{"id":150805,"date":"2025-07-19T15:46:24","date_gmt":"2025-07-19T22:46:24","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/?p=150805"},"modified":"2025-07-19T15:46:24","modified_gmt":"2025-07-19T22:46:24","slug":"sri-lankas-higher-education-access-crisis-2025","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/2025\/07\/19\/sri-lankas-higher-education-access-crisis-2025\/","title":{"rendered":"Sri Lanka&#8217;s Higher Education Access Crisis \u2013 2025"},"content":{"rendered":"<h2><span style=\"color: #0000ff;\"><em><strong>Jayantha Herath<\/strong><\/em><\/span><\/h2>\n\n\n<p>In 2025, Sri Lanka faces a critical higher education access crisis. Despite 196,000 students qualifying for university admission, only 45,000 were admitted to state universities. This leaves over 75% of qualified students without access to public university education.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image size-full\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"600\" height=\"600\" src=\"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/07\/image-3.jpeg\" alt=\"\" class=\"wp-image-150806\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/07\/image-3.jpeg 600w, https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/07\/image-3-300x300.jpeg 300w, https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/07\/image-3-150x150.jpeg 150w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 600px) 100vw, 600px\" \/><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Key Issues Not Addressed by the New Government Reforms<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>&#8211; No expansion of state university seats<br>&#8211; No community college system<br>&#8211; No scaled open university options<br>&#8211; Inadequate financial aid<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Call to Action<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>We urge the Sri Lankan government to prioritize higher education access by:<br>1. Expanding state university capacity.<br>2. Establishing a national community college system.<br>3. Scaling up open and distance learning options.<br>4. Increasing financial aid and scholarship programs.<br><br>Without immediate action, the country risks leaving behind a generation of capable students.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Jayantha Herath In 2025, Sri Lanka faces a critical higher education access crisis. Despite 196,000 students qualifying for university admission, only 45,000 were admitted to state universities. This leaves over 75% of qualified students without access to public university education. Key Issues Not Addressed by the New Government Reforms &#8211; No expansion of state university [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-150805","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-politics"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/150805","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=150805"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/150805\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=150805"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=150805"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=150805"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}