.

One noteworthy point of this census however sets the Western Province apart with a computer literacy rate of 27.7% which is much higher than all other districts. By looking at this evidence and from practical observation of the Sri Lankan environment it can be concluded that there is a subculture of Sri Lankans that are IT literate. The research done in this paper focuses on this ‘net generation’ (who spend at least one hour watching television, playing computer games or surfing the net) and how technology can be used to teach them. There may be a digital divide in Sri Lanka but when we consider private higher education students it is observed that all students know how to use a computer and most students have internet access at home as well as access to a personal mobile phone. This sub-culture of students are in the most part tech savvy and receptive to information, they are a generation who’s questions are answered by Google search engines.

Sri Lanka maintains high educational standards as compared to the rest of Asia (Gamage and Halpin, 2006) however when we look at research papers with regard to the local context it is quite clear that even though there is potential for e-Learning it is not implemented on a broad scale. Research done by Thowfeek and Hussein through an investigation of South Eastern University Sri Lanka found out that lecturers here are optimistic towards accepting e-Learning methods (2008). Even though we can see a positive outlook here it should be noted that research done in Sri Lanka with regard to e-Learning includes simpler technologies such as casual browsing of the internet, use of SMS facilities and telephones. Most of the research done with regard to ICT focuses on developing the computer literacy of the country and talks about issues such as the digital divide, distance education centres and growth of telecommunications due to the recent increase in competition in this market, deregulation of ICT policies, e-Readiness and computer literacy (Thowfeek & Hussin, 2008) Literature written by Gunawardena (2007) did however include some new topics such as incorporation of virtual private networks, ADSL, implementation of WAP and e-government.

Governments can take steps now to maintain and protect the teaching force. First and foremost, they need to ensure teachers continue to be paid and are positioned for a rapid school reopening once clearance is given. Second, they can make health and safety upgrades to schools, improving sanitation facilities and guidance on issues like handwashing and health education. Finally, to make up for lost time, they can replace traditional long holidays with an extra school session. Governments might even experiment with more permanent changes to the traditional school calendar, balancing local community rhythms with a schedule of teaching and learning that optimizes students’ and teachers’ time together.

The digital economy will empower our nation by providing affordable and secure internet connectivity to every citizen in Sri Lanka, removing barriers for cross-border international trade. A platform for cashless payments will also be created. In addition, digital technology will be added to the school curriculum. We plan to foster entrepreneurship opportunities in digital commerce, while providing training in cyber-security monitoring and response. This statement has adopted from former PM Ranil in his parliamentary speech in 2018 December. It shows us his future orientation to develop the country. Unfortunately, opposition and some group of community badly refused such as e-Sri Lanka and TAB for Students concepts. Today. We all realized that how those concepts are valuable in education and business under the COVID 19 situation.

THE DIGITAL ECONOMY

The digital economy will empower our nation through providing affordable and secure Internet connectivity to every citizen in any part of Sri Lanka, removing barriers for cross-border international trade. A platform for cashless payments will also be created. Digital technology will be included as a new subject in the school curriculum. We plan to foster entrepreneurship opportunities in digital commerce while providing training in cyber security monitoring and response.

CONCLUSION

Distribution of tablet computers for GCE A/L students will be implemented from the next school term, Former Prime Minister Ranil Wickremesinghe said before the presidential election. Unfortunately, New Government, fully disagreed and tarnished her reputation as well. The Former Prime Minister further said that the Government’s objective is to create a future generation that’s ready to face the challenges of the future by introducing smart classrooms and tabs for Sri Lankan students. How important those initiation, still young people and women in Sri Lanka thinking strong man or hero for their leader than visionary leadership.

The coronavirus crisis is a deep and sudden shock, but it is unlikely to be the last. Governments should not lose sight of the long-game: ensuring that all children and young people in low- and middle-income groups are educated. To build a healthy, prosperous, and secure future, let’s ensure school systems are adequately financed, make smart use of technology, and protect teachers.