Education, Education, And Education

Education, Education, and Education

Education is a cause that has grown very close to my heart. I want to do so much for it. My passion surfaced a few months ago when I read that some people, after they had eaten in golden plates, vacationed at exotic locales, invested in shares, gold, property, etc., joined causes to help the underprivileged.

Here I was, without any money, but never short of ideas, itching to do charity in the manner of the above privileged lot. I diligently hunted for a cause, and zeroed in on education, thinking that it would make me look rich and intellectual at the same time, like a combination of Paris Hilton and Arundhati Roy.

Then, I ransacked my brain for a solution to spread education. After discarding half a dozen ideas, I settled on this three-step plan:

1. Print the word ‘education’ on reams of paper.
2. Shred the papers. In case shredders are unavailable or out of order, burn the papers.
3. Scatter the shredded papers or the ash with the help of helicopters or airplanes on areas where you want to spread ‘education.’

Immediately after finalizing this very creative and original strategy, the first thing I did was to apply for a patent. After that, I wrote letters to the Ministry of Human Resource Development as well as various leading educational institutes to implement it. But damn all of them snobs! Not a single person replied. India is never going to progress until new talent is recognized and rewarded.

Then I realized that you couldn’t achieve anything in that godforsaken country without connections, so I tried to find out if I had friends or relatives who could forward my cause.

To my relief, I discovered a friend, Richa, whose bio said that she was a PhD in education from JNU. I explained my theory to her and she replied that it would be like spreading shredded education. I said, all right, we could make sure the word remained intact. But no, she simply dismissed it. Imagine her guts. She dismissed my plan on the phone, and I saw my husband smirking.

And then she continued with her rant. As if getting a PhD gave anyone the authority to speak on his or her subject. What these bigheads lack is common sense. My grandmother was illiterate, but she knew more than any university-educated bum.

Richa informed me that even after 63 years of independence, half of India’s population was illiterate.

“Who are you kidding?” I said. “Every kid I know studies in an English medium school, and every adult I know has a college degree.”

“What about the street children, the maids, the presswallahs?”

“Oh them! They don’t need education. And oh, the maids…God save us from BA-pass maids. They would turn husbands into Shiny Ahuja or Jude Law.”

She laughed as if it were a joke, and told me that in that case, the gardeners and chauffeurs would be MBAs and post graduates too. Imagining the scenario became quite confusing and frustrating, so finally I decided that only the rich should get college education.

Now, I can talk with my other friends for hours on stretch, but Richa was intolerable. I couldn’t understand all that she was saying. Therefore, I asked her to send her views via email. I thought I would use her input to improve on my three-step plan, but found it entirely useless. Let me share her junk philosophy with you.

1. Ensure Equal Rights to Quality Education: There is a vast difference between the quality of education provided by the expensive English-medium private schools, and that doled out by the Government schools. Only 10% of the parents are able to send their children to private schools. Thus the majority of our population does not get the opportunity to realize its full potential. As if those 90% would take the country to the moon. On the contrary, some of them might give a tough competition to the more deserving rich kids.

Common school system (CSS) was first recommended 40 years ago by the Kothari Commission on Education (1964-66). We should look forward instead of mulling over such antediluvian ideas.

2. Increase the Budgetary Allocation to Schools: More money is required for the infrastructure and for teachers’ salaries to improve the quality of education in Government schools. This sounds good, as it will allow the perpetually hungry politicians and bureaucrats to earn a few more bucks to buy peanuts.

3. Give Due Importance to the Study of History, Languages, and Social Sciences: India’s education system has always given priority to mathematics and science, believing that the country needed scientists and engineers for its progress. We have been producing enough talented engineers. What we need now are better administrators, politicians, and social scientists. The disconnection between education and daily life has rendered us as one of the most anarchic and regressive societies in the world. lolz….. asif teachN shakespiar wl do Ny gud 2 NE1!!!!!

4. Make Anticorruption Literature a Part of the Syllabus: We need to instill anticorruption values in children from young age. Corruption is the bane of modern India. All the ills of the society can be traced back to corruption, and the only tool with which we can fight this monster is education. I think, what she is trying to say is that when our kids enter the workforce, they should be well acquainted and well versed in the greasing mechanism, instead of behaving like awkward, dumb fools, slowing down the smooth working of the system.

5. Promote Reading Habits by Building Libraries: All citizens should have easy access to well-stocked libraries. Now, who reads from the dead trees in this age of online libraries? The Government should instead place an order for a billion iPads for all its citizens

6. Nurture Civic Responsibilities: By making community service and volunteering compulsory in schools and colleges, students will learn to think beyond the four walls of their homes and become responsible citizens. What is this? A jail manual or what? Does she want our Babloo and Pinki, who don’t even fill a glass of water on their own, to go out and clean the streets?

7. Heh! There is no seventh rule in her email. She seems too ignorant to realize that nobody succeeds without following seven rules.

Guys, I am ashamed to call this fictional woman, Richa, my friend. I have been wondering what is wrong with her. She seems to me like a frustrated soul. Instead of shopping and partying, she is abnormally preoccupied with the education of the 90%, which is our pool of low-paid workers for menial jobs. Looks like she is worried that the uneducated/undereducated people will make the country more chaotic. But seriously, is there any scope for more chaos in our society?

I still want to do something for education, but in such a way that it wouldn’t affect the existing state of affairs. Look, how cute these kids are. I wish they all became healthy-wealthy, healthy-wealthy, and-wise, and-wise.


Related articles on India Together:
1.  The demand for a Common School System (CSS)
2. Success Story of a Literacy Campaign
Picture courtesy yfrog.com