"A newspaper consists of just the same number of
words, whether there be any news in it or not."
—Henry Fielding (English, 1707-1754)
Word for the day
Ameliorate (v)
To make or become better, more bearable, or more
satisfactory; improve, e.g., strategies to ameliorate negative effects on the
environment.
Malice towards none
If NiKu feels MeKu is a losing proposition and hence not
worth supporting in presidential election, what would make him believe that
RaGa is a candidate worth supporting for PM post in the 2019 General
elections!!!
First random thought this morning
Please rewind your memories a little bit and try to remember the
primary plank on which the incumbent NDA government was elected.
What I get is
"corruption in public offices".
"We the People" gave them overwhelming mandate to pursue
this agenda. Now if they are pursuing it with some vigor, how does it become
political vendetta?
If they do indulge in political vendetta, under the garb of
anti-corruption drive, "We the People" will decide their fate in
2019.
Back to school - 3
I have the following solutions to offer, with a caveat.
Caveat: I have discussed this issue with a number of people from
various walks of the life. While a majority of people who actually participate
in the education system as contributor or beneficiary, did largely agree with
my views, most of the policymakers, elite, and policy influencers found these
too radical to implement.
Suggestions
1. The Right to Education (RTE) law should be transformed
into a more comprehensive Right to Uniform Education. It should be a
fundamental right of all children to receive an equal and uniform opportunity
to receive education.
2. The government should establish and fund all
educational institutions up to graduation level. All private institutions
meeting the prescribed standards should be nationalized forthwith; other
should be shut down.
3. All education till primary level should be in
mother tongue, with Hindi and English as electives. From secondary level, all
students should be given an option to choose their medium of instruction.
4. Like the taxation system, the education and
examination system should also be uniform across the country. All regional
boards should be abolished. A central autonomous regulator should be
established to administer and regulate the education system. The regulator
should have six members, one from each region (North, South, East, West,
Central and North East) and one Chairman. The members should be retired vice
chancellors of the top university in each region. The chairman could be a top
scholar.
5. Up to secondary level the examinations should
be to identify the strengths of the children rather than emphasizing on their
failings. The post secondary course for the students should be chartered based
on their strengths rather than ambitions of their parents.
6. A strong vocational training network should
be integrated with the post secondary education system. This network should be
managed and funded by the industry under their CSR initiatives. The students
should be assigned to this network based on their aptitude. The government's
role in this network should be to make sure that the society honors the dignity
of labor and no one is discriminated based on their profession.
7. The examination system post secondary level
should be purely job oriented. The Central regulator should conduct various
examinations that would qualify the students for applying for various
specialized courses and jobs. A student joining IIM immediately after completing his
stint at IIT and becoming a banker soon after is travesty of the system.
8. The government should create an open source
National Portal for Learning (NPL).
All working teachers should be required to upload at least one
lecture/lesson per month on the portal. All teachers receiving pension should be
encouraged and motivated to upload lessons and lectures related to any subject
and standard.
Similarly, all class one bureaucrat should be mandatorily required
to upload lessons on policy making and administration.
All professionals (e.g., doctors, engineers, CAs, lawyers,
lecturers, etc.) should be required to earn certain continuing education
credits. They may earn these credits by uploading lectures, lessons, case
studies based on their real life professional experience etc.
Besides, all citizens should be encouraged to contribute to the
portal.
This way, the government can create a learning portal, having education
and training material for all standards, professions, vocations in all
languages. Anyone in the world can use this portal for learning anything they
wish.
A system of evaluation (online tests etc.) could be integrated
with the system to help people who can't attend regular schools due to age,
inability or any other reason, to obtain formal qualifications.
9. The NPL should be supplemented with a
National Corps of Volunteers (NCV), comprising of people who want to volunteer their time and skill
for teaching and training Indian citizens. The regulator should approve their
training/teaching program and provide necessary facilities (like class room in
schools post normal school hours and required teaching material) to each such
volunteer, who can then teach/train the interested participants. For example,
if a retired English teacher wants to teach English to construction labor,
rickshaw pullers, elderly parents etc., he can be provided a class room (post
school hours), books and writing material for students. Similarly, if a Hotel
chef wants to give cooking classes to people, he can be provided necessary
facilities. Any citizen of India should be free to join a class of his choice.
10. The government should create six Exclusive Education
Zones (EEZ), one in all regions of the country. These zones should be
designated as neutral land for taxation, labor, education and currency law
purposes. All reputed global education institutions should be invited to set up
their integrated campus in these zones. The only conditions should be 20%
admissions to Indian students and 40% jobs to Indian.
Every years billions of dollars worth of precious foreign currency
is spent by Indian students travelling abroad for higher studies. Through these
zones, we may be able to save much of this forex outgo. Many foreign
students who cannot go to advanced countries like US and UK for higher
studies, can come and study here.
Besides, our teachers will get opportunity to collaborate with
their global counterparts in research and development activities. And global
best practices in education could be imported into our education & training
system. We have seen tremendous result of this in auto industry
11. Accomplished people in every field should be encouraged
and funded to establish their own Academies of Excellence (AoE) to promote
excellence in their own field. For example, a Padma Vibhushan in classical music
may be encouraged to establish a residential music academy to train students in
classical Indian music. Similarly, top professionals from medical, engineering,
fine arts, yoga, languages, etc, could be invited to contribute positively to
the nation building.
These are just a few suggestions. There is lot more that could be
done.
If the readers are wondering, how this gigantic transformations
will be funded. That is no problem at all, in my view.
The government may just exit all industrial and banking
activities. The resources raised from these exit should be more than enough,
besides the education surcharge, to pay for this endeavor. Moreover, for next ten years,
the corporates may be required to spend their mandatory CSR allowance only for
this initiative.
The households will save billions, they pay for coaching and
admissions of their children. This will be the biggest boost to private
consumption and hence tax revenue.
NLP, if managed properly, can become a valuable asset as single
point global source for all education and training needs. I would imagine it to
be more valuable than Wikipedia, Whatsapp and Facebook put together, in less
than a decade.
Are you worried about the unemployment of millions of people engaged
in the business of coaching? Well me too!
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