Notes on Education

For decades a common sight in towns and cities across India has been school children, even five and six year olds, carrying enormously huge school bags likes beasts of burden. It saddens any compassionate adult to see this sight. Many have voiced concern over the matter. Not only is this a daily burden, medical practitioners have stated this can lead to permanent physical damage and deformities to a child, but yet the practice went on and on. Perhaps no practical thumb rule was suggested by anyone to control the practice. On the part of schools, perhaps the greed of commissions that accrue from sales of books have been paramount. Moved by the plight of these children, some months ago this author tweeted to the Prime Minister Narendra Modi and his Honorable Minister of Human Resources Shri Prakash Javedkar ji suggesting the sort of rule that might be imposed on schools, To this author’s delight, this author read in the morning newspapers today,   “Center fix

  https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Mt._Nanda_Devi.jpg This note comments on a new higher education initiative in India, Pradhan Mantri Research Fellowships, which will be administered at IITs and other excellent institutes of higher Education in India as reported in the daily newspaper Times of India today.   As a deep IITian this author is certain that students will not call it by that name or PMRF and make up their own friendlier nick name for it. May I propose one here, Namo Prakash Fellowships since this proposal appears to be result of the Honourable Prime Minister Shri Narendra Modi and his brilliant education minister the Right Honourable Shri Prakash Javedkar. At the route of success of nations through human history has been the existence of higher education institutions of excellence. Thus while it were the Buddhist Universities led by Nalanda in India during its golden age, it has been Universities of Oxford and Cambridge during the British Empire an

  W hile modern children have become wizards at electronic devices with even three year olds using a smart phone like a professional, they are not as good at basic skills such as reading, writing and arithmetic. Some of the modern methods of teaching these subjects at school is not helping much either. These are essential skills that a human needs not just through all of their education but also to navigate successfully through life. For my own grandchildren, I had to go back to reviewing what I had learned in primary school and develop teaching material in the simplest possible way to teach them some more arithmetic at home besides what they learned at school. I have to admit that the task was just as challenging as advanced mathematics I used in my career as a scientist and professor of engineering. However, the end result of the effort was completely satisfactory. Realizing it would be useful for other parents as well the material has been compiled in a set of colorful b

  M ahatma Gandhi had said that India cannot progress in a true sense until its villages progress. The majority of Indians still live in its villages and they are in a sense the soul of the nation. In recent times Prime Minister Narendra Modi has revived this theme and expressed the desire to begin with model villages called Adarsh Grams. For various reasons the scheme has not taken off due to various constraints among them budgetary ones. A way to overcome this is to combine infrastructure that already exists in villages with other needs of a village. One such is the post office that has now been increasingly used for essential banking needs as well as some other government services such as the issue of Adhhar cards. A school is also an essential infrastructure in villages and it too can be provided to give more services to villagers in a way that improves both school and village life. The services that a school can provide in a village are: Treated drinking w

http://www.publicdomainpictures.net/view-image.php?image=1742 V arious schools of India from primary to high school are of two types. First are government or state run schools and the second type are schools run by private parties that include individuals, societies, trusts or companies. Problems exist in both type of schools that compromise quality of education in the country and the quality of life of citizens. Here we shall consider the most important problems that face both type of schools and propose a simple solution that will help to improve the situation considerably. The main problem in state run schools is the quality of education and governance within schools. The major problem with private schools is their greed and ever increasing fees and expenses imposed on hapless parents. Some severe tragedies have taken place in private schools that even include severe beating, rape and murder of little children. Clearly existing mechanisms are insufficient to dea

T he attention of this author was drawn to the present topic on reading a report that the government of India is planning to introduce a national level certifying examination for engineers. Over the past decade and a half a huge number of engineering colleges have come up across the country, many of dubious quality. They are producing a poor quality of professional engineers and hence such an exam would help control the situation while assuring the industry that employs them of quality. While a good move, what lacks in this change is what was mentioned as enlightened compassion. May we try and understand this. First it is necessary to explain what enlightened compassion implies. It refers to doing an act of good for another person’s long term interest rather than a short term one. The point is well illustrated in a classical story of a robber who was caught and about to be hanged in the public square. He was granted one last wish. He asked to whisper something in his mothe

O ver the past five decades human population has increased hugely to touch a near seven billion now. As a consequence, there is a huge pressure on both urban and rural lands accessible by basic infrastructure such as roads, electricity and water. Humans are devising ways to manage with less and less land for their life and activities. The pressure is also influencing educational institutions that have to do with reduced land availability. Nevertheless, certain minimum requirements still exist for land for different types of educational institutions ranging from kindergarten to university. This author has written about such land requirement before for separate type of educational institutions. The present note summarizes all these findings in a single comprehensive table. An affiliated college is one that prepares students for a university level examination but does not have authority to grant university degrees on its own for which it affiliates itself to a university. A

https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Youth-soccer-indiana.jpg Open areas When this author was young he lived in towns and cities that had open areas for children to play football, cricket or hockey or just to fly a kite and run around. Since then human population has expanded and many towns and cities are devoid of open areas for children to play in. The ensuing lack of green exposure and playgrounds are leading to nations full of compromised individuals that are low on health and high on stress. What is even sadder is that the same lack of open spaces has crept into schools too and children do not get a respite of green and open spaces even during their school hours. Perhaps it would be an enlightened government that shall prescribe certain minimum open area that schools for children must have before they are given a license and recognition to operate. The question arises as to what should be done with schools that already exist if new regulations are propose

A central question that has a huge impact on the lives of young children is of age. What age should formal schooling begin and at what age may the child be sent to a preschool/kindergarten and for how many years?   Different practices prevail in different countries as regards age and preschooling and this is appropriate since social conditions within homes and the resources available to schools vary from country to country. The question that needs to be answered first is - Is it a good idea for government to regulate questions related to age of school going children and the years they may spend in preschools prior to entering class I? As regards government run schools, the government does have to come up with a policy for the same. However, private schools could be left to make their own choice. That could work well in the ideal case since then each school can come up with a policy that is best suited to the area within the country it operates and the kinds of children

T his note is with reference to schoolchildren in India although it may have relevance for children of other countries too. While much has been written about and much needs to be done to improve the quality of school education in India, this note is not about that at all but rather the environment in which this education is delivered, something of equal if not greater importance. There are at the present time many issues that add misery rather than joy in the lives of school children. These are things like, weight of school bags, quality of food served free or in schools canteens, commuting to schools, behavior of teachers, disproportionate amounts of homework given, lack of play grounds and open environment, noisy school architecture, schedules and timing etc. Rather than covering all of these topics together and losing focus, we shall take these issues one at a time and see what simple changes can be made to remove this distress. Let us begin with annual school schedules