BoC provides Rs. 5 billion in PC loans for 50,000 teachers

The Ministry of Education has signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) with the Bank of Ceylon (BoC) to implement an islandwide credit scheme to finance the National Teacher PC Drive program. This will help 50,000 school teachers all over the country to obtain personal computers (PCs) for their personal use and teaching purposes.

Under this scheme, a government school teacher can get a loan up to a maximum of Rs. 100,000 to cover up to 75% of the cost of a PC complete with e-mail, Internet and other facilities. These loans require no collateral from the borrowers.

Only an irrevocable letter of undertaking from the Provincial Director of Education is required, stating that the monthly instalment on the loan will be recovered from the borrower and remitted to the Bank until the loan has been fully repaid.

Each school teacher buying a PC under this scheme will get a free scholarship from Microsoft that provides all training on its usage, leading to the internationally recognised International Computer Driving Licence (ICDL) certification.

Chairman of the Bank of Ceylon Udayasri Kariyawasam, who signed the MoU said, "As Sri Lanka's leading bank, we have an obligation to nurture national development at every possible level.

Through this loan scheme we want to make sure that no government school teacher anywhere in the country is deprived of having a personal computer for want of funding. Our islandwide online branch network will serve school teachers even in remote areas. We are granting these PC loans at the lowest possible interest rates.

A repayment period up to 36 months will minimise the monthly financial burden on the school teachers who benefit from this loan scheme." A countrywide census conducted in 2006 by the Department of Census and Statistics and the Ministry of Education on the literacy of school teachers on ICT (Information and Communication Technology) suggest that only about 32% of the school teachers are computer literate, and that the student to computer-literate school teacher ratio is as high as 57%.

Secretary to the Ministry of Education, Ariyaratne Hewage, who signed the MoU on behalf of his Ministry said, "The National Teacher PC Drive will enable our student community to acquire the computer skills and knowledge by first supporting our teachers with the skills and motivation needed to use computer resources effectively."

The National Teacher PC Drive is an initiative of the Ministry of Education under the accelerated ICT Education Quality Improvement program.

Its broader aim is to enable our students to acquire the ICT skills, which will help to create a knowledge-based future society as envisioned under the 'Mahinda Chintana'.

Minister of Education, Susil Premajayantha, said, "I firmly believe that the National Teacher PC Drive, with strong financial backing from the Bank of Ceylon and technical support from Microsoft, will be instrumental in taking our school teachers towards a knowledge-centric society."