Part 6: Social Market Economy

Education should be reformed to create

creative capital and not mere human
capital

Monday,

19 October 2015

Should the objective of universities be just producing graduates?

Sujata Gamage, columnist, writer and campaigner for education, had
responded to Part 4 of the article under this series titled Universities and
research institutions as catalysts of an innovation economy (available at:
http://www.ft.lk/article/478857/Part-4--Social-Market-Economy--Universities-research-institutions-as-catalysts-of-an-innovation-economy) in a
communication titled The role of universities and research institutes in an
innovation economy
(available at: http://www.ft.lk/article/482639/The-role-ofuniversities-and-research-institutes-in-an-innovation-economy ).
She disagreed with the view expressed by this writer that universities
should get into research in a big way in order to provide the seeds for an
innovation economy, namely, research leading to new inventions in
collaboration with industry. Instead, she had argued that the main role of
universities should be to educate people who will constitute the countrys
human capital.
Progress of society comes through disagreement
Readers should be grateful to Gamage for creating a debate on an
important issue by questioning the viewpoint expressed by this writer. A
dynamic society moves forward not by agreement but by disagreement
and, hence, Gamages intervention should be viewed as a salutary
development.
It is hoped that more erudite people will get into this debate, thereby
enhancing the knowledge, wisdom and understanding of the readers as well
as policymakers.
University education helps provided it is relevant and
applicable
In the five articles published by this writer in this series, the
argument presented was that for education to contribute to
continued economic prosperity, it should be relevant and
applicable. It was argued that making education relevant
was a matter for educational authorities including
universities.
Thus, the relevant education should lead to the development
of creative capital and not mere human capital viewed from
an orthodox point of view. That creative capital will generate
inventions and those inventions are used in practice for
producing commercially viable goods and services by
entrepreneurs through a process called innovations. The

responsibility for creating an environment conducive for innovators to

operate was the task of the government, it was argued.
Inventions and innovations should go hand in hand
Accordingly, the viewpoint expressed was that both inventions and
innovations should go hand in hand. Thus, without innovations, inventions
become fruitless; without inventions, innovations could not take root.
Gamage has enlightened on one part of this process, that is, education
leading to the training of the human capital needed by a society.
This writer has argued that that education should be relevant education
should be relevant education leading to the development of creative
capital. Since it appears that the concept of creative capital has not been
properly explained in the previous articles, it is hoped to devote todays
contribution to clarify this concept and focus on how education should be
reformed in the country to serve the innovation economy to be built.
Wisdom of Rev Weliwitiye Sri Soratha Maha Thero: University
students should be probing, critical and rebellious
The founding Vice Chancellor of the Vidyodaya University, the predecessor
to the current University of Sri Jayewardenepura, Rev Weliwitiye Sri Soratha
Maha Thero, is reported to have stressed this point when the university was
opened in 1959.
The erudite Thero had advised the university students that they should be
probing, critical and rebellious. Though all these three attributes stressed
by him are interconnected and cannot be separated from each other, for
ease of understanding, they could be analysed separately in their reverse
order. Being rebellious means that university students should be
intellectually rebellious by questioning the existing and accepted wisdom.
For that, they should be sceptical and should not accept anything as being
presented to them. Being critical requires them to evaluate both the good
side and the bad side of an issue that demand their attention before
deciding on their own stand on it. What he meant by probing was that
university students should not accept anything presented to them without
exploring them.
He, therefore, advised students to get into a culture of questioning,
evaluating and exploring if they wanted to be learned men and women.
These three attributes constitute the foundation of evidence-based decision
making which leads to the creation of a creative society.
University should not undermine the quality of the degree as well
as the research undertaken
Later, Soratha Maha Thero in an address made to undergraduates
highlighted the quality of the university and the graduates who pass out

from the university as follows: It is our mission to present the society with
intellectual and not merely to breed graduates. If one endeavours to
transform this sacred abode to a place where degrees are sold, or to a place
in which student are given degrees in a mere mechanical fashion that will
only lead the University as well as the country to be dragged in disgrace. If
our graduates are not proven with the expected intellectualism that their
degree claims them to possess, people will indubitably arrive at the
conclusion that our University is a store where degrees are sold. Thus
everybody affiliated to the University should keep in mind not to engage in
any act that will undermine the quality of our degree and the research
work
(available at: http://www.sjp.ac.lk/news/commemoration-speechon-rev-weliwitiye-sri-soratha-thero/ ).
It is the school system that should begin to develop critical minds
Such a culture cannot be developed merely at the university level in Sri
Lanka today. That is because, before entering the university, students
spend nearly 12 years at schools and the culture at schools is not to
question the existing knowledge but to accept it blindly. The culture of
questioning, or in the words of Rev Soratha Maha Thero, the culture of
being rebellious, should be developed in the school system by teachers. But
what is observed in the school system in Sri Lanka is, instead of
encouraging students to question, they are trained to observe and uphold
conformity. The pressure of examination too does not allow students to
learn by questioning.
All they are required to do is to learn by rote the matters that would be
questioned at examination papers and get the highest marks possible so
that they can ensure a place at a local state university. A student who does
not get enough marks to enter a university is labelled as a failure by the
system, including his or her family members. Then, why should one bother
to learn by questioning when one can have a safe journey to a university
simply by following the opposite.
Paradoxical view of commerce students: Eliminate the middleman
This is obvious when students celebrate commerce days in schools. Though
they follow a stream that leads to a profession involving buying and selling
or functioning as middlemen, the short dramas they often perform on stage
on school commerce days have a paradoxical theme: That is, labelling the
middlemen as exploiters of both consumers and producers thereby
suggesting that they should be eliminated. It is a paradox that they are
suggesting that they themselves should be eliminated.
This is because students learn not by exploring, evaluating and questioning
but by simply accepting societys views on traders. But if the students
explore by themselves, they would find that the middlemen serve both the
consumer and producer by reducing the inconvenience to them called
transaction costs in economics and facilitating the exchange of goods by

