Cleaning university mess: Role of the academics and the State

With the rejection of the Cabinet decision proposed to resolve the problem of university academics, the issue seems to be dragging without a settlement. The lecturers’ main demands are a salary increase, increase in Government funding of the education system to 6% of GDP (Gross Domestic Product), end to political interference in education, and establishment of autonomy of the universities.

The university standards have plummeted, as indicated by the World University Rankings; products of the universities, the graduates, are unacceptable to the job market. Tens of thousands of graduates absorbed annually to the public service have failed to be engaged in productive work and are a burden on taxpayers. Thus any increase in salaries of university academics need to be coupled to elevation in education standards.

The Minister of Higher Education opened the closed universities, but the lecturers are missing. With the prolonging crisis, the lecturers are collecting support from student organisations and trade unions to impose pressure on the Government.

Newspaper comments

In my last article in Daily FT titled ‘Universities in crisis: Key learnings,’ I discussed the degradation of university rankings and made broad suggestions for improvements. There were a number of related articles in newspapers.

An article in the Daily Mirror highlighted: “The employability inadequacies of graduates due to non-revision of syllabuses, degree courses failed to be updated to suit the job market, majority students being taught Buddhist civilisation and geography, the inability of poor students to gain knowledge of English and IT at admission stage due to expenditure, and the various protests and strikes in the university that extends the course period.”

Friday Forum on 31 August highlighted: “There are of course serious issues of teacher underperformance in both universities and schools. There must be a system of enhanced teacher training and performance evaluation of all staff.”

“There is an over focusing on IT, Science and technology, undervaluing the humanities and social sciences has been recognised as a negative development in many countries in Asia including Singapore and China.”

Salary increase for lecturers

An article in the Daily Mirror titled ‘Sri Lanka’s Education Mafia’ detailed the appointment requirements of a university professor and reportedly the majority of our professors fail to conform to the required standards.

The article claimed that the gross salary of a probationary lecturer is Rs. 51,316, while a senior professor earns Rs. 126,536. If true, academics are certainly amongst the highest paid in the public service, apart from the politicians. Advocating any additional payments is based on specific performance and need to be measurable.

6% of GDP to education

University lecturers demand 6% of GDP be diverted to education and the current allocation is only 1.9%, a requirement of over three times the present expenditure. Lecturers are silent on how these additional billions will be used. Increase in additional funds would be at the expense of the development of the country and should be for specific purposes.

Military training

Physical training given to recent students prior to admission to universities under the security forces was criticised by the academics. In most universities in US, the first year curriculum specifies a physically exerting subject; students are expected to select from sports, military training and others according to facilities available and quite a percentage of boys and girls select military training as a subject.

Over-focusing on IT

The academics allege that the Minister is “over-focusing on IT, science and technology, undervaluing the humanities and social sciences which have been recognised as a negative development in many countries in Asia including Singapore and China.”

In Sri Lankan universities, IT and English were neglected with priority being given to humanities and social sciences. Naturally the system needs correction and for the moment priority becomes IT and English.

IT and English in schools

Students aspiring to enter universities, irrespective of stream of studies, need English and computer literacy to access the internet for research and knowledge. Without the proficiency of English, computer capability would be meaningless. Best would be to provide English and computer training at school level.

The current criteria that the Advanced Level students must be taught by a graduate teacher are an obstacle to computer teaching. The majority of computer teachers in schools are arts graduates who have picked some computer knowledge and are not computer graduates. IT graduate will not join the teaching staff at current salary.

The Education Department needs to re-educate graduates as diploma holders in IT and English, and provide computer laboratories to all schools.

IT and English in universities

In most foreign universities, students are expected to be proficient in minimum of two languages. While Chinese and Russian students study English, US and British counterparts study French, German, etc. In our universities, the majority of lecturers’ proficiency of IT and English is poor. This deficiency is not confined to the Arts Faculty, even in faculties that teach in English medium, the language skills of so-called lecturers are questionable.

Revision of syllabuses

University curriculum in practically all subjects has been stagnant and needs intense modification. It is common knowledge that some lecturers repeat the same lecture notes they received when they were students.

