Policy failure? Critical insights from mother tongue-based multilingual education (MTB-MLE) policy in Nepal

• In Event: Rethinking Multilingual Education in Linguistically Diverse Situations in South Asia: What works? And what does not work?

Proposal

Studies from around the world have consistently shown that education in children’s mother tongue is a necessary condition for quality and equitable learning and literacy (Giannini, 2014). Scholars also agree that mother tongue education is an important aspect of social justice, human rights and sustainable development (Skutnabb-Kangas, 2003; Lauwo, 2018; UNESCO, 2016). Yet, the evidence shows that a significant number of students are taught in languages they do not understand fully (UNESCO, 2016). This situation contributes to the learning crisis particularly of children from indigenous and minority communities. Mother tongue-based multilingual education (MTB-MLE) is a policy that some Asian countries have adopted as part of their initiatives to address the issue of language in education (Fillmore, 2014, 2021).
Nepal also developed a MTB-MLE policy in 2009 (Ministry of Education, 2009). The national policy and its strategies for implementing the policy was based on the pilot project funded by the Finnish Government from 2006-2008 in eight mother tongues in the seven schools of six districts. The languages included Tamang, Rana Tharu, Magar Dhut, Rajbanshi, Santhali, Athapariya, Urau and Tharu. According to the policy, the medium of instruction at the primary level shall be children’s mother tongues (Ministry of Education, 2009). In the beginning, some schools adopted the policy and developed materials in mother tongues. However, MTB-MLE policy has not received much attention in recent discourses on educational reform, particularly after the political change of 2015. The new constitution of the Federal Democratic Republic Nepal gave power to the local government to manage school education. Recent studies have shown that local governments are not much committed to implementing MTB-MLE policy, rather they are introducing English as a medium of instruction policy (Phyak, 2020).
Drawing on ‘policy failure’ (McConnel, 2015) and ‘language ideology’ (Kroskrity, 2004), I discuss how the status of MTB-MLE policy could be taken as an example of policy failure in the context of Nepal. I draw on the cases of the four experimental schools where the government had first implemented the policy. These schools have withdrawn MTB-MLE policy after five years of its implementation. The data includes critical ethnographic observation of schools’ policies, pedagogies and language ideologies of teachers collected through observation, field notes and interviews. The findings of the study shows that this policy has failed as “a process, program and politics” (McConnel, 2015). Rather than engaging local stakeholders, mainly teachers and communities, in discussions, local governments have asked schools to implement English medium policy. As a program, MTB-MLE policy lacks a comprehensive teacher education program and management and support mechanisms for schools. More critically, MTB-MLE policy as politics for ensuring linguistic and educational rights of indigenous and ethnic minorities has not been taken seriously. The interviews with teachers clearly show the construction and reproduction of the ‘deficit ideology’ (Gorski, 2011) of mother tongues in education. I conclude my presentation by drawing major recommendations to understand the complexities and enabling conditions that the government needs to build to address the policy failure and rework on implementing MTB-MLE.

Author

• Prem Phyak, Teachers College Columbia University