- Schools like prisons
The Kathmandu Post [6th Jan, 2012]
The
Kathmandu Post has published an article titled 'Schools like prisons'. A relevant issue in the present context of exam oriented learning approach.
If
you type the word “prison” in the search box on Wikipedia, you will
find that its meaning is given as a place in which people are physically
confined and usually deprived of a range of personal freedoms.
Imprisonment is a legal penalty that may be imposed by the state for the
commission of a crime. Incidental criminals are harmless to other
people. Some mentally sick people are a danger to other people. If we do
not restrain them, they might harm other people. But here I am talking
about educational jails, and this is the season for many more brutal
prisons to open for some months.
Private
education has been praised for providing quality education in the
country that has contributed to raising the pass rate in SLC, the
so-called Iron Gate. The fever of the SLC examinations has begun with
the start of the pre-send-up tests, passing which makes you eligible to
appear in the send-up examinations, which, in turn, are necessary for
appearing in the SLC. As in past years, SLC has become a prestige issue
for parents, teachers and schools. Distinctions have become the standard
for children, especially for those studying in private schools. Fixed
time (generally three hours) paper and pencil tests will decide the fate
of children. Inability to perform well in the examinations will lead to
failure and force them to face the bitter taste of being incapable,
though there are doubts about the ability of the standardised tests to
measure one’s capability.
Failure
to do well in the three-hour examinations, which undermines the value
of learning that children achieve in a decade of schooling, will create
much disappointment, and cause dreams and ambitions to vanish into an
abyss of despair. It is going to disappoint the
parents who invest a large amount of money on their children’s
education. It will also disappoint the teachers who have claimed to put
in their best effort to educate their students, and the schools that
seem to work day and night for them.
Parents
worry about the prestige they lose in the community of relatives and
friends, teachers worry about their status as a qualified teacher, and
schools about the prestige they might lose in the community of schools.
Parents, teachers and schools use all sorts of tools to ensure that
children perform their best.
Many
schools will categorise their children through the pre-send-up
examinations into distinction, first, second and third divisions and
fail. Then the schools will create compartments that provide special
attention to the children. The freedom of students will be seized and
strictly monitored. Many schools will call for compulsory hostel for all
the students. Students will wake up early in the morning, have
breakfast and start practicing — practice, lunch, practice, tiffin,
practice, dinner and some more practice. Practice, practice and practice
will be the only formula applied. Students will be kept away from their
family, entertainment and everything except books and exams until the
SLC arrives. Students will be confined to a jail-like hostel or be put
under house arrest.
After
all, one needs a certificate to go for further studies or get a good
job in the market. No certificate, no future! Extra tuition will start
early in the morning; children will get limited time for bathroom, lunch
and dinner. Subject teachers will be arranged for extra classes and
“special” practice sessions will focus on predicted questions, and
rumours will spread about prior information of a few or a whole set of
questions. As for “special” classes, people fail to ask the most obvious
question: What is so special about such classes that confine students
within the walls of the classroom and force them to stare at questions
and answers for hours, until they have a picture memory of the page but
have no opinion of their own?
During
an informal conversation at a workshop, a teacher said that the exam
centre and the seating arrangements were set at the request of the
schools, which have greater powers than the educational authorities.
Schools make the seating arrangement so that high and low performers sit
next to each other. He also talked about a special arrangement for exam
paper correction centres for some schools.
Regarding
the preparation classes in the hostel, one of my friends said that
during the night, students feel sleepy, so they arrange tests from 9 pm
to 12 midnight. Parents invest a huge amount of money to keep their
children in the hostel where the fees are exorbitant without any
justifiable basis. The torture that children face in the name of SLC is
quite awful. The prisons will remain open till the date of the SLC
exams. Schools, teachers and publishers of practice books and guess
papers will benefit a lot, but will the students learn anything new?
It
is not only the hidden financial interest of schools but also the
curriculum and assessment system that is responsible for the torture
students suffer in the name of SLC. The curriculum and assessment system
tries to measure the knowledge of students in a rigid frame confined to
paper-pencil tests that happen only after 10 years of learning. This
type of assessment is quite unjustifiable to learners with diverse
learning styles. A curriculum that emphasises learning for life skills,
and assessments that happen while learning as a continuous process would
better help learners and make learning fun. In addition, the letter
grade that the curriculum board plans to implement probably would reduce
the level of torture children have been facing.
Thapa has been a teacher for 15 years and is currently a visiting faculty at Kathmandu University
Source: Posted on: 2013-01-06 08:31 [The Kathmandu Post]
for epaper:
http://www.ekantipur.com/the-kathmandu-post/2013/01/05/free-the-words/schools-like-prisons/243756.html
or http://epaper.ekantipur.com/ktpost/epaperhome.aspx?issue=612013 (Page 6) [6th Jan 2012]
Photo Curtsey: File Photo, The Kathmandu Post