In majority of our universities, teaching amounts to reading prepared lecture notes and the hundreds (sometimes over a thousand) students write down the speech. Why should students waste their valuable time in copying the same note? Why cannot the notes be offered to the students as a book? Students could be requested to read the relevant chapter in advance and lecture could become a discussion of the subject matter.

Upgrading of university education

Everyone agrees that the quality of education needs elevating and degree programs be job-oriented, but how to achieve these is the problem. The university academics demand higher salaries, but are already highly paid. Further increase in salaries should include an arrangement for uplifting education standards to elevate employability of graduates.

My last article showed that the World University Rankings earned by every local university is above 2,500 and they dropped further. Given below are some of my thoughts which could become a basis to address the condition.

Deterioration of education quality

Deterioration of education quality in Sri Lankan universities commenced with the transformation of teaching from English to Swabasha and the decline continued over a half a century. Therefore the current staff is not entirely responsible for the mess.

Upgrading of the education system requires a massive effort from the lecturers individually and collectively, with the corporation of students and the Government. The lecturers would be expected to initiate and carry forward a massive transformation. To conduct the conversion academics need to be compensated for their additional efforts.

Improvement of lecturer capacity

A university teacher, irrespective of his discipline, needs computer literacy for communication and knowledge of English for research. The competency levels may vary, depending on whether he lectures in English or in Swabasha. If their standard is below par, they need to be helped by the English and IT departments of the respective university.

Lecturers need to upgrade their lecture material continuously in keeping with the universal developments, which has not been happening. To correct this situation the lecturer himself can propose improvements to his course materials for the current year. After a lapse of decades, the proper enhancements of lecture material may take time and improvements to teachings need to be a continuous process.

Measurement of improvement

The knowledge of English of students and staff could be ascertained by a test similar to IELTS as detailed in my previous article. For the assessment of improvement of lecture quality, lecturers’ current lecture notes need to be available. The lecturer could avail his current lecture material to be entered into the University computer so that improvements could be compared.

Entry of notes into the university computer would be a monotonous job and university students can be employed for the purpose. Sri Lankan universities, unlike other countries, do not offer employment opportunities for their students and this could become a starting point. But as lecturers are expected to update their notes on the computer, further entry into computers would not be necessary.

When the teacher reaches computer literacy and the required English standard and submits proposals for improvement of his course material, he should be eligible for a cash incentive. When improvement of course material continues on track, he could continue to enjoy his incentive. With the continuous improvement over a period, the incentive could be converted to a fixed allowance.

But if a particular lecturer refuses to improve himself nor the course material, he may have to be considered a misfit.

Improved education to students

The improved lecture notes would be available to the university students over the university intranet (details later) and the students are expected to study the relevant section for the day’s lecture prior to attendance. There would be no copying down lectures in the class, but would be a discussion on the important sections.

Tutorials would be an extension on lecture notes and the discussion, where students are expected to search over the internet or through the library. The students would be awarded grading based on the tutorials as part of the continuous assessment. The students so produced would not be bookworms, but with the ability to research, think and write, as demanded by the Employers.

University intranet

Each university is expected to have a local internet facility (intranet) accessible exclusively for the university staff and students. The access to intranet would be controlled through a password. The main university computer will keep track on users of the intranet and wade off intruders.

The Government will finance the establishment of university intranet and computer facilities in libraries, etc., and as the Minister for Higher Education has already promised laptops to every student, access to the intranet would not be a financial burden to students.

New courses of study

To improve the employability of graduates, development of new courses of study satisfying needs of the industry and commerce is a prerequisite. Identifying different courses of study is easy. All recognised universities publish courses they offer and give a summary of the course contents on their websites. If a lecturer were to spend few hours on the internet, solutions could be found.

University lecturers need to be invited to propose new courses of study. The proposal should include the subjects required, whether a similar subject is already taught, summary of course content, what modifications are needed, additional resources required in the form of buildings, equipment and staff.

