Education Policy – Part XIII Noble, selfless teachers – need of the hour.

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National Testing Agency, an autonomous body with numerous academic, educational and psychometric experts, will administer aptitude tests and tests in specific subjects that can be taken on multiple occasions during the year in order to reduce the intense and unnecessary pressures of the university entrance examination system.

Does it mean that students suffer ‘unnecessary pressures’ because the examinations are conducted by the Universities? And if NTA ‘administers’ them, there would not be any of these problems? Already, the exams are being held twice in a year. Now, it would be on ‘multiple occasions during the year’.  Can we presume that it would take place every month at least? That is, there would be no ‘exam season’ any more. Will it be a great achievement? We do not think so as we do not see any advantage in the new set-up.

‘NTA tests will aim to assess essential concepts, knowledge and higher order skills from the national common curriculum for the purpose of aiding colleges and universities in their admissions decisions. Most educational institutions and many employers will be encouraged to use these NTA tests rather than their own examinations to ease burden on the students and on themselves.’

We do not find any explanation on why it should be ‘most’ institutions and ‘many’ employers instead of ‘all’ of them. It means that there could still be ‘other’ institutions and employers not coming under the NTA tests. Will it not be a ‘waste of time’ then as it is mentioned in the report – to write exams for the ‘other’?

‘The current curriculum transaction arrangements (?) involve a ‘one-size-fits-all’ approach with little variation or modification from student to student. All students in a given course receive the same type of instruction, same assignments, same learning assessments and pre-fixed assessment schedule’. The draft report finds it unacceptable and advocates the need to strongly support ‘singular interests’.

‘Uniformity’ is the most basic component in any system of assessment and evaluation. It is in fact the fundamental rule that all the competitors or participants undergo same or similar tests so that the performance of the individuals can be assessed and ranked appropriately.

The ‘scale’ or the unit of measurement has to be one and the same. The runners in a competition have to run on the same track; everyone can not have a track of his / her choice.

The committee may come out with any amount of explanations but nothing would be convincing because there just can not be different yardsticks for different people. The idea of ‘singular interests’ appears to be inherently faulty. If this is to be accepted, the idea of NTA goes against this principle since it is nothing but a unified, solitary examination system.

Is it ok if the power is concentrated at one point as a sole dictating authority over all sorts of tests / examinations all over the country? Sorry, it does not cut much ice.

The report then moves on to ‘Teachers’. (chapter5)

The objective says – ‘ensure that all students at all levels of school education are taught by passionate, motivated, highly qualified, professionally trained and well equipped teachers’. We do not understand the logic behind so many adjectives being used. Is it not enough to say ‘quality’ teachers? The penchant for superlatives makes the point over-stretched considerably losing its importance.

It is a general and factual perception that the teachers today have lost much or all of the best qualities once found in the teachers. It was long ago that we had teachers who had complete control over the students for the good of the students and for the good of the society at large. They were the real role models for all the students alike. But do we find such noble teachers today?

We are complaining of serious deterioration of standards in every walk of life. It is because, I am firmly of the opinion that, teaching community has miserably failed to stand up against the growing tendencies of lawlessness among the students. The committee does not seem to have recognised this fact.

‘What are the primary issues affecting the teachers and teacher education today?’ asks the report. The first reason it says is that ‘there are few initiatives that explicitly aim to recruit the best performing students’. It then goes on to add many other reasons that revolve around teacher education, lack of sufficient infrastructure and deployment of teachers for non-teaching activities etc.

The committee ought to have spared a few thoughts over the political interference and selfish interests of the powers that be in the appointment of teachers. This is the gravest menace that has crippled the education system in our country.

Let us now look at what happened in Tamilnadu as a case of illustration.   

In the early years of independent India, Kamaraj the great as the Chief Minister went on a war footing to carry school education to every nook and corner of the state.  It was a real golden period of a great social transformation.

The children from the poor downtrodden families worked their ways to growth and prosperity through free education provided by the government of Kamaraj. There was an all round development in the most positive manner possible in a democracy. 

It was not to continue for long anyway.  The forces inimical to education, knowledge and composite wisdom of the people rallied, did all sorts of false propaganda, played with the emotions of the people and defeated Kamaraj in the elections.

The down slide in the ethical and moral standards of personal and public was set in motion then.  It all started in late 1960s or early 1970s. There was a systematic ‘invasion’ of the petty narrow minded politicians, creeping into the well established education system. Political workers and family members of local ‘dadas’ were inducted into the schools and colleges as teachers and professors.

All the good work done by the visionary Kamaraj, the people’s leader, was systematically destroyed. The great leader affectionately called ‘Kalvi kaN thiRandha Kamarajar’ in Tamil (meaning the one who opened the ‘eyes’ of education) passed away suddenly on 2^nd October1975. So, there was none to stem the rot. The ‘operation’ was complete in less than a decade.

 At the advent of this century i.e. by 2000, the last of teachers appointed during the Kamraj period had retired from service. As a result, the youth coming out of government schools and government colleges today did not have the ‘luxury’ of being guided by selfless teachers in schools / colleges.

All they had in the class rooms were nothing but recreation, entertainment and a time pass as they were ‘taught’ enough of local politics and of useless cinema dialogues and nothing else. Now, the ‘culture’ has firmly set in.

There are of course exceptions to it with a rare species of good teachers and well behaving students. But should we not make it a rule rather than an exception?

New Education Policy has failed to declare the school education system value based and on the same note has failed to announce elimination of corruption and political interference in the recruitment of teachers.  

‘The structure of teacher education, recruitment, deployment, service conditions, professional development and career management must be completely overhauled to ensure that teachers are maximally productive and efficient’  – says the report.

More than being productive and effective, teachers, particularly at the primary education level, must be noble, selfless persons committed to inculcating values in the children. This aspect must be borne in mind and must be ensured in the recruitment of teachers.

New Education Policy must seize the opportunity to bring the ‘character’ of the teachers into the recruitment process. This is the most important need of the hour. Our nation deserves to have nobler teachers. To achieve this, the policy makers must raise their voice against all the unscrupulous practices happening in the recruitment / transfer / deployment of teachers.

 Will the committee rise up?

( to continue

Baskaran Krishnamurthy

Mail: [email protected]