ANALYZE THE NATURE OF QUALITY EDUCATION IN SRI LANKAN

EDUCATIONAL SYSTEM
The education system of every country plays a pivotal role in promoting economic growth
and shared prosperity. Hence, all the countries pay special attention to improving their education
system same as Sri Lanka. As in other Asian countries, Education is a basic right in Sri Lanka.
When compared to many other developing countries in the world, Sri Lanka shows remarkable
progress, in terms of basic education.
The Present Situation of the Education System in Sri Lanka
The general education system in Sri Lanka provides 13 years in three cycles. Children
from 5-10 attend primary school (Grade 1-5), from age 11-14 junior secondary school (Grade 6-
9), from age 15-16 senior secondary (Grade 10-11) and age 17 -18 collegiate or GCE Advanced
Level - A/L (Grade 12-13). In Sri Lanka, schooling is compulsory for children from 5 to 14 years
of age. All students must study their language, second language (English), Maths, Science,
History and Religion.
The public schools offer curriculum prepared by the Ministry of Education and the private
schools offer local as well as the British syllabus. There is a new set of private English medium
schools established recently and they are approved and registered by the Board of Investment
(BOI) - Sri Lanka.
The government spends about 4% of the GDP on education, which helps to improve
literacy and school enrollment for both males and females. Sri Lankan educational system was
designed to provide education facilities free to all students from Kindergarten to University
education. The government also provides free textbooks and uniforms (3 for a year) to school
children. The establishments of Central colleges, the introduction of national languages (Sinhala
and Tamil) as the medium of instruction in primary schools, and free mid-day meals have helped
to improve school enrollment mostly among poor families.
Is the Sri Lankan Present Education System good?
When compared to the developed countries in South Asia such as India and Malaysia, the
Literacy rate of Sri Lanka remains above 93%. Similarly, Sri Lanka has surprised the world with
its powerful education system. However, there are a few main reasons to highlight the Sri Lanka
education system as a good system.
1. Free education Facilities
2. Gender equity in education
3. Quality maintained in the field of education
4. Introduction of school and institute for children with special needs
5. Bilingual teaching methods in education
The practicality of the Present Education System in Sri Lanka
For an education system to be successful and practical, there are various competencies to
be included besides knowledge, such as creativity and skill development, ethics, discipline,
leadership, communication and leisure. But, Sri Lankan education lacks many such competencies.
Students should have more freedom and leisure to discover creative and innovative things. But it
has been restricted from primary education. Skill and attitude development are not considered a
priority in the current education system. Further, the existing examination system does not
encourage students to learn and perceive. So, owing to all these reasons, the practicality of the Sri
Lankan education system is not satisfactory.
Quality Education System
Quality is a concept which has made inroads in every sphere of life including education.
Quality is a much more complicated term to define than it appears because a variety of
perspectives such as the customer's perspective and the specification-based perspective should be
taken into consideration.
In the field of education, the term ‘Quality’ has been attributed to multiple meanings such
as ‘exceptional’, ‘excellent’, ‘fitness for purpose and ‘enhancement or improvement’ reflecting
different ideological, social and political values of diverse stakeholder groups (Harvey and
Knight, 1996). Rasheed (2000) identified effectiveness, efficiency, equality, relevance and
sustainability as five key dimensions of quality. UNICEF (2000) recognized five dimensions of
quality in education: learners, environments, content, processes and outcomes.
Quality and Standards are not alien elements to the education system of Sri Lanka. For
several decades there were practically interminable discussions about the actual performance of
the education system and what that performance should be. The need of the time however is the
creation of a school that can contribute towards confronting the problems and challenges that a
meaningful living in the new millennium will involve.
Challenges for Quality Improvement.
Sri Lanka faces the following main challenges when improving the quality of education.
 Access to education. Sri Lanka has made remarkable progress in expanding access to general
education (primary and secondary), but access to vocational education, and higher education
needs improvement. While there is equitable access to primary and junior secondary education,
senior secondary, and higher education is still not always easy for the poor, those living in the
rural and plantation sectors and less developed provinces, and women. The access gap between
the poor and rich has been widening.
 Learning outcomes. Although learning outcomes in general education have been rising, the
results of national examinations and achievement assessments suggest that by international
standards, learning levels in Sri Lanka are still low. There are serious disparities in all subjects
by province, gender, economic group, and location. The quality and relevance of vocational
education and higher education programs are also questionable.
 Education and labour market outcomes. Though the Sri Lankan labour market is
characterized by low unemployment, the informal economy is large and underemployment is
relatively high. A special concern is the magnitude of youth unemployment, the low
employment rate of women, and high underemployment, especially for women and rural
residents. Though earnings increase with education and vocational training, there is evidence
that the premium for additional years of education has been declining over time—perhaps
because of the mismatch between the skills in demand and the education of the workforce.
For Quality Education System in Sri Lanka
Therefore the attention should be directed not only at the increase in the cognitive development of
the school but rather in bringing about its development in terms of quality so that the basic
objectives of education can be achieved. The Asian Development Bank in one of its early reports
referred to five problem areas which hinder the development of education quality. They are as
follows:
1. Equity and Access
2. Relevance of Education
3. Quality of Education
4. Lack of Resources.
5. Accountability and Efficiency.
For the development of Education quality what is required is that objectives of Education should
be achieved in the school system. For this, the schools should be engaged in a relentless effort. An
important activity required for this is that the school should adopt a planning and management
methodology. It is by identifying strengths concerning education quality in the class that the
school can achieve a standard of quality. For a successful school, these strengths should be greatly
developed.
By the operation of a monitoring and evaluation mechanism, it is possible to improve the quality
of any educational institution. It will also facilitate the implementation of the plans of an
institution. The resource efficiency and productivity of the institution will also be consequently
enhanced. All the physical and human resources in a school and the whole educational process
should be used in such a way as to provide a quality service to the client.

E.M.N.D.K.EKANAYAKA-2022ME07