New GATE does not solve old problems

2. One does not have to be anti- people or anti-education or anti- poor to appreciate the problems with GATE.

3. The biggest problem is that many so-called tertiary level institutions are not providing tertiary education.

4. The Government is paying enormous amounts of money for students to acquire what is essentially an upper high school qualification.

5. The only real beneficiaries are the money-making institutions.

Since student fees are guaranteed by GATE, they couldn’t care less who they enroll - the more, the merrier. Of course, in order to sustain business, these students must “graduate”.

6. With the advent of GATE, we do have many more people walking around with “degrees” but most know very little of what they are supposed to know.

Because standards vary so widely, I recommended then that students pay their own tuition fees initially (with exceptions made for the needy) and upon “graduation”, the Ministry of Education administer a simple test in the appropriate subject area. If a student passes, their fees will be refunded. Trust me, the test will not have to be of “degree” standard – basic subject matter will suffice.

The details of how the tests will be set and administered can be worked out but I submit that it will weed out most of the abuse of the system while ensuring that those who pass through will be of some value to their employer.

Which brings us to the current debate over the changes to GATE.

The biggest problem is that the bands are too wide. For example, a household with an income of $9,999 pay nothing while those who earn one dollar more will pay 25%.

Those who earn $10,001 will pay the same (25%) as those who earn $19,999. And those who earn $20,001 will pay the same (50%) as those who earn $50,000 or more.

While I can understand the need to simplify the system, clearly, this is not equitable.

A fairer, but not perfect, approach is to make the bands smaller.

For example, $10,000-14,999 (20%), $15,000-19,999 (25%), $20,000-24,999 (30%), $25,000- 29,999 (40%), $30,000-34,999 (50%), $35,000-39,999 (60%), $40,000-49,999 (80%), $50,000 and over (100%).

Even fairer is to make the payment scheme “continuous”, where the amount you pay is in direct proportion to what you earn. For example, suppose we want those earning $10,000 to pay 20% and those earning $50,000 or more to pay 100%. For an income of between $10,000 and $50,000, the percentage to pay would be 20 + (inc – 10,000) x 80/$40,000.

In this scheme, the following payments will apply: $20,000 (40%), $25,000 (50%), $30,000 (60%), $35,000 (70%), $40,000 (80%), $45,000 (90%). Other income values will pay a proportionate amount. For example, each $500 increase will pay one percent more.

The adjustment to GATE is a step in the right direction. However, while it will save the Government some money and the level of abuse might be less, much needs to be done to address the real problems (such as meaningless certification) associated with it.

Noel Kalicharan via email