OBE out, English in

Main Stories, National
Source:

The National, Friday 12th October, 2012

By JEFFREY ELAPA
PNG’s controversial outcome-based education  (OBE) system will be abolished along with all ele­mentary schools to allow the old education system to be reintroduced by 2013.
English will now be the main medium of instruction in all subjects.
The free education policy of the O’Neill-led go­vernment is expected to continue with the inclusion of secondary schools receiving free education subsidies while the elementary school system introduced over the past decade, when the education reform (OBE) came into existence, will now be shelved.
Prime Minister Peter O’Neill said in an interview yesterday that verna­cular taught in elementary schools would also be done away and replaced by English, which will start in prep and Grade 1.
He said English proficiency was poor, all reading, writing and communication should be done in English as in the past.
“Students commencing education from prep to Grade 1 should be taught in English,” O’Neill said.
“The teaching of traditional languages and customs is the responsibility of the parents at home and the villages.”

O’Neill said the decision to abolish OBE and ele­mentary schools was because of the huge opposition to the OBE system coming from the public claiming it was not producing quality education.
“Our interest is quality. We have decided to abolish OBE and elementary school system after many parents and citizens have raised concerns that the system was not appropriate and was producing poor results.”
He said that the government had instructed the Edu­cation Department to review the curriculum to replace the OBE with a new curriculum to start next year.
He said the curriculum would be focused more on subjects such as English, maths and science, which were successfully taught in most schools prior to and after independence.
He said that he had spoken to the director-general of AusAID Peter Baxter to help in the creation of the new curriculum when he met with him last Thursday.
Baxter was in the country and met with the O’Neill to discuss issues relating to AusAID’s ongoing assistance programmes.
He also said that the teaching capacities and infrastructure would also be addressed by the government to provide quality education the country.
He said that as part of the government’s policy to produce free and quality education, his government had decided to look at all aspects of the education system and not just the free education component.
Meanwhile, an academic George Hungure Hinhera revealed that the OBE system and structure were good but was not working because of poor implementation.
He said that Grade 10 dropouts teaching at elementary level was the cause of the problem and called for highly-qualified teachers to teach at the elementary schools.
He said that elementary was the foundation and qualified teachers should be teaching and that local language should only be used for simplicity to explain for better understanding.