Salute to the bad onion

Discards are the stuff of life me thinks. That is, if each wasted animal managed to trash himself in a dumpster someplace. Now, if other people have thrown one out with the garbage then that’s a little sad. Not for the discard, he knows a good thing in the form of a bin when he sees it, but… it just boils down to the fact that trash is something quite a lot of people have a serious problem dealing with and they solve it by tossing it out and letting other people have a go.

Fine. Admittance of incompetence is greatly appreciated good people.

Trash, human or otherwise, is for other people to deal with. Fine. So we have a multi-million rupee business in dumpsters and related paraphernalia not forgetting the human beings involved in it whose supposed contribution to life is primarily as a statistic for the number of blue collar workers who are not yet jobless.

Secondarily, of course, they collect your garbage. Eh? Did I get that right? Is there actually a sub-stratum of human beings who go around collecting other people's discards? I wonder. Its always “garbage disposal units” in the plural but “trash collector” in the singular. Even the bloody machines that work this industry are “disposal” thingies. Not the human beings. They collect your trash.

I should try to interview one of these blokes. I don’t think anyone has ever done that. You hear of a “garbage workers union” any place let me know. The results of a chit-chat should be interesting. Although I guess it won’t make any more sense than interviewing a psychotherapist. That particular animal also collects other people’s garbage. Well not exactly. He provides each gunk filled gar-bag with a dumpster but calls it a couch. And he earns millions too. Come to think of it, why not interview the garbage as well while I’m about it? What does it feel about its fall from being one in a clutch of great tomatoes of which it was the only rotten one through the fault of its stupid farmer, its fertilizer, its pests, its picker, its packer, its distributor, its purchaser? What’s its take on everyone making gourmet dishes outta rotten tomatoes and selling them at heart-attack prices to people who would be better off with a heart-attack or haut-indigestion at the very least? (You absolutely must try the rotten tomato bouillabaisse at this gorgeously cozy little place I discovered darling. It’s absolutely out of this world. I’ve been having the runs for a week now and in fact I’m running even as I speak luv. Oh?   *giggle* Oh yes. I got the man to install a phone in the throne room. It is such a necessity for people with discerning taste in food like us you know?).   Blah.

How does it feel like to be that breathlessly anticipated child that once its born doesn’t look, taste, feel or cook quite the same as every other? I think I know the answer. It will say “thanks but no thanks, no interviews thank you very much, gotta plane to catch and a date with a dumpster, er.. the grocery store is just around the corner so talk to the tomatoes if you really feel the need to blab.”

I think I will sit down on this curbside, next to a dumpster that may or may not contain a dead body and wish that I were born mad.

The Spirit of Giving II - The Statistics

About a year and a half back, in the post “The Spirit of Giving”, I mentioned that Sri Lanka is a nation of givers.  Well, apparently hardcore statistics also seem to indicate that as well. In this year’s World Giving Index (WGI) that has just been published, Sri Lanka as a nation ranks #9 overall in a survey done across 135 countries. Averaging the rank over the last five years, it comes in at #8.

The survey was conducted to determine the spirit of giving of a country by asking what percentage of people in a nation a) helped a stranger b) donated money to charity and c) volunteered their time.

The highest and lowest percentages for a) helping a stranger is 79% (USA) and 22%(Cambodia), b) that for donating money is 91% (Myanmar) and 4% (Yemen and Georgia) and c) that for volunteering time is 53% (Turkmenistan) and 3% (Yemen).

Myanmar and the USA top the overall rankings with a 64% overall generosity rating. Myanmar ranked #1 in donating money and #2 in volunteering time but was not that keen to help strangers coming in at #63. The USA is #1 in helping a stranger, joint #5 for volunteering time and #9 in donating money.  Myanmar’s high rank in giving time and money might stem from its Buddhist traditions despite the country being under the yoke of a military junta for decades and the #1 ranking for the USA in helping strangers and its good showing in the other two categories maybe a testament to that country’s tradition of welcoming any and all and the spontaneity of its people to quickly help someone in trouble despite general perceptions of the nation as a whole being a selfish capitalist bear.

