The Big Picture
I felt better after last week’s rant about the teachers at the school.
Speaking of which, your comments have been wonderful. My next blog is will be a Talkback so I’ll have the opportunity to respond in detail. Thanks so much–some of them were very helpful!
However, it may be surprising to you that all that was actually delivered with a rather narrow perspective. When detailing problems within a system, it’s always important to step back and look at, well, the whole system.
Allow me to transport you to windswept hills of tea and cinnamon! Mother Lanka, whose proud Sinhala ancestors suckled on its ancient water tanks and created cities to elevate an infant Buddhism to its universal glories! Even as goats bleat while kneeling on railroad tracks, Lanka’s children march forward to an ever brighter future! Oh, industrious–
No. I’m sorry. The word “industrious” has no place in Sri Lanka. If we substitute it with “bureaucratic,” then we’ll be on the right track.
It is helpful to realize that teachers in Sri Lanka are government employees. In fact, a majority of Sri Lanka’s workforce is employed by the government.
Doctors at government hospitals, teachers at government schools, workers laboring on government roads, grunts at the government-run Port of Colombo–all of them are government workers and are all happily awaiting their turn to pick from the ripe pension tree.
Sri Lanka hands out government jobs as easily as coconuts grow on trees. The Port of Colombo–you know, those shipping docks where Titanic-sized boats load or unload their cargo–employs 18,000 workers. By comparison, Singapore’s ports has only 2,000 workers…and moves ten times as much cargo.
It is prestigious to work for the government. You get paid well, and you also get a very nice pension plan. The government promises entire university graduating classes full employment, and when they don’t deliver, these graduates strike by blocking off roads until each one has a government job.
This expectation of government-sanctioned employment goes to the very top. Sri Lanka’s Cabinet holds 105 members (or 107; the 4 February English newspaper contradicted itself on the number). That’s 53 Ministers, 21 Deputy Ministers, and 33 Non-Cabinet Ministers. This is easily the largest Cabinet in the world.
Among these distinguished men and women are the Minister of Water Supply and Drainage, the Minister of Irrigation and Water Management, the Non-Cabinet Minister of Water Supply, and the Non-Cabinet Minister of Irrigation. With so many people looking after Sri Lanka’s water system, we can expect nothing but the best.
Take transportation. Sri Lanka is proud to have a Minister of Petroleum Resources, a Minister of Highways and Road Development, a Minister of Transport, a Non-Cabinet Minister of Highways, a Non-Cabinet Minister of Highways, a Non-Cabinet Minister of Petroleum Resources, a Non-Cabinet Ministers of Road Passenger Transport, a Deputy Minister of Highways, and a Deputy Minister of Railways. Surely with all these enlightened Ministers continually improving Lanka’s transportation system, matter-energy teleportation cannot be far off.
And should the American President’s mission of nation-building in Mesopotamia ever be thrown into doubt, he can rest easy by choosing from any of Sri Lanka’s five Non-Cabinet Ministers of Nation-Building.
And finally, we must not forget to mention the two Ministers of Sports, who both, upon being named, raced for the previous Minister of Sports’ cushy office, with one beating out the other with only moments to spare.
That’s one hand. On the other hand, we have the simple prestige of being a teacher. It gets you hitched. The same applies for woman doctors. 80% of Sri Lanka’s female doctors do not practice medicine. They went through medical school just simply add the Dr. in front of their names, exponentially increasing their chances of getting married. What man would turn down an educated woman, especially one with a government job and pension plan?
The end result is that you have government-employed teachers who were in it just to get married, are earning comfortable salaries, are enjoying high status and prestige in society, and are difficult to fire. Well, at least the literacy rate is in its low 90s, the best in South Asia.
That’s the big picture here, folks. It’s a very different system. But just because it’s different doesn’t mean it doesn’t need reform. At Rohana, quite a few teachers and the principal do not buy into this stuffed bureaucracy and are keen on improving their little, forgotten corner of Sri Lanka’s massive educational system. I am eternally grateful for their presence.
Still, I’m going to start pushing a little harder from now on and track down teachers who are not showing up to their classes but instead wandering around the school yard, acting very much like a lost student instead of a highly respected government employee.
However, I’d be remiss to end this post, titled “The Big Picture,” without providing a few pictures of my own, so here are a few random shots:
A rare sight–girls playing cricket! This impromptu game lasted for just five or ten minutes before we had to go line up for evening prayers. Iresha, the current bowler, is waiting for someone from the field to throw her the ball, while Chamali and Nimasha are batting.
A few Saturdays ago, the boys created their own cricket tournament. From left to right, I present the Sri Lanka, England, and America teams. England came out on top with a 2-0 record, while America went for second with 1-1 and Sri Lanka came dead last, losing both games.
I still hang with the boys far more than the girls, mostly simply because I can enter their dormitory while the girls remind me that theirs is strictly off-limit to my type. However, they get more and more comfortable with me–and some are now even bold enough to poke my sides or jostle my hair. From left to right, Gayasha, Anuradha, Kalaini, Irangika, Anushika, and Pesnila.
