My School, My Pride : Schools are not the places and factories to produce robots
My School, My Pride : Schools are not the places and factories to produce robots
Schools are not the places and factories to produce robots who can only read and write. Schools are the places of character building and value inculcation among young people
If any governmental institution or department in Jammu and Kashmir is grabbing headlines, it is undoubtedly our school education department. Different print and electronic media houses remain abuzz with mixed news reports regarding it. Netizens discuss educational issues frequently on different social media platforms, and register their varied responses.
Everyday, different decrees and orders are issued by our administrative machinery to remove possible bottlenecks which hinder the smooth functioning of the system. Unprecedented sense of accountability is being infused into the numb nerves of the department, to elevate our academic standards.
Hefty amounts are spent on trainings of teachers, upgradation of school infrastructure and availability of various facilities to children and teachers in the schools. New things are surely working! There is an evident change in our school education system.
The initiatives have begun to bear fruit. Of late, the department registered almost one lakh fresh admission to different classes. Thousands of students have chosen government schools over the private ones. Students from government schools have brought laurels to the department by shining in different board examinations.
Infrastructure in government is improving substantially to meet the challenges of changing times. Even parents have begun to believe in the system. Public perception is now rapidly changing, but a lot is yet to be done.
But, ironically, the department is still in the line of fire. Teachers are made soft targets, and are often bashed for none of their faults. Even the loss of academics to COVID-19 pandemic is attributed to teachers which is brazenly a bias. It has become a routine of this land to taunt the teachers. Mentally sick people always resort to mudslinging against teachers.
Every Tom, Dick and Harry delivers sermons on Facebook and other social media networking sites, against teachers. Teachers are either harassed for personal grudges or some petty issues are exaggerated badly to demean the nation builders.
Keeping a good vigil on the schools is not bad at all, making a rapport with schools is quite encouraging, registering healthy criticism will help teachers to grow, but, unwarranted meddling with the institutional systems is somewhat unacceptable and unfortunate.
Sometimes, an illiterate person tries to intervene in the teaching methodology of teachers; sometimes a mobile journalist castigates him for trying to inculcate moral values among children.
It is a teacher who is qualified, proficient, experienced and skilled enough to groom his/her students in accordance with the requisites of modern times. He knows well the psyche and the interests of children.
A teacher always thrives hard for imparting value based education to his/her students. And interestingly, NEP 2020 stresses upon the same thing viz value based education. Values are not learnt by children from books and theories, but from real life experiences.
It is proven fact that the values like humility, courage, respect, kindness, patience, honesty etc, are inculcated among children through pragmatic experiences. In many developed nations, students are asked to clean their schools regularly. It removes any possible amount of ego in children.
It is one of the reasons behind the compassionate natures of people belonging to developed countries. Better educational system is undoubtedly the greatest impetus behind the moral exaltation of great nations.
Unfortunately, when a teacher in our part of the globe, tries to break the shackles of stereotypes, he is castigated and reprimanded.
Most people of our land consider schools the places to learn a set of fixed subjects, wearing a distinctive uniform and passing some grades. But, schools in the broader sense are more than that. Schools are not the places and factories to produce robots who can only read and write.
Schools are the places of character building and value inculcation among young people. Schools are the places where destinies and fates of nations are written. Schools metamorphose us from Homo sapiens to the true successors of Adam (AS).
Schools and educational institutions are not the places which only confer degrees and certificates upon us, help us to learn a few skills and knowledge, pave way for us to earn rewards and recognition; but, schools are the ovens which bestow maturity to our raw stuff. Schools are not the places which prepare us for some challenges of life, but these are the places which prepare us for life.
Repercussions of valueless schooling are visible in our society, and we are paying heavily for it. Our young people have become shirkers; they hate manual work, because they don't have the sense of dignity of labour. A couple of decades ago, dignity of labour was taught practically in our schools.
I vividly remember performing various non-academic assignments in my school. We were made to clean our school premises periodically; we used to plant willow and poplar trees around our school. We would love to dig and prepare flower beds in our school.
I remember cleaning my school toilet at multiple occasions. Neither would we demur nor would our parents oppose the orders of our teachers. Even corporal punishment from teachers was thought to be blessing, though it is a bit obnoxious.
But, now, things have changed drastically. Teachers no longer dare to involve their students in value oriented pragmatic lessons at schools, because they fear official apathy. Who not knows that there are no sweepers and peons in our primary and middle schools? Teachers broom and clean their schools themselves.
They lock and unlock their schools themselves. They wash and wipe the school washrooms themselves. But, they don't ask their students to clean them except at certain occasions because it ensures appreciation of work in our children.
And shockingly, some people portray these children as bonded labourers. Very recently, worthy director school education Kashmir, issued important guidelines regarding the cleanliness of schools.
Even NEP 2020 stresses upon the participation of teachers and students in cleanliness drives and campaigns, because it helps children to add positivity to their behaviors and attitudes.(RisingKashmir)
(The author is a Teacher and Rising Kashmir Columnist. He can be reached at mushtaqhurra143@gmail.com)