The tradition of giving is high in Britain, Australia and New Zealand as well. Ireland’s Celtic culture is probably behind its top ten ranking (#4). Many South American nations rank in the middle (#30s - #90s) along with most Middle-Eastern countries excepting conflict affected regions which rank lower. Most African nations rank lower along with nations of the former Soviet Union. Cultural bias based on regional geographies  is perhaps seen in these demographics. The highest ranked Muslim Majority country is Indonesia (#13) followed by Iran (#19) while most others rank in the middle range. Why this is so could be an interesting anthropological exercise since Islam ranks giving quite high amongst its human priorities. Perhaps other regional or denominational factors affect the ranks. The four nations with a Theravada Buddhist tradition, Myanmar, Sri Lanka, Bhutan and Thailand rank high (#1,#9,#11,#21). Japan and France are both ranked at #90 with their ranks for helping people at #129 and #134 respectively so if you are in either of these two countries, it would be best to know that you are pretty much on your own!

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The high rating for Sri Lanka was largely due to the fact that it came in at #3 in the “volunteering time” category with 50% of the nation doing so and ranking just 3 percent points behind the leader Turkmenistan.  It ranked #40 in helping a stranger with 56% of the nation doing so and #17 in donating money with 56% of the nation doing so. Sri Lanka’s overall rank of #9 is against an overall percentage of 54% of the nation's population living in a “spirit of giving”. The highest percentage for Myanmar and the USA is 64%. Further, Sri Lanka is way ahead of other South Asian nations excepting Bhutan (polled for the first time this year) which came in at #11. The next highest ranking is for Pakistan at #61.

Overall it seems that people are far more willing to throw money at charity than invest their time for no personal gain. Surveying other statistics, the lowest rankings for donating time or money is around the 3-4% mark with that for helping a stranger at 22% indicating that overall, people are more inclined to help a stranger than engage in other charitable acts. Additionally, it seems as if the escalation of global youth unemployment rates has negatively affected the “spirit of giving” of this demographic which should be a cause for concern for our future. Natural disasters in a nation are seen to marginally spike up the giving element whereas conflict in general seems to have the opposite effect with regions that are in conflict scoring lower. However, Iran, which the world believes to be in general turmoil ranks #19 indicating that it is a nation that is capable of high levels of generosity and perhaps, also indicates a general level of peace with itself. On the contrary, a general stinginess of spirit is seen in developed countries such as France (#90), Japan (#90), Sweden (#40), Germany (#28) etc.  Sri Lanka ranking this high also lends credibility to the claim that it is basically doing just fine although various political agendas seem to claim otherwise. In fact, in the post-conflict era, Sri Lanka has shown marked increases in generosity across the three areas polled.  

Special action for special children with special needs - A bouquet for the Department of Examinations

Things are bad…

Children with special needs...or those who are disabled or  perhaps, differently abled.  Kids who face more than the average challenges of school goers are called various things. That is, if they are called anything at all.

In Sri Lanka, any impairment in children that is physical, cognitive, mental, sensory, emotional or developmental or a combination thereof is by default, left unacknowledged, ignored or wished away.  Those disabilities that cannot be hidden are reluctantly acknowledged via embarrassed silences on the part of both caregivers and those the kids come into contact with. Few, very few, will look at these children and see potential, identify excellence, determine possibilities or understand equal-or-better societal relevance. This in turn, creates both physical and attitudinal barriers that simply results in compounding problems for these children.

Quite a large majority of parents primarily and teachers secondarily have been guilty of this ostrich act to the lifelong detriment of the variously challenged children they either bear or guide.  While these attitudinal negatives rooted in cultural and social astigmatism hurt kids in many areas of engagement, in the world of academic endeavor they can be disastrous.