Samantha (on far right) asked me if I wanted to go see a deaf wedding. “SURE!” I said. Only it wasn’t a wedding–the wedding was actually the day before while this was the reception. Weddings in Sri Lanka are two-day (lit. “white sari” and “red sari”) events, apparently. Wearing one of the school boys’ shirts (they strongly disapproved of my original outfit), I am standing next to the newlyweds on my left, and the bride’s four girlfriends, all deaf, surround us.
After the reception, I went back to the school, and we all walked to the temple for poya day prayers. From left to right, Ishara, Ruwan, Rajitha, Sanjeewa, Kumara, Jeewatha, Ishara, Sudath, Priyankara, and the awesome deaf matron, Chaminda.
Hi Adam,
What a learning experience! Reading about the system reminds me of my early days of teaching in the inner city of Chicago where teachers, once tenured, got away with anything and doing nothing, very frustrating! Love your pictures, although I must say that your writing describes things in ways that produce pictures in my head. Look forward to the next one.
Debbie
How was the wedding?
Yeah! I felt like I was visiting Sri Lanka AGAIN. Big hi to everyone there for me, especially Samantha! Adam, was Iresha the one I met when I visited Rohana?
And yes, do a blog about the wedding. What was it like?
hey adam..
you should also realize because sri lanka is SOOOO small in population and geography size, and really runned down by the government- they actually have a higher literacy rate than most 3rd world countries, and even beats India at that- despite the fact that India is taking off in her own high-tech way.
i came across your blog when researching for my undergrad disertation and have just spent the last couple of hours reading all your entries. i can totally relate to everything you have written (esp. your love for the birnjal curry and thr local yougurt). i spent my gap year working in an orphange near to anradapura in 2003 and have been back to sri lanka 3 times since to do more volunteer work in a home for disabled children in kalutara. i love it out there so much and cant wait to get back . im heading back out at the end of march for a month to start on my diserataion research.
will you still be around then? i would love to meet up with you if you are and hear more about your views on the education of deaf children in sri lanka as that is going to be the focus of my disertation.
hope to hear from you soon and keep up the good work
fiona
fcaldow@hotmail.com
i appreciated your effort to really step back and look at the big picture.. there’s gotta be more to it though. there are other countries with incredibly high employment, guaranteed by the government, and when not — guaranteed unemployment compensation; examples: cuba & certain parts of europe; where education is pretty damn impressive (and often better than the US). perhaps it is the circumstances in the other countries; maybe a higher “dole” allows for more flexibility; or maybe there is something culturally instilled like the sense that your work IS important to the community, to the country. just throwing out some thoughts, one cant answer these questions without thoroughly researching a couple of different countries & then doing a comparative analysis.. though..
that said, the number of people in the cabinet?! wow! and its a little depressing to see how valued marriage is & that women would work to just to get married… your account of the situation of emplyment for women is new to me.. what i have learned is that sri lanka actually has a relatively high number of women that emigrate to other countries to work as domestic workers in an effort to help take care of their ow families in sri lanka. sri lanka was one of the 1st countries to start exporting women to the middle east in response to the demand for domestic workers. perhaps the women who go through med school are of a different economic class? and those who do not get to go through school, do not get educated at all? I’ll send you an ILO report if you’re interested..
and my god, blog about the wedding!
Adam, I am an old name for you! Amy S. sent this to Rob and I. I have to say I loved reading about your experiences again… last time when you got the cochlear!
your experience is amazing and you are making a great difference… I couldn’t be more proud to know you!
More pictures too- they are great!
Wendy (Hagele) Stapf
Adam - I love reading your blog and am always so moved by your commitment. I hear your frustration that it’s not shared by some of your fellow teachers. My husband is an administrator in a large Charter School (K-6) in Chula Vista near the Mexican border here in San Diego. The majority of their students are in the ESL category but in the first few years of the charter, the greater challenge was to weed out teachers at the top of the pay scale who were only marking time until retirement. The primary motivation to be in the classroom being that they were still drawing breath, and the longer they stayed, the greater their retirement compensaton.
One of their most successful innovations has been to implement a home visitation program where teachers are required to visit every student assigned to his or her class before school starts each year. Teachers almost always are able to establish a rapport with families, get a sense of their circumstances and individually connect with students. They also established a “Leadership Council” of teachers on staff, voted in by their peers, who provide input, propose new programs and manage teacher related issues in tandem with the Principal. Conversations overheard between teachers on the playground now are excited ones about students and their development rather than gossip and personal lives.
I realize political and cultural constraints in Sri Lanka are vastly different but I see a similar thread in past suggestions from others in this blog. Find ways to give teachers more status and involvement. Painting blackboards - brilliant!. There must be many more projects at the school that could be taken on by teachers and students.
Looking forward to next time - keep it up. You are the best.
hi again! just wanted to say that reading the various comments from people in your life has been fascinating. there seem to be people from all sorts of backgrounds, quite a few tied in with education & i’ve really enjoyed the chance to hear what they have to say — your idea of blogging has allowed for that opportunity.. just another reason im glad you have this website