The proposals for new courses would be ascertained by a committee and accepted proposals would be awarded Rs. 50,000 (say). If more than one proposal is received for the same course non-selected proposals too could be given a lesser cash award and ideas could be incorporated into the former.  With the acceptance of basic proposal, proposer would be invited to develop a working model, which would be presented to the fellow lecturers in the university, who are expected to extend constructive criticism. The proposal could be further improved by incorporating suggestions and the proposer would be eligible for further Rs. 50,000 (say). The new course of study would be implemented under the proposed. Our university professors could develop new courses, study the required subject matter and prepare a new lecture material for which lecturers are already being allocated time, are supposed to carry out and would be eligible for additional payments.

If the university lecturers do so collectively, with the introduction of new courses of study as demanded by society, students will have no problems in finding employment, university rankings will go up, and foreign students would queue for admission. The new courses of study should be for small classes, so that the supply will not exceed the demand.

Possible courses of study

Few examples of possible courses are given below as an indication and the potential is endless. Our hospital administration is conducted by senior doctors with years of experience, without knowledge of administration and finance, wasting their medical experience. In developed countries the hospital administration is in the hands of medical administrators with few years in the medical college, study administration and finance.  In some countries keeping medical records of patients are carried out by medical secretaries, who are especially trained with a medical background.

Dam and road construction uses natural materials as earth and stone. The materials are selected, tested prior to usage and during construction and the quality control is the responsibility of the materials engineer. ‘Materials’ are taught as a subject in civil engineering, but the industry requirement is far higher and specialised personnel are in demand.

The manner concrete being used in construction has seen vast development over the past decades, leading to concrete with enhanced properties as pumpability, higher strength, slow-setting, fast-setting, self-compacting, etc. Specially trained concrete technologists are a need for the industry.

Large numbers of countries in the world produce and export fruits, vegetables and flowers, an industry largely by-passed Sri Lanka. We need to move from our traditional plantation crops and diversify into other fields of agriculture. For diversification of cultivation we need specialists in plant breeding, a sector open to the universities. An article in FT few days ago highlighted that in countries that give value-for-money for visitors, tour guides in wildlife parks are bioscience graduates with further training in wildlife and photography.

Sinhala music-lovers talk of a golden era of song and music during the 1970s. Professor Sarathchandra from the Peradeniya University produced a number of popular dramas with actors and singers from the university students. Our students are taught to criticise and appreciate songs and drama.

The scores of professors who teach and over 10,000 students in our universities who offer Sinhala as a subject have failed to produce even a few who could compose a good song or a drama of similar standard. Our Sinhala professors could select 15 to 20 youth with talent and groom them to be song writers and drama producers.

The Sri Lanka Film Corporation studios are located close to the Kelaniya University and the two parties could join hands to generate film script writers and film producers.

Given above are few requirements based on the current needs of the society, but the numbers of possible courses are enormous and can be easily found in university websites.

Funding requirement

The above changes to university system would require improved computer and English teaching facilities, additional staff and buildings. Courses of study with fewer students will require additional lecturers and specialised facilities. The lecturers with their improved English, IT and improved course contents will be eligible for higher emoluments.

Schools too need improvements to educate children in computer usage and English. The teachers training colleges would be expected to generate persons proficient in teaching in English medium, which in turn needs retraining Lecturers in training colleges.

Proposers of new courses and their developers too would be eligible for extra payments. New courses will require additional staff, especially with reducing number in a class. Additional funding would be needed for the improvement of education; however the total expenditure is unlikely to reach even halfway of 6% of GDP.

The proposed payments to university teachers cannot be affected under the current system. But the Cabinet of Ministers has already accepted a proposal to consider the Universities to be regarded as a special entity. The eligibility criteria of extra payments and the process of continuous evaluation of lecturers need to be evolved.

The enhanced salaries might entice academics back to teaching, but employability of their graduates will not improve. The prolonged strike has granted a golden opportunity to seek innovative solutions to improve the quality of university education, and should not be disregarded.

(The writer is a Chartered Civil Engineer who graduated from Peradeniya University and has been employed in Sri Lanka and abroad. He was General Manager of State Engineering Corporation of Sri Lanka and left the position in February 2010. He is presently employed at a Chinese construction organisation. He also ran a manufacturing and a sales organisation for over a decade.)