Oddusuddaan education standards at all time low - Principal

[TamilNet, Wednesday, 19 September 2007, 00:20 GMT]
"The prevailing war situation has severely affected the education of our young people. Students attendance rates have dropped due to fear of aerial bombardments and claymore attacks in the vicinity of our school. Only a permanent solution to our conflict will allow the schools to prosper and educational standards to improve,” said Mr.N.Karunaharan, principal of Oddusuddaan Maha Vidyalayam located within Thu'nukkaay Educational Zone last week.

Excerpts of the comments made by Mr.Karunaharan follow:

This school was established on April 24th 1974, and gradually improved to achieve the status of 1 AB; but at present the school is functioning with the standard of 1C .The decline of the status of this school began with Sri Lanka Army (SLA) offensives and the resultant impact of fear among students and parents.

The mathematical and science sections of G.C.E (Advanced Level) class have not functioned in this school for the past seven years because of the dearth of qualified teachers. We need 25 teachers but we have only 17 in our teaching staff. We have a total of 650 students from Grade one to Grade thirteen. Due to the shortage of teaching staff we have combined the various divisions in each grade into a single class.

We also do not have any teachers to teach computer courses. Though we have a computer room with 16 computers, the students are unable to pursue those studies due to non availability of teachers.



Until 1995, there were nearly 1500 students in this school and we had adequate number of teacher resources. We had nearly 36 teachers at that time . he school was leading in every field including education, sports and culture.

After the aggression of Oddusuddaan by SLA in 1997 the preeminence of the life of the people of this area including the standard of this school dropped, and the school was relocated along with the general civilian population.

The SLA constructed their fortifications close to the school and the troops ransacked the entire school property. They smashed all the doors and windows and caused serious destruction of most of the school buildings.

After the liberation of this area, the school has once again begun to function here and nearly 750 students pursue their education in this school. However, unlike in the previous years, it has become impossible to function efficiently. Only a few civilian settlements close to the school and the students have to travel from far away villages.

"Only if there is a permanent solution the quality of education of this school will improve,” Mr.Kaunaharan said.