buying from producers and selling to consumers. The aberration of the

system occurs when the middlemen holds monopoly power over
information which he uses to his advantage. Thus, instead of identifying the
problem, students cry like parrots that middlemen should be eliminated
from the system.
Vicious circle of ignorance within the countrys school system
The pressure of the present examination system has forced students not to
devote time for learning any other subject or engage in any other pastime.
Hence, they do not read, discuss, debate or interact on matters other than
what is needed for them to pass the examinations. Thus, the general
knowledge, world outlook and aptitude of students become very narrow.
When students do not question teachers, teachers too do not have
incentive to learn anything other than what is needed for preparing
students to sit for examinations.
Hence, the education system in the country has got into a vicious circle of
ignorance: teachers do not encourage
students to question; students do not
want to follow a path involving learning
by questioning, evaluating and probing;
since students do not question, teachers
do not have incentive to have the
capacity to answer the possible
questions; since teachers are unable to
answer the questions, they do not
encourage students ask questions.
Hence, the school education system in
Sri Lanka moves around this vicious circle
of ignorance.
Universities practically becoming a
continuation of Advanced Level
classes
When these students enter the
university, they expect the university
lecturers too to function as school
teachers who would do nothing but
prepare them for examination papers.
The prescribed readings for students are
rarely read by them before lectures. With
modern technology, most of the lectures
are presented in the form of PowerPoint
Presentations. Hence, students have
given up even the habit of taking down
notes of lectures. If a question is asked

from the previous lecture, not many can answer it because they do not
even practice the reflection of what was taught previously before the next
lecture. All they do at the university is not going through a continuous
learning system but collecting lecture printouts and other materials till the
announcement of the examination and start learning by rote. But by that
time, it is too late for them to have a critical knowledge of the subject being
taught to them.
Max Planck story: A Nobel Laureate being impersonated by his
chauffeur
The Swiss writer Rolf Dobelli, in his 2013 book The Art of Thinking Clearly,
has distinguished between two types of knowledge, the chauffeur
knowledge and the Planck knowledge by referring to a story attributable to
the 1918 Physics Nobel laureate Max Planck.
In this story, Planck, after being awarded the Nobel Prize, had gone on a
lecture tour across Germany where he had delivered the same lecture to
every new audience he had met. After some time, it had become pretty
boring for him to do so. But his chauffeur who had been with him
throughout had learned the lecture by heart and had proposed to his
master that they could exchange positions in the next lecture just to kill the
boredom: Chauffeur impersonating Planck and delivering the lecture while
Planck enjoying it in the audience dressed in chauffeurs uniform.
Everything had gone on well until the question time when one academic in
the audience had asked a question. The chauffeur had been taken
completely unawares but instead of revealing his true identity had played
the smart card. He had ridiculed the questioner saying that it was such a
simple question that even his chauffeur could answer it. So did the
chauffeur who was in the audience.
Distinction between Chauffeur Knowledge and Real Knowledge
Based on this story, Dobelli makes a distinction between the chauffeur
knowledge and Planck knowledge. Planck knowledge is the real knowledge
acquired in the hard way learning all facts and depths of a subject.
Chauffeur knowledge is, on the other hand, learning simply to put on a
show by imitating someone or just presenting what someone has said.
Though it is difficult to distinguish between the two, Dobelli gives a clue to
do so. Those who have the real knowledge know the limit of their
competence and if a question is asked beyond it, they would simply
apologetically respond that they do not know it. Chauffeur knowledge
holders on the other hand would continue to play the game by pretending
that there is no limit to what they know.
Rolf Dobelli: Be sceptic of even views given by authorities
In another chapter, Dobelli has advised those intending to think clearly to

be sceptic of everything they see as patterns or revelations because it may

be due to an illusion in the brain. For instance, he advises that if someone
sees Jesus Christ in a pancake, he should immediately ask the question why
Jesus wanted to reveal himself in that manner. This scepticism he says
should be extended to every authority on issues because authorities are not
correct always. His advice has been simple: when one encounters an
authority, challenge him. What Dobelli has said here is simply an echoing of
what the Buddha said in the Kalama Sutra some 2600 years ago. He told
those from the Kalama clan: Dont go by reports, by legends, by traditions,
by scripture, by logical conjecture, by inference, by analogies, by
agreement through pondering views, by probability, or by the thought,
This contemplative is our teacher (available at:
http://www.accesstoinsight.org/tipitaka/an/an03/an03.065.than.html ).
Dont produce people with chauffeur knowledge but those with real
knowledge
Sri Lankan education system, both at school level and at the university
level, produces people with chauffeur knowledge and not those with real or
Planck knowledge. Accordingly, students go through the education
machinery but come out not as really learned men and women but those
who are unable to think clearly.
This has to be changed if the country wants to align its education system to
the innovation economy to be set up with the implementation of the social
market economy policy being pursued at present. Until and unless this
target is met, spending money on education is a waste of resources.
That is why it is necessary that Sri Lanka should provide relevant education
to its students enabling them to think clearly and creatively. It will build up
a creative capital and not just a human capital.
Israel, a leading innovation economy in the modern world, built its creative
capital by allowing students to be sceptic all throughout and thinking out of
the box when it comes to providing solutions to issues they have faced,
according to Dan Senor and Saul Singer who documented the story of
Israels economic miracle in their 2009 book Start-up Nation.
(W.A Wijewardena, a former Deputy Governor of the Central Bank
of Sri Lanka, can be reached at waw1949@gmail.com )
Posted by Thavam