Need to modernize Sri Lanka’s archaic education law highlighted

By Zahara Zuhair
The need to modernise Sri Lanka’s existing education law, which is required to carry out educational reforms, was underscored recently at a forum held in Colombo.

“The current education code law is Education Ordinance (No. 31 of 1939). Since then, we have not had a single act for general education though we had several acts for different sections such as examination.

The Supreme Court in 2007 pointed out when discussing with regard to access to school to Grade 1, that there is a legal vacuum for education in this country. This is a situation we need to overcome,” National Education Commission (NEC) Vice Chairman Dr. G.B. Gunawardena said at a policy engagement forum organised by the Institute of Policy Studies (IPS) this week. The Education Ordinance (No. 31 of 1939), which was enacted after a long deliberation, still remains the basic law of education in Sri Lanka. 

Gunawardena said that though several attempts were made to push the implementation of new policies and proposals over the last couple of decades, such attempts have failed. “As the NEC, what we can do is, we can submit recommendations to the president. The president, according to the existing law, should declare if he/she accepts it as a policy. 

But this has never happened in the last 26 years. At 18 occasions, recommendations have been presented to several presidents, from President Premadasa up to the present president, but it has failed,” he charged. 

Proposals for a national policy on general education in Sri Lanka for the next decade were submitted to the president by the NEC chairman on January 26, 2017, at the President House. The prepared set of recommendations is guided by the key concept of raising the quality of education policy proposes on general education. 

Dr. Gunawardena said that they are hopeful that the latest proposals they prepared in 2016 would be accepted by the present policymakers. 

However, sharing contrasting views, education sector specialist Dr. Upali M. Sedere said that an act would not resolve the problem but what is needed now is an educational policy framework. 

“An act itself will not resolve problems. Many countries don’t have an act. There are many reasons; an act itself will not bring any solutions. Sometimes it locks you up in the process of the needed change,” he said. 

He was of the view that as education is a process, it cannot be structured. 

“This is why many developed countries do not have educational acts. We need an education policy framework. 

What is important is the need to understand the pillars where the investment should go, which direction it should go. Sometimes it locks you up that it becomes the bottle neck. You need to have a policy frame work that guides you though giving you the chance to go through the change,” he said.