Proposed education plan has social impact: Officer

 The five-year National Education Plan proposed plan for all children to go through 14 years of education, without reference to an examination has social implication, an official says.

Back to basics programme director Frank Evans from the Aitape/Lumi District, West Sepik, said in a statement that the proposed five year (2015-2019) plan has the potential to permanently damage the whole social fabric of life of people.

“This has social implications which are obviously not apparent to policy-makers,” Evans said.

“One social implication is the village life, the village is, and should continue to be, the backbone of PNG society. 

“Removing children from a village environment for up to six years and exposing them to facilities which are in most cases superior to those in the village, will make it very difficult for students who are not selected for further training after Grade 12 to re-adapt to village.”

He said for day students in urban areas life after Grade 12 may not require much in the way of re-adjustment. 

“But in rural or remote areas, the situation is completely different,” he said. 

“We will watch the death of villages because students, long separated from the village, are reluctant to return. 

“The intentions of the Government to erode the role of the village in PNG life are already being seen in the efforts of the Constitutional and Law Reform Commission to set up ‘Capital City Districts’ in each province.

“The setting up of these urban districts will have a profound negative effects on the role of villages.

“Because of the low standards in elementary and primary schools, many, many students by the time they reach Grade 10 are simply not coping with the academic studies involved.”