I don’t think anyone would disagree that education in this country is sadly lacking. The general consensus on Dominican Today is that the government do not allocate sufficient funding, even less than the 4% of GDP which is mandated in the constitution. Some take the view that too much is spent on less worthy priorities, especially the Metro. Others maintain that even with adequate funding for schools and teachers, a fundamental change in the priorities of parents, and hence children, regarding the need for education would be required.

Regardless, an enormous, sustained increase in funding would be required to bring the standard of education to an acceptable level, using conventional methodologies. Dominican children only attend school half the time of children in developed countries, due to the need to have two “shifts” per day per school since there is such a shortage of schools, classrooms and teachers.

I am proposing a dramatic departure from the conventional process of children attending conventional schools, taught by conventional teachers. Information technology, the internet and the attitude of Dominicans to these makes an internet-based education system a potential solution.

Rather than building more schools, hiring and training more teachers, the government provide specially-made computers and internet connection to every household. These computers are constructed such they can only be used for their intended purpose, not movies, chat, games, etc. Likewise they can only access the designated education sites. The hardware could run on direct current powered by a re-chargeable battery and rectifier, thereby overcoming the intermittent nature of much of this country’s electricity supply.

Interactive education programs are utilized, both on-line and off-line. Also there is regular, but not continuous, one-on-one direct interaction between students and specialist teachers, using webcams, microphones and headphones. This would be mainly for problem-solving and counseling. The bulk of the teaching and regular exams would be done using specialist, interactive software.

Children would still attend a conventional school, but only, say, one day per week, for sport, science practical work, formal exams, etc. Since they would handle a much smaller number of students per day, they could provide much better facilities and teachers per student.

School uniforms and lunches are an unnecessary waste of money and should be phased out.
The network need not be restricted to children’s education. The entire household could benefit.

I believe this approach would be cheaper and have many benefits. Please consider and suggest changes, criticism, whatever.

Very good well thought out logical, sensible and feasible recommendations to improve public education in the DR. It is most definitely worth taking a closer look and consider those ideas in greater depth. But public education in many parts of the world has always had the reputation to be lacking in many respects, continually behind when compared to private schools as it has been similarly true for DR.

Thanks, Guillermone

The idea came to me when I noticed the leap-frogging of telecommunications technology here. Many areas have gone from no hard-wired telephone service direct to mobile cell-phones. To bring the education system up to scratch would require a doubling at least of the number of schools and teachers, using the traditional approach. I believe an internet-based system could be implemented and maintained for a much lower cost.

The development of such technology would not be difficult, and may also be something that could be adapted and exported to other countries.

great ideas, Roy. here is one reason why i agree with you. cross country regressions have established, empirically, a positive, and robust, correlation between CAPITAL EXPENDITURE and corruption. countries that are high on the corruption index spend more money on buildings than on teacher´s salaries, because you can siphon more money away from building a million dollar parking lot for UASD than you can by paying decent teachers´salaries, in order to attract higher quality personnel. as i have contended, however much of the budget that is allocated to education, it will do no good, because watering a barren bush only makes it bigger, but cannot cause it to bear fruit.

Thanks, Dready.

I agree a balance must be struck between capital and recurrent expenditure. The problem with UASD is they are funded by government purely on the head-count of students. There is is no entrance exam, so many start then drop out in 1st year. Also there is no balance among faculties. I went to a graduation ceremony last week. About 55% of the graduates were in medicine. Yet despite the urgent need for doctors, there is no funding in hospitals for more places, so most will end up as shop-assistants and hairdressers. There were very few science, agronomy, engineering or information technology graduating. So much for Lionel's proposed "knowledge based economy"!

Incidentally, the UASD parking building is not used, since people prefer to drive to the door of their particular faculty then find the nearest park, legal or otherwise. Walking halfway across campus is to be avoided at all costs.

Taking your barren bush analogy further, water is necessary, as is the correct NPK (nitrogen, phosphorous & potassium) balance is needed - nitrogen for vegetative growth, phosphorous for see germination and potassium for flowers and fruit.