Changing education scenario in India

Education in India is merely subjective and deals with courses involving Math, Physics, Chemistry, Humanities and Arts.

 If we look at a global picture of the same spectrum, the situation is more or less same; education on a global forum also means the same like how it is in India. Why don’t we give importance to dance, music, theatre and so on? Why don’t people graduate in such streams? Why aren’t there any Universities which certify people in these dynamics? 

Speaking of certificates, let me ask you all a question, do you think degrees really matter?

In the days gone by yes, but these days, I don’t think degrees really matter. We have numerous test cases around us who are successful enough in establishing themselves by leading decent lives with no degree. Hence, talents do hold a position in Indian society, but not to a very great extent.

Does education mean only learning or mastering the subjects like math, and science? No, it is way beyond that. As children, we have followed the same syllabus, and the new born in every household is also learning the same syllabus. There has been enormous change in syllabus since the evolution of education as a field, and this is a global picture and not just in India. 

Let’s also look into what is creativity and who has it in abundance? Creativity (according to the dictionary), the use of imagination or original ideas to create something. More or less we all agree to this. On the other side, we all even know that creativity is abundance in children/ young minds. 

Their ability to imagine is beyond ours. This ability is important for a better tomorrow. Their creativity will lead to a balance in the society. Are we nurturing their creativity? Are we encouraging their imaginative ability? No, I don’t think so. 

With parents working and not being able to spend time with their children and with mechanical functioning of schools with syllabus not catering to the child’s imaginary or creative abilities, we are in deed killing the abilities of young adults to think beyond. Quoting Sir Ken Robinson, “Creativity is as important as literacy”, we all should collectively work towards the primary goal of transforming education. 

We are all made afraid of mistakes; we plan on not committing any mistakes in life. But there ends the idea of learning and creativity. Mistakes help us learn and reciprocate. I personally believe in, ‘commit mistakes, learn from them, and commit new mistakes; never repeat the same mistake’. I never understood words like teacher, lecturer, teacher as per dictionary is ‘someone who teaches, especially in a school’, going with this, if I was to learn, I did learn from a lot of people in my school, from watchman, from caretakers and from lot of such people. 

They all taught me something or the other in life. Why aren’t they called Teachers? And when we look at another similar word called Lecturer, it says, ‘a person who gives lectures’. 

Technically teacher just don’t teach and those who teach are often not called teachers, like-wise, lecturers don’t just lecture but do a lot more than just lecturing. Why don’t we call people in the field of education as Facilitators? As the saying goes, ‘a true educator acts as a facilitator’. Facilitator is a self-explanatory word. Teacher or Lecturer don’t just teach but they facilitate learning, be it subjective, personal or professional, they look after a whole of us and transform us into men and women from boy and girl. 

“Syllabus being the prime problem, issues like no quality teachers or educators, no infrastructure, irregularity of students and even teachers are problems on other hand. Collectively addressing all these is possible via Multi Quality Enhancement Mechanism; 

there are no practical modules of this yet, but this could be a stop solution if rightly implemented. Setting up a separate body who are not just professors but also students and young professionals who would collectively work on designing a new syllabus based on the available research data stating the reforms in education system. And this body should also be allowed to conduct regular check on schools and college all over, regardless of government or private run. 

Implementation of the said should be done on a large scale and shouldn’t come as a pilot study. A pilot study project called CBSE-I (CBSE International) a separate curriculum which is an advanced version of general CBSE was implemented for about 5 years and later it was curbed stating numerous reasons, 

but when we look at the results and gains through that, they are on par with IBDP curriculum. Implementing solutions as pilot study will never allow us to reach the big picture and so, implementing solutions in one go on the whole would definitely help us a collective dream.”

I would like to end it with a quote of Sir Ken Robinson, “Human resources are like natural resources; they're often buried deep. You have to go looking for them; they're not just lying around on the surface. You have to create the circumstances where they show themselves.” 
The author is by English Facilitator, ShantiniketanVidhyalaya.