Free Education: A letter to the President

| An Open letter to the President Rajapaksa by the Federation of University Teachers

( April 25, 2012, Colombo, Sri Lanka Guardian) The accolades that Sri Lanka has received since independence for its impressive social indicators has been the result of the establishment and protection of two basic institutions: universal free health and free education services. These two sectors have enabled Sri Lanka to meet two fundamental rights of its citizens without discrimination; many of the putative developed countries are still trying to achieve these despite their wealth. Hence this is an achievement of great distinction and one that needs to be protected at all costs.

However, it is with great dismay, that we observe that the current government under your Excellency’s leadership appears to be gradually destroying one of these pillars of post independent Sri Lankan society: namely, free education. As the Federation of University Teachers (FUTA), our intention is to draw your attention to the damage being wrought on the state university system, which constitutes an important institution within the education sector. While we are equally disturbed by the deterioration of the primary and secondary education sectors, recently epitomized by the Advance Level examination related Z-Score fiasco, in this instance, we will focus only on the state of tertiary education.

Your government and the Minister of Higher Education has made quite clear its intentions of supporting private universities, destroying the autonomy and independence of universities and slowly but surely paralyzing the effective functioning of the state university system. We observe the following with grave concern:      / Read More »