Allocation of teachers among public schools and minimization of cost: The case of public education in Sri Lanka
| Author | Tikiri Nimal Herath |
| DOI | http://doi.org/10.1177/2057891120935993 |
| Published date | 01 December 2022 |
| Date | 01 December 2022 |
| Subject Matter | South Asian Politics |
Allocation of teachers among
public schools and minimization
of cost: The case of public
education in Sri Lanka
Tikiri Nimal Herath
Economics Department, University of Sri Jayewardenepura, Sri Lanka
Abstract
Overall, in Sri Lankan public schools, the student–teacher ratio is very low. The number of
teachers is considerably greater than the number of classes; sometimes the former is double or
more than double the latter. In a school in which all the teachers are individually deployed in each
class, many teachers have to remain idle. Thus, every day a certain number of teachers remain idle.
This situation points to two issues. Firstly, in Sri Lankan public schools, resources are underutilized
and hence costs are not minimized. Secondly, since there is an excess of teachers in schools, a
formal and logical method is required to determine the optimal number of teachers. This article
tries to develop a formula to determine the required number of teachers for a school, and thereby
to find ways to minimize costs when employing teachers. Primary data on classes, teachers and
subjects offered with respect to 40 public schools in the North Central Province were collected.
When empirical data on the number of teachers in sampled schools were compared with calcu-
lated teacher requirements in terms of the developed formula, it was found that school authorities
are underutilizing teachers. The article concludes that (a) based on the developed formula to
determine the required number of teachers, many public schools have an excess of teachers and
hence current transfer policy for school teachers is not logical, (b) teacher requirement can be
decided according to the developed formula and (c) by adopting one teacher-two subjects-one
school and one teacher-one subject-more schools models, government authorities can minimize
costs further.
Keywords
cost minimization, one teacher-one subject-more schools model, one teacher-one subject-one
school model, one teacher-two subjects-one school model
Corresponding author:
Tikiri Nimal Herath, Economics Department, University of Sri Jayewardenepura, Nugegoda, 10100, Sri Lanka.
Email: n-herath@sjp.ac.lk
Asian Journal of Comparative Politics
ªThe Author(s) 2020
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DOI: 10.1177/2057891120935993
journals.sagepub.com/home/acp
2022, Vol. 7(4) 849–860
South Asian Politics
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