EDUCATION PITFALLS

In respect to the former, the Government plans to build 600 centres by 2010 and train 1,500 teachers to staff them. In the coming fiscal year, 50 such centres will be built and about 100 teachers trained. However, these figures imply a fundamental shortcoming. If these teachers are intended to staff the new centres, that means that two will be assigned to each centre. But what will the student population of these centres be? The accepted teacher-student ratio in kindergartens is one to ten — and even then only in a situation where there are five or more teachers in a controlled environment. At 1,500 teachers for 600 centres, the ratio is about the same. So none of these centres can have more than 20 students, which means that the programme is catering for 12,000 students. Yet Prime Minister Patrick Manning cited a figure of 30,000 toddlers to be served by the centres by 2010. This clearly cannot work.

Early childhood centres have two main functions — one, to train children in formal cognitive skills; and, two, to socialise children in respect to interacting with their peers and with adults in a learning environment. Research suggests that the first function is trivial — children’s academic abilities are not harmed if reading, writing and calculation are taught at a later age, nor does early education provide any significant academic advantage in later life.

But the second function is crucial since, contrary to popular belief, children are more powerfully socialised outside the home than in it. In this respect, one of the most important decisions parents can make in respect to their child’s attitude is choosing the right pre-school. But many parents do not have that option, so the government-funded centres will be crucial. If these centres are places with chaotic environments where the first thing children learn is that Miss or Sir has neither control nor competence, it could negatively affect the rest of their academic lives.

At the other end of the educational spectrum is the Government’s introduction of free tertiary education.The most crucial point of this measure is that it is temporary. Naturally, the Government did not say so, but it is highly probable that, when the energy bubble contracts, this will be one of the first cost-cutting measures to be implemented. So free tertiary education may benefit the next four or five batches of students in three- and four-year programmes. At the end of that time, if we are lucky, the nation will have a sufficient portion of persons with higher education to help keep the country on even economic keel.

In this regard, it is therefore crucial that the Government implement measures to ensure that students work for a certain length of time after they graduate, failing which they must pay the fees that they were exempted from. However, it is not enough that Government impose this obligation on students — the Government must also ensure that there is productive work (or at least an effective on-the-job training programme) available for all these students. As past experience with scholarship winners has shown, it often happens that individuals pass their time doing nothing, not because they are unwilling to work, but because the government has nowhere to put them.

There is no doubt that the ideas the Government has outlined are good. But, as with all other aspects of the Budget, the crucial question is that of implementation. Without that, these same ideas can actually harm, instead of help, our country.