Ageing students in free education
In January this year, university students from South Asian countries gathered in Colombo. Once a year they gather in a city of a South Asian country to participate at their South Asian Economics Students’ Meet – an annual conference and get-together of Economics undergraduates in the region.
This year the event was held in Colombo throughout a week, and was attended by 80 students and their professors from Afghanistan, Bangladesh, Bhutan, India, Nepal and Pakistan as well as about 120 university students from Sri Lanka.
The South Asian Economics Students’ Meet is one of the few regional forums, if not the only one, which has managed to survive and thrive since its inception in 2004. In a region where differences and conflicts overwhelm integration and cooperation, many regional forums emerged but did not survive or thrive. It is not surprising that, South Asia has been considered the “least-integrated” region in the world.
But the South Asian Economics Students’ Meet has continued to grow planting seeds of integration in the hearts of budding economists in the region.
Sri Lanka’s older students
I take up the above incident for today’s discussion not to talk about the event per se. It has always been a gathering for university undergrads to interact, to expose themselves and to learn from each other - an opportunity that we never thought of 25 years ago. They used to compare and contrast about their own strengths and weaknesses too as a learning outcome of the gathering.
While there were many great things for Sri Lankan students to be proud of themselves, they were really embarrassed to find out one thing: Sri Lankan university students are at least three years older than their counterparts from other South Asian countries!
By international standards which is practiced even in other South Asian countries, students enter the university at 18 and, become graduates at 21 or 22 years. In Sri Lanka, students enter the university at age 21 or 22 years. After spending three to four years in the university, provided that the academic year is not disrupted, they become graduates at around 25 years.
Causes of the delay
The delay is not at one point, but throughout the whole study period beginning from Grade 1 in the school. A child who is admitted to Grade 1, sits for the GCE (O/L) examination a year later than a student sitting for a comparable examination abroad such as Edexcel or Cambridge examinations in the UK.
Then the same student in the Sri Lankan study stream is sitting GCE (A/L) examination one more year later; this results in two years of delay. Finally, the student enters a state university with another delay of one to two years. By this time the student is already three years behind an international student who started education at the same age.
Within the university too, the issues of the academic year which is often longer than the calendar year, adds up to the delay. And, there are other disruptions too which would effectively drag the study period of an average university student further.
Exclusive minority
Many students do not get adequate qualifications at the GCE (A/L) examination to enter a state university at once. Since there is intense competition and that competition has been growing over the years, many students fail to enter the university at their first attempt. This would add another year of delay to the ageing students in our free education system.
As of now, there are more than 300,000 students taking the GCE (A/L) examination, and out of them more than 150,000 pass it. The state universities can accommodate only about 30,000 students, leaving behind about 120,000 - four-times the number of students who get admitted .
As many are competing to enter this group of exclusive minority, it is quite possible that many failed not just the first attempt, but all the attempts. This is why even with the highest A-grades for all the subjects, the university entrance has now become increasingly uncertain. The more the students trying for A- grades, the greater will be the intense competition.
Freedom of education
One important thing that Sri Lankan undergrads are proud of themselves in the midst of their counterparts from other South Asian countries is the “free education system” they enjoy in Sri Lanka. A sample of our university student population consists of students from all types of backgrounds regardless of the differences.
As far as “free education” at university level is concerned, however, we are talking about only the free education of an exclusive minority group comprising 30,000 only! Many of the others who were left behind don’t have “free” education, neither the “freedom” of education.
Is education free?
During the time of my postgraduate studies in Europe, when I told my foreign classmates that in Sri Lanka we have “free education”, I remember some of them raised their eyebrows. It was not because it was such an admirable thing, but because they didn’t quite understand it.
They asked me: “what do you mean by “free” education? Education has a cost, and somebody has to pay for it.”
Education is not a “free good” in economic sense. The only difference is that in “free education” the one who receives it does not pay for it. Its cost has been transferred to a third party who pays for the cost of education.
Getting late to work
It is clear now a Sri Lankan youth starts working late, compared to their counterparts in other countries – an economic problem that required correction at policy level. When a Sri Lankan graduate starts to work at around 25 years of age, assuming he or she gets a job immediately; by that time, a graduate from another country who started education at the same age at Grade 1, has already been working with at least three more years of working experience.
While our graduates are getting ready for work, for some of them, they are already over-aged for some of the jobs. Some of the good years of the working age have been wasted in the schools and universities as well as during transitions from one level to the other.
People who are getting delayed to enter the labour force of the country are in the “economically inactive” category. All students at working age are in the economically inactive category; they are dependents!
If the retirement age is the same as in other countries, then the duration that a Sri Lankan employee is working, is shorter too. After leaving the labour force, they again enter into “economically inactive” category and become dependent.
In fact, during this global ageing era it is customary that many countries extend the retirement age too. It allows a nation to get older people to work more contributing to the economy on the one hand, and to reduce the dependency ratio in relieving the economic burden of the ageing population on the other hand.
Politically correct
In spite of all the above negative economic implications of “getting late”, the country can postpone “unemployment” because we keep our children long years in schools and universities. Therefore, whatever the economic implications of getting late, it is “politically correct”.
If the economy is not expanding enough, job creation is slow and there will be more people getting accumulated into the labour force and become unemployed. Among various tactics that we can follow, keeping people a longer period in “student” category is one of them too.
The world is, however, moving in a different direction. There are various attempts by universities and colleges in the world to make the learning process quicker and the transition times shorter.
(The writer is a Professor of Economics at the University of Colombo and can be reached
at sirimal@econ.cmb.ac.lk)