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© Proceedings of the Ruhuna Quality Assurance Sessions 2021 (RUQAS 2021)
st
21 September 2021

Educational Reform Strategies for a Disaster Situation

Sri Lankan education system prioritizes theory-based education under primary and secondary stages.
Even though there is a single syllabus for the school children around the country, the existence of

numerous subjects, grades and schools make up a complex system. However, there is a simple way to

break down the structure of the education system for creating a common platform. Figure 1 illustrates
the breakdown of the levels of the Sri Lankan school education system under different variables

(Department of Census and Statistics, 2021).

Currently, the main scope of the Ministry of Education of Sri Lanka is to develop and update syllabi,

guidance books for students and necessary teacher guidance books for all levels of Sri Lankan school
students (Liyanagunawardena and Williams, 2021). To overcome the current barriers for distance

education in Sri Lanka, it is proposed to introduce a Learning Management System (LMS) which can
be used in offline conditions as well, where students will be able to update time to time by using

possible internet connections. Further, such a common learning management system for the entire
country will provide equal opportunities for students to receive extensive higher quality education

across the country. Figure 2 illustrates the essential features of the proposed learning management

system for Sri Lankan school education.

The visually appealing media like cartoon-based and music-based programmes could be introduced for
junior-level students in the same platform. Moreover, this system will enable and promote self-

studying among the students. Integration of virtual experimental models will bring a novel innovative

learning opportunity for school level students. The system should, in a way, ensure that higher
secondary level students will be encouraged to use instruments provided in the virtual platform to set

up and carry out their experiments. This proposed new LMS system design strategy should consider
three main areas, which include the ways of delivering the subject content, the methodology of

conducting laboratory and practical sessions by introducing virtual labs and student evaluation and
assessment methods. Further, there are several benefits in introducing a common learning management

system for all the school students in Sri Lanka including increased opportunity of continuing and

distance learning, equal distribution of resources, common curriculum delivery, unique quality
assurance process for all the school in the country, reduce the dominance of tuition based private

education and improvement of the English and soft skills of students.

Conclusions

The natural and man-made disasters taking place from time to time, force governing parties to close

down Sri Lankan schools and educational institutes. This brings the whole educational system to a

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