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Educational Adventurism in Punjab
The humid
July-August months coincide with the education season in Punjab.
Though we did not have a very hot summer, the humidity has dulled
the educational desires of Punjabis. Aspiration-oriented instant
stardom is the mantra. It is the launch session for interactive
white boards in a state where black boards are rarely used. Every
street corner of urban Punjab is dotted with learning centres. To
the outsider it conveys a picture of a massive educational
revolution in Punjab. Walk into any of these and they are prepared
to dish out a future across the shelf. If you have the dough, there
is no worry.
After feeling
the heat of human trafficking through the marriage route and the
musical troupe route, education shops have sprung up promising the
moon. Quality education from quality institutions is still sought
after by students and parents but they have to face tough
competition from the ‘nouveau-riche educated elite’, for whom a
course in Animation or Applied computing techniques is more
significant as it allows migration to foreign shores.
The insatiable
Punjabi love for greener pastures is taking sinister proportions in
the educational arena. Task-oriented and job-oriented vocational
education is doing the rounds of all fields of study. The admission
process is called counselling, though there are a handful of
qualified educational and psychological counsellors in the whole
state. The reputation of a college is not measured by the quality of
faculty and the provision of laboratory and other facilities,
including sports and hostel arrangements, but by the kind and
quantity of placements. There is no doubt that educational
supplements by major newspapers have bestirred the fantasy of
tudents and they have a vast choice at their disposal.
Studying
opthalmology or gemology or cosmetic dentistry or putting in flying
hours to become a pilot –all is available if you have the
inclination and the diligence to pursue offbeat courses. There is
little talk of values, quality life and being a good individual. The
chant of success and grand success is what students, their parents
and teachers want to hear. Children, goaded by parents and doctored
by teachers who are no longer the teachers of yore but are doing
jobs, want instant success, almost like fast food.
Bachelors and
Masters are secondary to diploma and functional courses. While
Universities from far and wide, very many of the lower quality are
setting up centres, the Punjab government is oblivious to the
ramifications of this loose educational system, without guidelines
and parameters, in the decades to come. Rural Punjab is witnessing
the mushrooming of newer kind of educational centres set up either
by foreign institutions or by private individuals, severely
challenging the existing primary education structure.
Sooner than
later this education system will collapse. Growing competition at
the country and global level will drive serious students outside the
state of Punjab as there is no place for mediocrity. There is need
to reinvent and rejuvenate the education system than to aimlessly
follow a pattern of education which is ignoring the mother tongue
Punjabi and which does not teach value systems as a prerequisite for
living a fuller life.
A movement to
set up rural libraries and rural study centres and a massive
motivational campaign to motivate the staff in government-run
schools can turn the tide as the existing infrastructure can be used
for education, sports and training in soft skills. The one way to
beat this adventurism is to inculcate love for books and reading. We
need new story tellers as our grandmothers and grandfathers have
somehow relinquished the charm required to weave together families
and foster love for stories and religiosity, which have been our
strengths for centuries. Diaspora interest in generating education
consciousness has begun but the long route desires more
professionals and certainly a long term professional approach.
6 August, 2008
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