Ten-year education plan for Jaffna – PM

A 10-year-plan will be implemented to improve the quality of education in Jaffna, Prime Minister Ranil Wickremesinghe said.

He made this observation at a ceremony to present letters of appointment to Northern Province teachers who worked on contract basis and as volunteers in the Sri Lanka Teachers Service, at Temple Trees yesterday.

The Prime Minister instructed Education Minister Akila Viraj Kariyawasam to take necessary measures to implement the 10-year-plan with the assistance of Northern Province Education to improve the quality of education in Jaffna District.

“Before the conflict started, the standard of education in Jaffna was very high with a large percentage of students from the District qualifying for university entrance,” the Prime Minister said.

“But as a result of the war, the education sector in the North was paralyzed largely due to the lack of physical resources and valuable human resources,” the Prime Minister said.

He further said that the entire education system in Jaffna had completely collapsed. Therefore, we have to take basic measures to uplift Jaffna’s education sector. It will take nearly 10 years to achieve this target. A special education mechanism should be introduced for Jaffna with the assistance of retired teachers and principals.

Education Minister Akila Viraj Kariyawasam said the government wants to improve the country’s education system without any discrimination. During the past few years, a number of measures had been taken to solve major issues such as teacher shortage and the lack of physical resources in the Northern and Eastern Provinces.

“When the present government came in to power in 2015, only 60 percent of the country’s schools had electricity and we have been able to increase it up to 98 percent. School sanitary facilities have also been improved. Measures have also been taken to ensure 13 years’ of contributory school education and also to introduce 26 vocational subjects,” Minister Kariyawasam said.

He further added that a revolution is happening in country’s education under the present government.

State Education Minister V.S. Radhakrishnan, Northern Province Governor Reginald Cooray, Ministry Secretary Sunil Hettiarachchi also participated.

(Source: Daily News – By Ishara Mudugamuwa)