Glimpses of the real university crisis
November 2, 2012, 8:14 pm
By Professor G. H. Peiris, The Island
(Continued from yesterday)
What
all these add up to is that the case for a general salary increase to
the entire community of university teachers is not very convincing,
unless its capacity to blackmail the government more effectively than
most other categories of workers is added to the weight of that case.
There are many in this community that need and deserve a substantial
pay hike. There are many who do not. Rajiva Wijesinghe’s analysis on
‘hours of work’ (referred to earlier in this paper) is of utmost
relevance here although it reveals only a part of what goes on. In
fact, the reality is much worse. In certain faculties at Peradeniya the
convention is that teachers arrive at their work place between about 8
and 9 in the morning and remain there up to about 4 or 5 afternoon,
regardless of the number of hours of formal teaching. In others,
especially where the teachers are expected to spend much of their time
at the library, there is no such regularity, even though only a very
few are ever seen in the library – perhaps they have all their books at
home. I have known teachers who loved to teach. A few of them
routinely taught hours and hours, well into late evening, with no
reward whatever other than the satisfaction of breeding competent
graduates. I recollect a professor at the very apex of his profession
who could have minted money in private practice, but lived frugally,
rode to work on a Vespa, and took a break off his work at the
university and the hospital only for a snack lunch from the Milk Bar at
the entrance to the Peradeniya Gardens. They are the legends, adored
by their former students. At the other extreme, I also know of a
Peradeniya don who had a full-time private sector job in Colombo with a
spacious office and support staff, and whose appearances at the
university were few and far between. There were several I knew whose
contribution to higher education was through private tutories and not
the university. No need to go into other sordid details.
There
must surely be at least the semblance of a link between work and pay.
Admittedly, devising a system which would facilitate the targeting of
higher salaries and other benefits on those who need and/or deserve is
not easy. But certain steps could be taken in that direction.
On
the basis of impressions (which obviously require verification) I am
inclined to say that it is those in the middle grades of the university
academic staff who need and deserve a substantial increase of their
emoluments. That stratum consists largely of scholars who have been
exposed to recent advances in their specialities. Those fresh from
their probationary study leave tend to carry heavy loads of teaching,
and also have the drive to engage in productive research. At the same
time, it is they who face serious problems in respect of housing,
children’s education and other essential needs. Since the intrinsic
worth of the doctoral or masters degrees varies widely, a system should
be devised to take into account the "value" of each such qualification
(the type of research done, the source of the degree etc.) in the
salary ‘placement’ which need not be at the bottom of the ‘Lecturer
Grade’ scale. Again, there are certain loosely applied requirements for
promotion from ‘Lecturer’ to ‘Senior Lecturer’ grade that should be
made more rigorous, but with the promotion being made more rewarding to
those who pass muster. In short, the university system must devise
methods of rewarding exceptional merit. In certain fields of study the
"merit promotion" system, supposedly based mainly on internal
evaluation, has become a joke.
It is also possible to use
‘Housing’ for staff (and students) as a mechanism of targeting benefits
within the university system in a meaningful manner and improving the
quality of its education. It appears in retrospect that Peradeniya at
inception was somewhat over ambitious in the way it attempted to cater
to this need. The buildings in the less ‘landscaped’ campus backyards
such as Mahakanda, Upper Hantane and North End could have been less
ornate and more functional like, for example, those provided at the
universities of Kuala Lumpur and Singapore; and thus made to cater more
effectively to an expanding demand which ought to have been foreseen.
At other universities in Sri Lanka the housing need has been almost
totally neglected. In the case of the universities located in the
metropolitan area, providing a residence within easy access to the
university (which is certainly within the capacity of the government)
would, I think, be equivalent to raising the salary of those at the
middle grades of the service by at least 50% (at prevailing levels of
house rent and costs of commuting); and it would have an invigorating
effect. This could be done if those in authority are less enamoured
with under-utilised and over-ornate constructions ostensibly to
beautify the city and to "serve the people". But both these objectives
would be better served by reducing the need for large numbers from all
over the country to come and crowd the city.
The existing
provisions for an year’s sabbatical leave with pay and travel
allowances at the end of seven years of service could be made more
meaningful than at present. The large majority of university teachers
are unable to make use of this privilege on account of their inability
to find paid assignments at universities abroad. A few of them I know
have hence resorted to the hilarious practice of getting their friends
at other universities to invite them as ‘visiting professors’ and
collecting, in addition to their normal salary, a salary from the
university they ‘visit’. This is not what sabbatical leave is meant
for. It is intended to facilitate the periodic exposure of our
university teachers to the academic world outside and to thus upgrade
their scholarly experiences. As a corrective measure it would be
possible to device a system under which the option of shorter periods
of overseas leave (not necessarily in the west), with substantially
enhanced allowance (to levels adequate for the recipient to spend time
at a good university abroad) is offered to teachers who qualify for
their sabbatical leave. There is no doubt that host universities could
be found without difficulty for those with reasonably good records of
research and do not have to depend on payments from the host
universities. And, some of the prospective hosts will offer reciprocal
exchanges of scholars, leading sometimes to highly beneficial link
programmes.
