Conversation in Mumbai
There is a research by Rebecca Winthrop from the Brookings Institute where she found that although there has been more students in developing countries go to school but when it comes to how much they have learned and how long they have spent in school, there is still a big gap. She calculated the number of years in school and levels of achievement in developing countries and concluded that education level of developing countries is about 100 years behind developed countries. As the education systems in most developing countries did not change much, they have the same levels of education that most developed countries had by early decades of the 20th Century. She warned that unless something dramatically change, this “100 years gap” would continue into the future. Her analysis is a reminder of the urgent need on how developing countries should make more progress in education.
There were debates about her research among educators, some agreed and many did not. I have read her research several times but my view is regardless whether there is a 100 years gap, 50 years gap, or 20 years gap the education gap between developing countries and developed countries does exist. My concern is what can be done to close this education gap? Most people suggested that government invest more money in education system to accelerate the progress. This solution has been done many times in the past with little progress because most of the money went to waste. I have seen many empty schools without teachers or students because of civil wars in Africa. I have seen schools with a lot of students but only few teachers in India. I have seen schools with many computers but did not have access to the Internet in South America. These schools all received funding from their government or from foreign aids to build classrooms or equipments but it did not improve anything. I have seen several education models being proposed but no one bothered to read and currently there are more proposals being worked in every country. Basically, none of these improvement efforts were effective because they did not taking into the consideration the most important factor: The teacher.
In my own opinion, education improvement must start with the teachers. A well-trained group of teachers can make things happen, because they know how education works. They know how schools should operate, how classrooms should be taught and with proper support, they can find way to improve the education systems. I have seen many good teachers left their job because they cannot make a living with their low salary, especially in Asia where the cost of living was rising quickly each year. I have seen many teachers work very hard in classrooms without electricity, without adequate materials, and with very old textbooks.
Last week, in India I told a friend who is a government official: “You cannot improve education if you do not start with the teachers. You can spend all the money to build modern schools, buy more computers and tablets but without the teachers, who are going to teach your students? Education improvement must start with improving the living of teachers.” My friend explained: “It is difficult to raise teachers' salary as it is a long-term investment but high-level governments do not like long term, they want something quick. They want to do something that everybody can see. Building new schools, buying more computers and tablets are highly visible on TV and Newspapers. It is easy to win election if you do something that the public approves.” I lamented: “Now I know why many developing countries cannot improve their education system. They have the money but not spending them wisely. Now I know why countries like Finland, Sweden are having the best education in the world because they invest in their teachers. My friends in Finland told me that it is more difficult to get accepted into education schools than Medical schools and teachers there are making the same money as Medical doctors. That is the formula for success; these countries invest in their future by investing in teachers.”
My friend asked: “But if there is only a limit amount of money, what would we invest to accelerate education improvement?” I told him: “Since your government cannot raise salary of all teachers then they should invest the limited amount to technology teachers and train a new generation of technology teachers. These teachers will train a new generation of technology students and that will be the beginning of education improvement trend. Last year, your government passed a law to provide tablets to all schools with the hope to develop a million information technology workers for the world. Of course, electronics and computer companies were very happy and praised this effort as the right thing to do. The truth is computers and tablets do not teach. Without teachers, these devices are useless and could be used by students to play video games or watch movies. That was a bad investment. Instead of buying computers and make computer companies happy, your government should focus on training more technology teachers and provides them with adequate supports so they can do their best. By invest in technology teachers today; your country may narrow the education gap between developing countries and developed countries, regardless whether it is 100 years or 20 years.”
Sources
- Blogs of Prof. John Vu, Carnegie Mellon University
