Schools that L‘EARN’!

No. I am not going to talk about whether schools are over exploiting with fees or I am also not going to talk about education becoming business. I feel educational institutions becoming more commercial is fine. But, in the process what schools need to keep in mind is what I would like to discuss here about.
First let us list some advantages of educational institutions becoming commercial. I have come across many such schools who charge fees substantially. Some positives things that I observed in this trend is that –

1. Schools are equipping themselves with more infrastructure and sophisticated learning environments
2. Schools are slowly moving beyond booking knowledge to at least positioning themselves as catering to the holistic development of a child
3. In the competition, each school is also trying to position itself as one step ahead of the other so called 'best' schools

So I am seeing development and growth because of education becoming commercial. I am not going into the negatives now. Let us keep that aside as of now.
While it is a healthy climate to see growth, what is worrying is when schools empower themselves for the sake of earning and not learning, when schools better themselves for attracting parents but not for benefitting students.
'Air conditioned classrooms.'
'Air conditioned library'
'Smart boards in every class'
It is very important for a school to equip themselves with latest technologies. But at the same time Air condition is a luxury over empowering teachers on various new methodologies of teaching! 'Project based learning' has been a buzz word in the west almost for the past 2 decades. But How many of our school heads would have tried and implemented it. How many of the schools are open to learn new things in teaching or open to bringing in a student centric approach or creating a culture of thinking in classrooms! While majority of the schools have budget allocated for books, sports equipments, teaching aids, technology, etc. it is saddening to note that not many have a budget allocated for empowering their teachers. And even if they have, it is very minimum and suffices just to put a record in the books that they are empowering teachers.
We stop learning when we feel we are full. So what would be the state of a school whose head feels he is full / his school is the best / he knows everything. The learning stops and they are no longer available for learning new things.
In the last week times of India there was a half page article on 'Innovations in education' and it stated that in a decade the world is going to face a huge crisis. The number of degree holders would be much more than the job demands. India has a greater chance but at the same time Indians face a big problem. We lack 'employability skills'. Empathy, working in teams, being a team player, motivation-all these fall under the employability skill. I have seen MBA graduates who can't speak English properly! So there are lot of youngsters out there who think they would get a job if they have a degree!
The process has to start from school. The teaching has to extend beyond textbooks to different levels of Blooms. Unfortunately, though Blooms taxonomy is taught in B.Ed. schools the application is just in examination level and teachers don't remember it beyond that.
'It is good to earn. But don't stop to learn.'
I end this blog with this punch dialogue. J
LET THE CHILD BLOSSOM


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