School Inspectorate System only to National schools, for now-MoE
View(s):The School Inspectorate System (SIS) is to be confined only to National schools, after dropping proposals to have the scheme for Provincial and International schools, the Ministry of Education (MoE) has decided.
The SIS is expected to come into operation from end of this month with a staff of about 100 persons in a separate office at the MoE. A Director General backed by 2 Commissioners, will head the office .
Initially, the MoE intended to include International and Provincial schools in the SIS. However, the International schools were dropped due to Legal snags, while implementation in the Provincial schools has been delayed for a later date.
Under the SIS, a panel of 5 experts in the Accredited Board will review reports submitted by the Inspectorate. The members are Prof Indira Nanayakkara, of the Law Faculty of the University of Colombo (UoC), Prof Nayani Molagoda, Dean of the Faculty of Graduate Studies, UoC, N.R. de Silva, Director Accreditation Council of the UoC, MoE Advisor H.M. Sirisena and Dr Sellathurai Sethuraja, former Principal of Nelliady MMV, Jaffna.
The Inspectorate, in teams, will visit National schools, spending 3 days in each school, where they would monitor whether syllabuses are followed, check on disciplinary matters and check on other shortcomings including shortage of teachers.
They will also monitor infrastructure maintenance, look into management of finances and assess the quality of Education.
The Inspectorate team’s final report to the Accreditation Board will be copied to the school’s Principal and to the MoE Secretary, and made public within the school, so that, parents, teachers and students can view them.
Thereafter, the MoE’s recommendations and the timeframe to implement them will be made known.
- Damith Wickremasekara