Sri Lankan education then and now

July 9, 2012, 7:31 pm , the island

For a long period of time, many letters have appeared in your journal dealing with education in the country. These have covered practically all aspects of the subject – but the fact remains that we all know that it is still in a "glorious mess."

This writer, who graduated 62 years ago and became a professional in his field, remembers with nostalgia what education was in the country then. There were no strikes, no inhuman ragging, no mass suspensions, no hold ups simply because those who entered the institutions of higher education then came to learn and not to fool, or play politics.

There were several institutions which produced the professionals required by the country such as doctors, lawyers, engineers, accountants, architects, teachers etc. These people had one thing in common; discipline and the ability to mingle among themselves with ease and dignity, though they were in different professions.

It would not be irrelevant to mention here what a famous scientist at the time said regarding university education that he would wish to have in UK, then. The scientist was the physiologist, Professor Lord Douglas Adrian, Nobel prize winner for Medicine, Vice Chancellor, University of Cambridge, President of the Royal Society and an Order of Merit. The occasion was the annual meeting of the Institution of Electrical Engineers, in London.

The subject was ‘University Education in Britain’. He summed up his speech with the following words; "the university education I wish Britain to have is one where a lawyer sitting side by side with a historian, should be able to discuss poetry."

This country, struggling to solve the problem or education, is still so far away from the above ideal that in the opinion of this writer, we will never ever be able to come even close to this ideal.

The writer hopes that the two ‘great guns’ in our Ministry of Education will see this ‘little piece’.

An Old Timer,

Colombo 4.