Note: I haven't yet watched the movie Three Idiots though I intend to do it in the near future but have read the book Five Point Someone. The reason for naming this blog The Fourth Idiot is because I was also like the characters in Five Point Someone and in all probability three idiots too.
I had always hated exams because they only taught me how to cram in but never to question. I liked the book Five Point Someone for this reason and appreciate Chetan Bhagat's views on Education system. In all probability everyone of us know that our education system is seriously flawed and that is probably one of the main reasons why 3 idiots has become a huge success. I must also note here that I was very happy when Kapil Sibal became the HRD minister for I always deemed him in high regard and believe he is taking some concrete steps in making the education system better.
Let me put forth my views however insignificant / immaterial they may be to the actual scheme of things.
Firstly, Every human being is unique. So every human being has a unique way and pace of learning . However, in my guess they may fall in different types / bands in the way they learn. In ancient India, the child was admitted in a gurukula and his education is complete when the guru says it is complete. I never understood the significance of this but it became clear to me in the past few years(probably 4 -5) that the prime reason for this was that the guru imparted education on a student to student basis.
Secondly, Every one would agree with me that one of the biggest challenges to the current education system is that the pace at which information and thereby the textbooks get outdated in today's world. However, the pace varies for various fields. Basic Sciences may have much lesser pace than technology fields.
Thirdly, Every one disagrees with the existing methods employed of evaluating a student. But we have not yet been able to find a better and uniform method to evaluate a student.In my humble opinion tests should become more and more open book based. This should be augmented by extremely good and committed faculty. Today, the student is expected to read, cram and reproduce what is already known. Instead, he may be asked to solve a problem which he has not crammed in. He should be evaluated on how he approaches the problem and not on what he knows or doesn't know. I feel that the student should not be put to time constraints and also the tests should be open-book as I mentioned.
Fourthly, I strongly feel that students willing to do research should be put in an environment that is conducive and oriented towards doing research right from their undergraduate days. This would reduce the time a Phd is created. Currently, there is a huge gap between the undergraduate / postgraduate stage to pursuing doctrate stage. Also, the stipends of Phd students in India is very less whereas they deserve much more than that.
1 comment:
I disagree with you on many thgs. I did not like CB's FPS, especially i was admitted to IIT-Roorkee and saw what students do @ IIT.
1) A student who wants to learn will ultimately learn. If you watched 3 idiots, Aamir gets rank 1 bcoz its his passion to learn. None needs to teach you. It is we who bitch abt the system and bark a lot becuase we are lazy are not hard working enuf to learn it ourselves. Ppl r simply confused souls. There are ample opportunities for a student in B.Tech/B.Sc to learn. For example, like summer internships at at least 20 research labs in India. At least 50% of Indian kids are unaware of this because all that they read in news paper is sports column.
2) Yes, science is progressing but the basics are still the same. Some one may invent something great but it has to obey F=ma. Tell me how many of kids follow the NCERT textbooks in 12th? I have seen very few, that too only @ parthi. PPl want test papers, imp. questions etc., It is students who are making the system cramming. The education system in India is one of the best especially much better compared to USA. We do not use calculator for counting. We think to understand. We do not use Microscoft office to plot simple graphs in 12th std physics expt labs. We use pencil and scale. Our system is good. But the students are at fault.
I hv more to say but lazy to type all this into this small box.
We do not need better education system but we need values in the system.Tho' swami created a place for developing such thgs, old ppl and worthless ppl flood it up with their ego's and politics.
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