Under exam conditions in a free education system that is geared to eliminate students from it, the academic challenges are universally acknowledged to be daunting. Put a mentally, physically or emotionally impaired child up against such a system and the perfect enabling environment is created for disabled children to give truth to the lie that they are unable.

Actually, things are not so bad… 

Very fortunately, the National Evaluation and Testing Service of the School Examination and Results Brach of the Examinations Department of the Ministry of Education seems to think so too.  A little known fact is that for quite a few years now, they have had a strong, fair, transparent and very inclusive system in place to support impaired children to do their very best at the national examinations. Expert panels are set up every year in urban centers island wide to assess children with special needs and determine the best way in which to mitigate the negative effects of the additional challenges that they face.

Additionally, and unexpectedly, quite a few government and semi-government schools have taken it on themselves to pay serious attention to the requisites of special needs children. Their commitment is long term and seems to be driven by strong buy-in to the fact that such children have a very important and significant role to play in society. While some, such as Ladies’ College and St.Thomas' College have full-fledged learning support centers or special needs units, many have the capacity and the process in place for early identification of such requirements and the ability to channel the children to institutes and individuals who can bring out the best in them. Further, as far as I am aware, no child who requests admission to a local school is penalized for disabilities or refused admission based on such disabilities.

I cite this as a reason why local schools have a greater grasp of the larger, more inclusive environment of the learning universe as opposed to international schools where, apart from Alethea College which has a special needs unit that supports impaired children including those with Down’s Syndrome, most others actively refuse admission to such children or, pay lip-service to their needs if they are diagnosed after admission. Many consider such children an irksome additional burden. This underscores the widely held view that international schools give admission to children who are capable of achieving high academic goals regardless of the system or the quality of education and rejects those who need to be engaged with significant effort in order to ensure that their best abilities are recognized and developed. Even the few committed special needs people working at international schools find it tough to obtain even the smallest concessions for children with impairment.

Well actually, things are brilliant… 

Here is my personal experience of this system and I am going to name a few of the names I know because I think it is very important that excellence is acknowledged.

My child had a significant attention disorder related to absence seizures resulting from a traumatic birth that caused loss of school time during the crucial primary school years when fundamental concepts are taught.  Development of both academic and social skills was impaired as a result. Luckily, she was at Ladies College where their learning support unit (LSU) was constantly on her case ensuring that she had minimal negatives resulting from her condition. A series of exceptional teachers such as Ms. Wyomi, Ms. Joanna and Ms.Avanthi worked with her over the years, gradually managing to wean her completely away from the LSU. Most importantly, Mrs. Alawwa, the sectional head at Ladies College who knew her medical condition told us about the efforts of the Examinations Department to help students such as my daughter even out the playing field at the upcoming O/L exams; the school got us the forms and we sent in our application through the school and parents and child were called in for a personal interview to their offices.

There were about seventy families and we were lead into a specious hall. The kids were treated like little princes and princesses by the staff and served with refreshments and tea. Sharp on time, the Commissioner General of Examinations Mr. Pushpakumara and his senior staff addressed the families, outlining the program, with the Deputy Commissioner Mr. Jayasundra explaining the rationale and the case-by-case treatment of each applicant and the need to understand that they were merely removing additional barriers to sitting the exam and not helping them to pass and the fact that there was no need to compare the concessions given to one child with those given to another. One got the feeling that meticulous planning had gone into the execution of the interviews.

