School education is the basic foundation for a person to become what he wants to be in future. It's not about the studies alone but the character formation, social behaviour and many soft skills as well that is required in his/her life. But for good or bad, there is a new culture that has emerged in our school education system in the recent past, where students are made to run after the coaching centres for getting through an entrance test or a narrow goal of mark scoring.
At the same time, we often hear complaints from the social as well as industry institutions about the wide mismatch of the skill sets of the candidates coming out of the academia and the actual requirement in the workplace or the life space. It implies that the current education system is definitely missing something that is essentially required in society and industry. This is nothing but the soft skills and the social values.
Education vs learning
Special coaching and tuition activities are not new. But these were originally conceived as a support for those students who are weak in certain subjects or for the ones who are slow in learning. It helps them pick up along with their normal peers. After all, learning is the overall purpose.
But what we are talking now is about the coaching centres that coach students with a narrow focus of just making them ready to perform an examination or entrance test. The very reason that there are so many such institutions out here, and their numbers and complexities are increasing day by day, only shows that there is a huge demand for them.
Curiously, some of these coaching centres have even started interfering in the school system, where they have their own cohort of students in the school. As a result, the schools are becoming just a place to register students and the students’ activities are almost fully under the control of coaching centres, which often have better and modern infrastructure than schools.
Many schools are also tying-up with the coaching centres to conduct classes in the school premises itself. It has gone to such an extent that the Central Board of Secondary Education (CBSE) had to issue warnings to many of these schools against this recently.
High demand for coaching centres
So, what one must understand is why there is so much demand for such coaching classes. As I said before, “survival of the fittest” is a natural law. When just one test result decides the whole outcome, obviously one will tend to excel in it whatever way they can. And when the whole system gets geared up to move towards this narrow direction, the coaching centres become an integral part of that process, and there is again one see the growing competition when the demand is high.
However, the evil impacts of this whole cycle is — (a) increasing student suicides in the campuses due to the pressure of exam capsules and poor social skills to manage such pressures, (b) less employability of educated youth in the industry due to lack of soft skills, and ( c) adverse effects in the society due to improper behavioural skills.
Purpose of education
So, it is time to ask the same fundamental question again —what is the purpose of education? Is it about preparing a person with the fundamental strengths to build his/her life, social connection and career or only to score high marks in test results? Certainly, the experience so far suggests that the final outcome of option two is distressing.
When employers complain about gaps in skill sets, what they indicate is the need for developing soft skills. Studies by Stanford Research Institute and the Carnegie Mellon Foundation among several Fortune 500 CEOs reported that 75% of long-term job success resulted from soft skills.
Thus, coaching the young minds to only come out in the entrance tests with flying colours without giving importance to their personal development, is ultimately to their great disadvantage.
Therefore, in addition to the test results, we must also give sufficient importance to the social and soft skills that deal with the other aspects of a successful career and life. This needs to be part of education itself. Coaching centres can’t or don’t provide this and that’s what distinguishes a school from a coaching centre.
We, as individuals, have limited capacity. Thus, if we concentrate on one aspect too much, we are ought to lose something else. If we concentrate too much on just the knowledge, we may lose other aspects in life, that may be a skill to live with others in this world. Since we are social animals, this will be disastrous. Whether a person is a medical doctor, engineer, teacher, business man, lawyer, or in any other profession, or at home or in office or in a public place, social behaviour is essential.
Development of social skills
Developing social skills must be a part of the educational system and sufficient emphasis should be given to it. One has to give opportunities for it to develop since it does not grow naturally and it also takes time to develop. Since personal and societal development is all the more important in today’s competitive world, every curriculum must include that with sufficient importance.
While entrance tests or qualifying exams must also be given sufficient weightage in the education, equal or more thrust should be given for the other elements. Therefore, the school education must come back to the fore and it should also progress with timely revisions and reforms as and when there is scope for further improvement in these aspects.
With the availability of the internet and the associated sources of knowledge and expertise today, even the present model of a school that was developed long ago, will require a reassessment for more inclusive framework. On the contrary, if it narrows down the focus further with an exam-oriented coaching centre culture, no doubt, it will be disastrous and counter-productive.
And, since the need for learning social behaviour is becoming increasingly evident now, the entrance tests and qualifying examinations must include more such elements in them. This will further boost the overall development of the students towards the benefit the society, industry and every spectrum of their life.
—The author, Dr. V. Premachandran, is a member of the working group in the Kerala State Planning Board, and was a Senior Fellow at the Solar Energy Research Institute, National University of Singapore.
(Edited by : C H Unnikrishnan)
First Published: Dec 11, 2023 8:16 AM IST
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