Financial Times

Looking after our children’s future
By Dr. Hiranthi Wijemanne
Most of us are aware that, the new millennium is experiencing a multiplicity of challenges. These range from urbanisation and globalisation, to population expansion and environmental degradation, terrorism and human rights issues, fundamentalism and authoritarianism, ethnic conflicts and political upheavals, natural and man-made disasters and unexpected disease outbreaks.

It is indeed a complex milieu in which today's children have to survive, and one in which learning as it inter-relates to schooling and education becomes of special significance. Today’s children need more opportunities to enhance mental capacity, gain knowledge and understanding, as well as improve skills. It is only then that they can grow and develop their full potential and become capable of facing such challenges. The latter part of the 20th century has also given birth to new technologies in the fields of communication, mass media and information, creating new learning opportunities.

Such advances are rapid and occur in ways most of us cannot even imagine. Information is no longer confined to books and libraries but can reach schools and homes.

In some parts of the world such advances have contributed to substantial economic, social, scientific and cultural development, building the capacities of people to create communities in which diversity is valued, and where a vibrant civil society works with a government to solve societal problems. Ironically, these same advances can polarize the affluent and educated who can benefit from such technologies from those who are denied such advantages due to poverty, ignorance and discrimination. This is a growing reality in Sri Lankan society which needs to be reversed.

Schools are organisations which provide structured learning experiences associated with formal, organised, usually time bound and graded activities, designed to instruct learners with a defined content, skills, values and behaviours.

Today’s schools cannot be institutions only for mass learning and employment. Schools must be regarded as a means through which it is possible to widen access to learning; to build new generations of children who will contribute towards a more harmonious form of human development, thereby reducing poverty, exclusion, ignorance, oppression and conflicts.

What role can the private sector play in helping Sri Lanka to respond to such challenges? The unique partnership between CIMA and The Sunday Times Business Club through the Annual Community Leaders Awards has created a path. While the concept itself focuses on building a momentum among leaders of the business community to work towards a social agenda based on global and local realities, needs and concerns, there is emphasis on children, as well as education and priorities on learning in its widest sense.

It is most encouraging that a small but significant number of business leaders are assuming a greater responsibility to our society at large, and particularly to our children who are those who will shape the future of our country.
This is an important factor which can blur the dividing line between non-profit organisations and profit-making enterprises as the role of government in society gets challenged by the more pervasive role played by the private sector. It is also a reminder that businesses consist of people who are also citizens of a country, people with human interest and societal concerns, particularly requiring the future generations.

Today more and more private-sector companies under the theme of Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) are evolving from organisations which provided “one-off” charitable support to those which forge partnerships across sectors focused on community initiatives that respond to specific societal needs.

Ideally such responsibilities should revolve round making use of the company’s skills and relationships with industry and the community, including the interests of its own personnel. CSR has the potential to benefit companies by building a stronger commitment and improve relationships between businesses and community-based organisations. It also offers employees a unique opportunity to assume a useful role in civic affairs. The Community Leaders Award this year recognises those companies which have undertaken exceptional work in education as the chosen sector of Corporate Social Responsibility.

Reflecting briefly on education in Sri Lanka, 93 percent of primary and secondary education in Sri Lanka is provided free by the state through 9,766 state-run schools which reach 3.8 million girls and boys island-wide.
Gender equality is maintained at all grades, a Sri Lankan feature unique in South Asia. The state employs 186,000 teachers and provides free textbooks and uniforms. This is uncommon in most of the developing world. There are, however, problems. There are widening disparities in the quality of the schools, particularly those in the more remote rural areas, plantations, conflict-affected areas and now some of the tsunami-affected areas. There are other difficulties as the state grapples with the problem of allocating adequate resources, particularly for recurrent expenditure and “extras” which in the more affluent and urban areas are absorbed by well-to-do parent/
teacher associations and “old boy networks”.

It is, therefore, very appropriate that this year's awards have highlighted education. It is also encouraging that many companies have given due recognition to the importance of education and got involved in those aspects of schools which are usually “unfunded” by the state. These are: adequate classrooms; furniture and teaching aids; safe water and sanitation; books and libraries; IT equipment; knowledge and skills; and English education. Relevant inputs to such needs by the private sector have contributed to significant increases in school enrolment and retention, lowered drop-out rates and improved the quality of learning. Most important, these have enhanced the morale of both the teaching staff and student.

Determining which companies deserved the gold awards was a difficult task as nearly all those who applied had made some contribution towards education and learning, and should be commended. However, the use of certain indicators as a measuring tool was useful in making the final choice.

These included the following: adoption of a strategy based on a holistic approach with many interventions focused on education as opposed to the provision of a few inputs; the formulation of needs-based projects; sustainability of intervention; existence of a strong relationship between the company and the school; prompt follow up and quick “trouble shooting-type” support; active employee participation; selection of project sites in the more inaccessible and remote areas where disadvantaged and “excluded” children live.

Award winners were selected by a panel of judges on the basis of a desk review of the documentation provided by individual companies coupled with field visits to project sites selected on a random basis. Teachers, principals and children were questioned on the impact of interventions during the project visits. Some key observations during the judging which influenced the final choices and which are relevant to quality CSR projects of the future are as follows:

* Planning of a needs-based and holistic project with clear objectives, activities and planned outcome.

* The delivery of promised inputs that were target-based and set to a time-line.

* Prompt follow-ups to solve problems during project implementation and a willingness to respond to new and/or unplanned needs.

* Establishment of close contact between the company and school.

* Efforts to measure output and determine impact beyond mere inputs.

* Determining accomplishments and assessing if “there was a difference” when evaluating the project;

* Selecting the “more-difficult-to-reach schools” which cater to more disadvantaged children.

* Proper documentation of the experience, including both “hardware” and “software” aspects with lessons learned.

While schools will continue to remain an effective and efficient way of transmitting knowledge and skills to children within the overall context of the right of education for all children, it is also important to identify those children who are excluded from formal schools and who may need non-formal structures through which learning could still be accessed. This should also include greater opportunities for inclusive and special education for disabled children. Greater attention is also needed to widen learning avenues outside classrooms, to the family, and even the community and work places.

In conclusion, learning from five to 18 years old during the primary and secondary stages of a child should also include two important ends of the learning spectrum. On the one hand, does early childhood development both as home-based intervention and centre-based activities lay the foundation and capacity for learning throughout life? The other is opportunities for learning once children leave school and for those who complete tertiary education in terms of improving job opportunities, obtaining gainful employment and life-skills education.

(This was a presentation made by Dr Wijemanne, an acknowledged children’s expert and chairman of the panel of judges that picked the winners of the Community Leader Awards 2006 organised by CIMA/The Sunday Times Business Club. The winner in the large category for excellence in furthering education was Slimline. The awards were presented at a gala ceremony on February 28 graced by Public Administration & Home Affairs Minister Dr Sarath Amunugama and Mahesh Bhatt, awardwinning Indian film maker and UNICEF Special Envoy who flew in for the ceremony.)

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