The interview process - driven from the top with the most senior officials taking the lead

• The children were given a brief writing task and then four expert panels, each with either a deputy commissioner or higher, a special needs expert and two other staff members conducted the one-on-one interviews. The Commissioner General himself headed up one of the panels. 
• The most severely impaired children were taken first followed by those who had come from a little distance away from Colombo (having missed their appointments at the regional interviews). 
• The entire proceeding took place in full view of every applicant. No time limit was set for each applicant and everyone was allowed as much time as needed to state their case in as much detail as they wish to with as many supporting documents as they wanted to share. 
• Those who needed specific types of equipment were provided with it and those whom the panels determined needed readers or scribes were identified. Many of the children were granted extra time. Some were even allowed to have the parent sitting next to them at the exam.  If a request by a parent was deemed to be irrelevant or unrequired, matters were explained patiently and thoroughly so that the issue was clear in their minds and the request revoked by mutual consent. In comparison, for London exams for example, it would be difficult if not impossible to obtain even the slightest concession for an impaired child. Even a bit of extra time would be a tough ask and getting a reader or scribe a near miracle. Allowing a parent to sit with a mentally traumatized kid is never going to happen.  Proof yet again that the international system is simply overrated and even more skewed towards competing for exclusion than set up for inclusion where challenged kids have to perform despite the system under conditions that would wipe out a normal child. 
• The rigor of the review process and the experience of the panels were such that anyone who was there to obtain an unfair advantage for a child was very quickly identified and gently but firmly rejected.
• Clear instructions were provided to us on how to make use of the facilities offered to the children on exam day and we were informed that the invigilators at each center would be informed prior to the exam on each special needs student and the particular requisites for them. Oh, by the way, that won’t happen at a London exam. We were also told that the scripts would be marked by a special team who are experts in special needs and understand capabilities regardless of any aberrations in the specific answers provided. Once again, at international exams, this won’t happen and people who have no clue about challenged students mark the scripts presuming they are part of a supposedly equitable knowledge testing environment where in fact, the opposite is the case. 
• Through the four hours that it took to conduct the personal interviews, the entire staff, from the lowest to the highest gave us the feeling that they were there to make sure we were in the best possible frame of mind, constantly weaving in and out of the seating area to attend to our slightest need.

Quite apart from the fact that the program was at worst equal to the best such programs in the world and at best was probably far far superior to most of them, that which struck the strongest note in our minds was the remarkably human touch of these senior officials and the lack of even the slightest high handedness in the way in which they engaged the children and their parents. The children, especially, were treated with respect and addressed as equals. None of the international systems have given me even the slightest indication of similar treatment despite all of the brouhaha over equal and inclusive treatment that they tout to any who care to listen. Given what we saw at the exams department, since my wife Manju teachers at a leading international school, we felt that all of that was so much gas.

Phrases such as “පුතා දැන් A නවයක්ම අරගෙන එන්න ඕනේ හොඳද” or “දුවට දැන් බයවෙන්න කිසිම හේතුවක් නැහැනේ? අම්ම ලඟින්ම ඉඳගෙන ඉඳියි ” or “බලන්න පුතා, මේ light එක වෙනුවට අනික් එක පාවිච්චි කෙරුවොතින් වැඩිය හොඳට පෙනෙයිද කියල?” were heard regularly coming from the highest of officials throughout the interviews. None left without a grateful smile on their lips and as the day went on (we were among the last few), I could scarcely believe my senses that such an exceptional program could exist within the echelons of officialdom or that such insightful, competent and committed officials were still to be found within the state machinery. Having been touched by their concern, their care and their meticulous attention to detail, we came away feeling proud to be Sri Lankan.  In a system that shuts children out, they are doing yeoman service to bring children in. These are exceptionally enabled human beings and they do our nation proud. Salute!

…and yet, things could be better…

There were only about 70 children there. In Colombo, I believe that this is but a fraction of the number that could have made use of the world class services provided by the department but as mentioned earlier on, the larger percentage of parents and teachers refuse to open these doors to their children. Teachers like Ms. Alawwa of Ladies or the teacher from St. Thomas’ who I saw at the interviews accompanying the families to better explain their cases before the panel are in a minority. Perhaps greater media exposure could be given to the program and even parents could play a part in spreading the news as Mr. Jayasundara pointed out.

I am trying to do my bit….