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South Sudan Works to Rebuild Higher Education

March 23rd, 2011 at 09:01am Under Education report

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This is the VOA Special English Education Report.

On July ninth, South Sudan becomes the world’s one hundred ninety-third nation. Almost ninety-nine percent of voters last month chose independence from the north.

South Sudan will also be one of the world’s least developed nations. This follows years of war and neglect by the Sudanese government in Khartoum.

South Sudan is about the size of France. Yet it has only fifty kilometers of good roads and almost no public electrical power or other basic systems.

Illiteracy rates are high. There are estimates that more than eighty percent of the population cannot read or write.

There are five universities. Three of them moved their operations to the north during the war. The southern government has brought most of the students back.

Officials estimate that about twenty-five thousand students have registered at the five universities. Classes were supposed to start in April. But the Ministry for Higher Education in the south has now moved the opening date to the middle of May.

The government pays for food and provides housing for students. But higher education minister Joseph Ukel says finding enough space was one reason for the delay.

Another issue is money. The government in Khartoum will pay for the schools until July. Mr. Ukel says the southern government’s proposed budget for this year does not include any money for the universities.

Then there is the problem of teachers.  Almost seventy-five percent of the lecturers are from the north. They are not likely to travel to the south to continue teaching for their schools.

Mr. Ukel says his ministry has asked southern Sudanese teachers outside the country to return.

JOSEPH UKEL: “Their problem was, what do you give us by way of carry-away salaries? That became our problem.”

William Deng heads a commission supervising the return of ninety thousand former fighters to civilian life. He says most of the soldiers who have come out of the southern army need education and training.

WILLIAM DENG: “The skill they only know is soldiering.  Now, you must train them with life skills, such as carpentry, making bricks and also small agriculture, or micro-financing.”

Only four percent of good land in South Sudan is being farmed. Millions of people need food aid to survive. The head of Juba University, Aggrey Abate, says his school can play a big part in training agricultural specialists.

AGGREY ABATE: “Agriculture is a very important area. And we, as an institution, will have the role of producing those who will come out and work in the agricultural sector, in terms of the necessary interventions that need to be made to improve our food security.”

And that’s the VOA Special English Education Report. I’m Bob Doughty.

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Contributing: Scott Bobb and Matt Richmond

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Stanley Kaplan: Remembering a Test Prep Pioneer

February 24th, 2010 at 09:08am Under Education report

This is the VOA Special English Education Report.

Here is a question for a college admissions test. Who was Stanley Kaplan? Did he A) start a test preparation company, B) start the test preparation industry, or C) die last month at age ninety? The correct answer is D) all of the above.

Stanley Kaplan

Stanley Kaplan was an educator and private tutor. In the nineteen forties, he began preparing students for the Scholastic Aptitude Test, now just called the SAT.

His parents were European immigrants who did not go to college, and he himself was rejected from medical school. He thought all Americans should have an equal chance at the best colleges, not just children of wealthy families.

These days, more students go to college. Yet wealthier families are the ones best able to pay for test preparation. Many programs cost up to one thousand dollars or more, though some are available for poor families.

Parents may hate the whole idea, but they feel nervous seeing others doing it. Then, after college, there are graduate admissions tests to prepare for.

How much do American spend on this largely unsupervised industry? At least one billion dollars a year, estimates David Hawkins at the National Association for College Admission Counseling. The research company Outsell puts the amount at two and a half billion.

The two biggest providers in the United States — Kaplan and Princeton Review — both operate in more than twenty countries.

Thirty years ago, the Federal Trade Commission found that Stanley Kaplan’s program could raise SAT scores — but only by about twenty-five points. The association for college admission counseling recently found a thirty-point increase with Kaplan and other programs.

Still, the group says this is not enough to make a difference for most students. It might help some get into a top college, but only if they have above-average scores in the first place. The report suggested saving money by considering “less costly forms” of test preparation.

Now, more about our story last week on President Obama’s nationally broadcast speech to students. We noted that many conservatives raised objections before the speech. But in nineteen ninety-one, Democrats accused President George H.W. Bush of using the last such speech for political purposes.

Then as now, Democrats led Congress. They demanded an investigation. It found no misuse of public money to support the speech.

And that’s the VOA Special English Education Report, written by Nancy Steinbach. I’m Steve Ember.

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