University Autonomy
The recent
infamous ‘UGC Circular’, the gist of which is that Selection Committees
for recruitment and promotion of university teachers should have two
UGC (i.e. ministerial) appointees with veto powers is, arguably, the
most blatant and insidious attempt hitherto made to pave the way for
political control of university affairs. It represents a crude
infringement of the only aspect of university autonomy that has
hitherto remained largely (but not entirely) uncontaminated by
political interventions. At one of the Selection Committees in which I
served (before my retirement from university service in 2003) the
telephone call from the President on behalf of one of the applicants
came (it so happened) while the very same applicant was being
interviewed. We listened with much appreciation to the
Vice-Chancellor’s end of the conversation in the course of which he
respectfully explained to the President that the selection is being
done impartially by a committee in which no one has overriding
authority. The unanimous decision of the committee was to disqualify
the applicant in accordance with regulations pertaining to "canvassing"
in such selection procedures. I still do not know whether what we did
was right, because the rejected applicant was the best of the lot. If
it is OK for Vice-Chancellors to be political appointees, what it wrong
in appointing Assistant Lecturers on the same basis?
As
everyone knows university governance in Sri Lanka has never been free
of political interventions. Political control of university affairs
through the exercise of powers over key appointments (and dismissals) in
the university system – ‘National Council of Higher Education’
(1966-70), Vice-Chancellors (from the very beginning), ‘University
Grants Commission (1978 onwards) and Councils of all universities
(throughout) existed all along. Since 1966, all Vice-Chancellors
(including certain activists of the ‘Friday Forum’ referred to above on
whose scholarly credentials, I should hasten to add, there is not the
slightest doubt) were appointed by politicians. And, I know of only one
Vice-Chancellor who had the guts to resist the intense pressures for
his removal following a change of regime. He told the government: sack
me if you will, I won’t resign. The new government did not have the
legal powers to sack, and he was spared. Moreover, even some of the
most vociferous champions of university autonomy have hardly ever
turned down offers from political leaders. For instance, there was
fierce protest when M. J. Perera, the eminent ministerial appointee to
the post of Vice-Chancellor of the University of Ceylon arrived at
Peradeniya in 1968. Within a few brief years several who had been at
the forefront of that protest gladly accepted political appointments
within and outside the university system – most of them picked not so
much for the expertise they possessed but as reward for political
support. This has been the case ever since. Here again, I know of one
person who, when nominated to the Vice-Chancellorship with greater
backing of the University Council than any other, stipulated in a
memorandum submitted to the minister various conditions (pertaining
mainly to university autonomy) under which he would, if offered, accept
the post. Needless to say, no offer came his way.
My
recollection is that it was on the eve of the parliamentary elections
of 1971 that, for the first time, a large group of university teachers
published (through purchased newspaper space) an individually signed
‘Appeal to Voters’ to support the oppositional coalition. The "appeal"
itself was brief, but the list signatures and names was long and
prominent. One cannot say whether the voters were swayed by the appeal.
But we do know that the ‘coalition’, after its electoral victory, was
swayed to give some of the dons the administrative posts which they
asked for. Such appeals have, since that time, become a regular
pre-election ritual. I have been told by a person whom I trust that a
former Chairman of the UGC kept in his office drawer these ‘appeal to
voters’ as ‘works of reference’ to guide him in matters such as
appointments to posts in academic administration and nominations for
fellowships and scholarships in the university system over which he was
the final arbiter.
So, my point is that political
interference in university affairs is, at least partly, a problem of
the dons’ making. Politicians will always want to control everything.
Over many years politicians of the parties in power have tended to
treat the universities as a job bank for non-academic jobs; and most of
the Vice-Chancellors readily accepted lists of persons already
selected by their ministers for such appointments. And now, the minister
wants to extend that power over academic appointments. That is no
surprise. If, in the present instance, the minister insists on sending
his nominees to Selection Committees, why don’t the deans and the dons
boycott the committee sittings, and make an issue of it. They will, I
am sure, have enough backing of the desired type (hopefully, not from
politicians struggling to make their way back from political
wilderness) to make the minister succumb.
Concluded
There have been many people in support of my mother’s cause and I
am both humbled and strengthened by it. Those who stand with us today, I
feel, stand not just for my mother. They stand for the independence of
the judiciary and a democratic society. My mother believes in this
country and it’s people. She has been a citizen of this proud country
for 54 years and have dedicated almost 32 years in various capacities
for this country. The country has not betrayed her. It’s people have not
betrayed her. Those who govern have betrayed the country it governs and the people who elected them.
