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Only
political will can stimulate change in education system
Former
Tertiary Education Minister Kabir Hashim discusses the problems
of the university system and suggests avenues to depoliticise
the beleaguered higher education sector
Q:
What were your sentiments when you were appointed
the Tertiary and Technical and Vocational Training Minister
during the previous government?
A: Even though the position was not a cabinet portfolio,
it was an immense responsibility that came with huge challenges.
It was in fact two ministries merged into one and within the
current government there are seven ministers doing the same
work that I did alone. This gives an idea of how much work
had to be done as well as the large amount of resources wasted
by the present government.
Q: What were the main
challenges you focused on?
A: Our university system is highly politicised. Normally,
student unions are supposed to be an expression of democracy
and that is how political values are imparted to the next
generation. However, in the current context, unions are totally
politicised and they are not student based. Most student unions
are simply used for political agendas and they have little
concern for the welfare of the students or the universities
inhabited by them.
Q: Do you believe in
the free education system? Should it continue?
A: I totally believe in the free education system.
In fact, it was former President J.R. Jayewardene who spoke
for free education in this country even before the purported
Father of Free Education C.W.W. Kannangara and our party has
always been dedicated to preserving those values. It is imperative
that the state remains involved in areas such as education
and health, to provide quality service to the poor, as the
state is devoid of a profit motive. Nonetheless, there can
be a balance whereby the private sector becomes involved to
deliver free education without diluting quality. No government
anywhere in the world can give unlimited funding. I have always
had a vision to make free education more qualitative, market
and demand driven rather than relegate it to the supply demand
curve that it has occupied for decades.
Q: What are the demerits
of having a supply driven higher education system?
A: Students enter university simply because it is there
for them to have it for free. They never consider what sort
of job they can get into by blindly following a degree and
the result is that they waste four years of their life and
emerge from the universities to find that they are not employable.
This frustration then provokes them to violence, a situation
that is understandable given that they have no alternative.
Over 51% of our graduates are art students and they have the
lowest employment rate. In contrast, 0.5% of our graduates
have studied IT and they are all employed. Moreover, there
is a huge dearth in the IT industry so these are the subjects
that we must encourage students to follow, if they want to
be in demand by the present job market.
Q: What were the initiatives
that were implemented during your tenure?
A: The current government is focusing on increasing
the number of universities, but not the quality of education
supplied through them. The Sabaragamuwa University is a perfect
example of this; the attention is not on how to improve standards
and maximise the capacities of universities but rather to
churn out more unemployable graduates. This must stop. We
need to improve and modernise syllabi in addition to building
world-class academics and the process must be enshrined in
national policies. This is the biggest problem of this country,
the absence of national policies and how plans made by one
government are not taken forward by subsequent parties in
power. Critical development markers such as education should
exist without political colouring, especially because they
must be sustained over a long period of time. I was aware
right from the start that the benefits of my tasks would be
reaped by educational ministers and generations of students,
decades after I had left office. Sadly, even that was not
to be. People can accuse me of having done nothing for the
tertiary education system while I was Minister, but what they
must understand is that it is a long drawn-out process that
was cut short by elections. We did not have the chance to
implement our plans and they were not taken on by the next
government.
Q: What were the specific
projects that you were involved in?
A: We launched a project in conjunction with the World
Bank titled Improving Relevance and Quality of Undergraduate
Education (IRQUE) worth around US$ 60 million. The short-term
objectives of it was to build a critical mass of change agents
through a focus on staff development and the participation
of stakeholders, create successful models of quality through
relevant and high quality study programmes, create incentives
for performance through a competitive funding mechanism and
foster sustainable development. The long term goals were to
modernise the higher education system through reform of the
legislative and administrative framework to allow greater
autonomy of human resource management and financial management,
cater to the increasing demand for undergraduate education
and involve the private sector as a major source of revenue
for higher education. However, all these require changes to
the Universities Act. We also wanted to initiate fund for
equal access to university education to support children from
poor families.
Q: How would these procedures
have been synchronised?
A: The plan was to scrap degree programmes that were
outdated and re-design them to meet international standards.
To assure international recognition we were to appoint an
autonomous and independent ‘Quality Assurance and Accreditation
Board’ that would evaluate all degree programmes in all
universities and streamline them in accordance with one standard,
which can in turn be used to measure against international
levels. Right now the same degree is taught through different
syllabi in different universities and that means that there
can be no standardisation.
Q: What ultimately happened
to all these plans?
