During my father’s time at S. Thomas' College Mount Lavinia in the 1930 and the 1940's the standards of education at least in the private schools were very high. As Dr Harsha Aturupane said – in his article in last week’s Sunday Times FT on education-- only a small fraction of the people got a good education then.

However, during my time at STC in the 1980's the education standard was not that good when compared to my father’s time. This is the period that Dr. Aturupane mentions when mass education was perhaps at its height and there was a drop in quality. It is good to hear from Dr. Harsha Aturupane that education standards are improving once again.

But at the same time I fear that the standard of English language in our schools both state and private is at an all time low. This might be due to the lack of quality English teachers. I feel that academics such as Dr. Aturupane are in a position to take measures to address this critical issue.

Niranjan Dias Bandaranayake,
Mount Lavinia