People’s Republic of Kampuchea (PRK) or Heng Samrin regime
(1979 to 1989) started to rebuild the country. This regime, which was supported
by communist Vietnam and other socialist bloc nations, ruled Cambodia after the
fall of the Khmer Rouge. The regime’s top priority between 1979 and 1981 was to
reinstall educational institutions. Generous support from UNICEF and International
Red Cross, together with a strong determination to restructure Cambodia by the PRK,
saw about 6,000 educational institutions rebuilt and thousands of teachers
trained within a very short period (Dunnett, 1993). According to an interview
with a senior education official who had been involved in basic education
system and teacher training since 1979, the regime’s policy on enhancing
education was: 1979-1981 was a period of restructuring and rehabilitating of
both infrastructure and human resources. By restructuring and rehabilitation I
refer to collecting school-aged children and putting them into schools despite
in the poor condition. Classes were even conducted in makeshift, open-air classrooms
or under trees. We appealed to all those surviving teachers and literate people
to teach the illiterates. We used various slogans such as ‘going to teach and
going to school is nation-loving’ and so on. There were no official licences or
any requirements for taking on the teaching job. We just tried to open schools
and literacy classes, regardless of their quality.
The rebirth of education in Cambodia in 1979 represents a
historically unique experience from that of any other nations. In the early 1980s,
all levels of schooling (from kindergarten to higher education) were reopened
and the total enrolment was almost one million. Many teachers were better
trained and quality gradually enhanced. Enrolment in primary education in 1989,
increased to 1.3 million, and in lower secondary to 0.24 million, compared with
only 0.9 million and 4,800 in 1980 (Ministry of Education, Youth and Sport,
1999). However, it is worth noting that in any primary school, about 30 per
cent of the children had no father, 10 per cent had no mother, and between 5
and 10 per cent were orphans (Postlethwaite, 1988). The political and economic disturbance
haunted Cambodia pending the second term of the current Royal Government and
the complete eradication of the Khmer Rouge’s machinery and organization in
1998. Nevertheless, the people of Cambodia still have pride and look forward to
a golden age when their nation will again be prosperous.
CONCLUSION: Social and political factors of the last four decades from
the 1950s to the 1980s determined the flux of crisis and progress of the
schooling systems. The former extensive Khmer Empire, Cambodia suffered massive socio-cultural destruction,
political turmoil, genocide, international isolation, and socio-economic crisis
during the civil conflicts of the 1970s and 1980s. Political and economic
problems during the above two decades were not isolated from the education structure,
which was also seriously damaged during the civil conflicts. Shifting from
limited or no access for girls to formal education within the traditional
school system to the French schooling system in the early twentieth century was
a positive step towards universal basic education. However, although primary
education was made compulsory in the 1950s and 1960s, there was no presence of
mechanism in handling the implementation of the policy. The changing concepts
of basic education from basic literacy to primary education, and to primary plus
lower secondary education in the mid -1990s saw the expansion of learning
opportunities for better lifestyle and socio-economic amelioration in
contemporary Cambodia. The experiments of the 1950s and 1960s were largely
unsuccessful because modern educational contents and outcomes could not meet
the actual needs of the society at that time. In other words, many Cambodians
feared that the modernity would lead to the demise of their traditional culture
Dy 97 inherited from their proud Angkorian ancestors. However,
present-day Cambodians consider reforms in education during the 1990s as positive
measures towards socio-economic development and improving freedom of lives.
This acknowledges tremendous support from international community for guidance
and recommendations.
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