A: I was bombarded with accusations of fomenting a
diabolical plan to privatise universities and the present
government worked hand in glove with unions to launch a series
of strikes against us. My response was to encourage a public
debate in the media about this issue and make them understand
that this was not a ploy to privatise universities but rather
to infuse private sector involvement. State involvement is
essential but it cannot be all encompassing. Human resource
development is one of the key indicators of economic growth.
Yet, the number of unemployed graduates and the number of
students who are not even admitted to university simply because
of space constraints indicate strongly how the system has
failed. The JVP is clearly using the universities for political
ends.
Q: How can the private
sector be linked to provide practical training?
A: What we proposed to do was to introduce a voucher
system for all students so that they can take it to any university
or higher education institution and use up the credits allocated
to that voucher. This would enable the student to do the degree
of his choice rather than to be slotted into only the degree
that he was chosen into. Even a student who did Arts can,
if he chooses to, follow an IT degree or perhaps look into
marketing. Whatever the job market demands, he can choose
it. But these were bold initiatives that were difficult to
implement as a minority government. Without Executive Presidential
powers or even provincial council clout, it was difficult
for our government to stand up against the propaganda. Ideally,
we should have had at least a year to have a public debate
over this issue but it all came to an end too fast.
Q: What in your opinion
are the changes that should be made by the Tertiary Education
Ministry?
A: Right now the Ministry is struggling just to survive
on a day-to-day basis. They are fire fighting rather than
operating with a conscious vision. The Ministry is a miserable
failure. There are so many private organisations in this country
‘selling’ substandard degrees, so what is wrong
with the private sector being involved in the process? How
can they justify what they are doing? If you ask the University
Grants Commission (UGC) Chairman where his children are studying,
the answer will probably be a foreign university. Everyone,
from the President to the Education Ministers, sends their
children abroad. How can you convince the common man of the
value of higher education in this country if they themselves
do not believe in it? It is gross injustice. Children from
middle and upper middle class families are the ones that gain
university entrance while the son of a poor farmer from Binthanne
cannot. Are these the principles that the free education system
is supposed to expound? These politicians are only thinking
about the next election not the next generation.
Q: How should the unions
be dealt with?
A: When I was the Minister, they would come and barricade
my office and not even let me out to have lunch. But I would
always find time to talk to them and listen to their demands,
most of which were given. But there are a handful of demands
that are not legitimate and even god cannot help them with.
A prolonged dialogue of this nature will make the students
realise that genuine efforts are made to assist them as much
as possible. This would diffuse the tension between unions
and officials so that they begin to have faith in the administrative
systems. Therefore, when politicians try to incite students
within unions with unreasonable demands they will be able
to realise the true agenda and not be used for political purposes.
Installing transparent and efficient systems will weed out
politicised factions and return unions to the purpose they
were originally meant for.
Q: Have you experienced
an instance when these schemes have worked?
A: Yes. It was during my tenure that a student from
the Jayewardenepura University was ragged to death and we
moved in even though the situation was heavily politicised.
We devised a semester attendance system that made it mandatory
for students to attend classes so that they were distracted
from the incidents taking place outside lecture halls. We
appointed a new Vice Chancellor and the incident was brought
under control. But some of the ministers in the present government
including Minister Ranjith Siyambalapitiya protested and had
the VC removed. Subsequently, all the good work that we did
disintegrated in one stroke. These ministers must take the
responsibility of answering to the children of this country
for what they did.
Q: How do you feel about
the mushrooming private higher education institutions?
A: I am totally against them. These places are fleecing
students and the hard earned savings of the parents. Because
there is no control system there is no quality either. In
India, the government had to finally intervene and ban certain
organisations because they were giving bogus or sub-standard
degrees. Unscrupulous individuals do not have to apply to
the Education Ministry to start a higher education establishment;
they can do so via the Board of Investment (BOI). This must
change but that requires legislative initiative.
Q: Research and Development
(R&D) is notably absent in universities. How can this
be solved?
A: A self sustainable R&D agency must be linked
to the industrial sector. Right now only the Moratuwa University
undertakes R&D projects and they cannot exist as purely
academic institutions.
Q: How must the administrative
and managerial systems change?
A: Academics have their own mafia. They are incredibly
difficult to change. Even though there are good people who
wish to change the system, they too are caught in the red
tape. Strong political will must exist to stimulate this change,
but that means the person in question must also be prepared
to become unpopular. We had plans to upgrade the Open University
distance learning programme to be in line with the best in
the world by gathering private sector funds to take over part
of teaching and training. However, I do not see that drive
happening within the system any time soon. There must be increased
civic consciousness that will push political leaders for change
of minds and attitudes. Only then will we see a real change.
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