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Teachers boycotting examinations: No postponement of O/L practicals 

24 Jul 2021

  • Cabinet paper tomorrow will address issues: Premajayantha 
  • President and Education Minister to meet TUs before Friday  
By Yoshitha Perera  The Government has not made any decision to postpone the practical exams of the GCE Ordinary Level (O/L) examinations scheduled to commence this week, The Sunday Morning learnt.  After submitting the cabinet memorandum tomorrow (26), there will be a settlement with the teachers and principals, State Minister of Education Reforms, Open Universities, and Distance Learning Promotion Susil Premajayantha told The Sunday Morning.  Premajayantha said the President and the Education Minister will have discussions with the education trade unions before Friday (30).   “After submitting the cabinet memorandum, there will be a solution for the issues, including the matter of the teacher-principal salary anomaly.”  Responding to The Sunday Morning’s query on completing the syllabus, especially for Advanced Level (A/L) and O/L students, the State Minister said that according to his knowledge, most of the leading schools have completed the syllabi and even revisions for the exams.  He said: “However, in remote areas, they have to cover some parts of the syllabus and that is why the Government postponed the exams until 14 and 15 November.”    He said that the Government had planned to re-open schools after administering the second jab to all the teachers.   He said: “Priority will be given to grade 5 and 13 students, as they are heading for exams in November.”  However, speaking to The Sunday Morning, Ceylon Teachers’ Union (CTU) General Secretary Joseph Stalin said that the teachers and principals would continue the strike until there is a concrete solution from the Government to the education sector issues.  “Even though the Education Minister has promised to submit a cabinet paper relating to the issues on 26 July, we cannot believe that it would solve all these issues. There were so many cabinet papers submitted under many governments to solve the teacher-principal salary anomaly issue, but none of them have been implemented,” he said.  In addition to teachers refraining from online teaching activities, last week, teachers and principals also decided to withdraw from practical examination duties related to the O/L and A/L examinations.   The teachers and principal trade unions decided to withdraw from online teaching activities from 12 July onwards until further notice.   Meanwhile, the Education Minister had discussions with the trade unions last week, but failed to reach a consensus.  Later, around 2,000 members from 47 education trade unions conducted a protest campaign in front of the Presidential Secretariat last Thursday (22).   


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