The Committee of Higher Education, under the leadership of Deputy Minister of Education and Higher Education Dr. Madhura Seneviratne, recently held a meeting to address pressing issues in the university system and present immediate solutions.

A key focus of the meeting was the policy report on granting university admission to students with special needs. Practical challenges of implementing such a system, including the university admission process, the use of the Z-score method, and examination procedures were emphasized in the meeting. Accordingly, the members agreed to introduce the admission system in several selected universities.

Attention was also given to expanding admission opportunities for students with national and international-level sports achievements. Beyond sports, the committee highlighted the importance of extending similar opportunities to students with unique artistic and creative talents under additional admission schemes.

The University Grants Commission (UGC) was instructed to take urgent measures to resolve issues related to the quality of external degree programmes and the unemployment faced by graduates of those programmes.

The committee also reviewed staff shortages in the university system. Out of 4,906 approved vacancies in academic and non-academic cadres, 3,152 (63% and 65% respectively) have already been filled. It was noted, however, that recruitment is still being carried out according to the administrative procedures of individual universities.

The meeting was attended by Minister Upali Pannilage, MPs Rajeevan Jeyachandramoorthy, Nimal Palihena, and Manjula Sugath, along with the Secretary of the Ministry of Education, additional secretaries from the Ministry of Higher Education, and representatives of the UGC.