In my previous post I have suggested that all education be provided by the State completely free of cost. I also said that there should be no private agencies involved in the provision of education. I have already said that the existing system of education in India is only enabling some while others are simply ignored and that the real reason behind that is the cost that is supposed to be borne for an access to good quality education. Those going to public schools such as the Hyderabad Public School or the Delhi Public School have a snob value. I still recall when a cousin of mine told his father that not everyone could go to a public school (he meant the Hyderabad Public School) when his father said that he did not see any great necessity for such a school. Added to this snootiness is a new variety coming from those who go to the various schools that are based in the Waldorf system of education. These schools are grounded in the idea that examinations restrict the thinking potential of the child and therefore provide an ambiance for them to explore their full potential. In doing so they charge hefty fees and inculcate an elitism which is detrimental to society for the process of differently enabling people is continued by this. They also do not have a system of uniform clothes for children leading to huge awareness of expensive and fashionable brands among even primary school children. The cars in which they are transported to school also become another marker of the social status of the child and the family. Then there are the International Schools resplendent with air-conditioned classes and air-conditioned buses to transport students to school from residence and back.
At the other end of the spectrum is the humble government school with no teachers, blackboards, adequate class rooms. No teaching of any sort happens here. No one complains about the state of affairs here since the intake of students is exclusively from the very poor sections of society. Most (if not all) government schools offer education only in vernacular media ensuring that what their students learn (if at all they learn anything) is hopeless useless right at inception. It is therefore a matter of little wonder that most government school students drop out and go on to pursue menial jobs and in the process lose their childhood. In between somewhere are the most numerous schools that have unquestioningly reposed their faith in the system of examinations. These schools function steadfastly with the belief that a successful student is one who has mastered the art of obtaining high scores in an examination. In these schools there is very little or actually no teaching. Syllabi are completed by the month of November and from then on students are bombarded with one examination after another till such time that they go to the final examination. Even in the time before the month of November these schools examine students on a weekly basis. The training for examinations is also usually spurious. Concepts are not taught and thinking is never encouraged. Questioning is usually met with punishments of varied types and it students are made to mug answers to question. Some of these schools have started calling themselves corporate schools.
I have for years wondered what a corporate school is and how it is different from a regular school until somebody told me that corporate schools do not shy away from a profit motive and that some of them are actually registered as private limited firms. These schools have their origins in Coastal Andhra (from Vijayawada, Guntur, Nellore and some from Vishakhapatnam as well) and have gradually spread to different parts of Andhra Pradesh. Most of them have ambitions of having a pan-Indian footprint. Most of these function from business complexes and encourage students to do nothing but mug answers to questions. They usually start working from six or seven in the morning and go on till seven in the evening after which the student is expected to go home and do homework and comeback early in the morning on the next day. Some of these schools claim to give orientation to students to crack entrance examinations for admission into the IITs from class six!!!There are schools doing similar things to students who aspire to become medical practitioners. I have wondered many a time as to how a sixth class student can aspire to become an engineer or a doctor. Obviously these schools are literally cashing in on the aspirations that parents have for their children and parents are quite happy to promote this nonsensical system of education for the satisfaction of their vanities. By making students study from morning to night and denying them of any recreation or sports both of which are essential for a healthy mind and body.
Around these schools and concepts of education is an ancillary educational industry. Tutorial colleges, residential colleges and private entrepreneurial individuals, all offering to build the students confidence in taking admission tests and examinations. This economy runs into thousands of crores and these vested interests are so deeply buried that it is now proving to be impossible to oust them. A case in point is the EAMCET examination conducted in Andhra Pradesh. While it serves a purpose for the medical part it serves no purpose for the engineering part. Every year anywhere between 15,000-20,000 seats of engineering go unfilled. Yet the exam is held. Why? Regional interests are at the apex of things. The ranks obtained in the entrance are used to decide which student belonging to which region (Andhra, Rayalaseema and Telangana) will be allotted which college. What is to be noted here is that most of these colleges are run by politicians and none of them have any faculty worth talking about. So it is in the interests of these colleges to have this system of entrance, counselling to fill seats since it is this process that ensures that all engineering colleges have some intake. The coaching centres make the best of this because if a student gets a higher rank the better are his/her prospects of getting a seat in a college in the hometown.
In all this it is very clear that two things are happening. The first is that the education system is more of an industry with profit as its primary goal. The second is that in all this any education (I judiciously avoid using the term meaningful here) is expensive and consequently out of the reach of the poor. So while there are all kinds of provisos for the education and empowerment of all sections of society (including the historically dis-empowered and neglected and abused), in reality education is still a privilege and a prerogative of the upper echelons of society who will send their children to other countries while doing their best to downgrade whatever is here. Therefore I suggest that education without a profit motive must be provided free of cost by the State. At the end of the previous post I said that there are problems with that too, but they can be surmounted. In the meanwhile I was drawn into this rant and so I shall postpone the solution to another post. Please bear with me.
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