Lindsay Pereira: No sense, no sensibility

The education department hasnt even begun to tackle issues that actually matter Few schools in rural areas have decent classrooms latrines or drinking waterGeography may soon become history in Maharashtra schools mdash read the headline in a newspaper a few days ago buried under presumably more important news stories involving film stars and the state of cricket in India According to the report the Maharashtra education department has decided that social science subjects at school level can be optional In other words students can decide not to study them if they are not in the mood Apparently vocational education will be offered as an alternative insteadNaturally my first reaction to this report was one of surprise because I assumed that the education department existed only to issue letters to schools mdash informing them about holidays during festivals in order to appease politicians or to ask them to make yoga compulsory to appease a few other politicians That it wasactually making decisions about education came as a bit of a shockI realised that the report listed subjects like geography political science history civics and economics among those that may no longer be compulsory What exactly did that leave students Also what vocational education would they be offered instead Plumbing Painting Sales Like most ideas emerging from the government of Maharashtra it didnt make much senseApparently this was to be a part of an initiative aimed at making our country skilled which mysteriously wouldnt be possible if we kept teaching students pointless things like the history of our country and the world or where India is on the map or why we pay taxes There was more The report also stated that a regulation had allegedly been introduced to make mathematics and English optional at school level It was supposedly to be implemented only in rural schools for now mdash to help youngsters there learn some skills before being implemented in urban areas as wellI assumed these ideas had come from people who had unfortunately been denied access to a decent education which is usually the case After all anyone with half a brain would have been able to figure out why it sounded like an astonishingly halfbaked idea Maybe they simply didnt understand what the social sciences did Maybe they didnt know that for instance they help us understand everything thats right or wrong about the society we live inThe social sciences to put it simply help us make sense of the world They focus on issues like poverty and governance family education what makes economies grow or shrink how these economies affect our families and us why our culture is important and how it is appropriated and why social groups are born or die In short without the social sciences we will all have a very difficult time trying to figure out what we were all doing here mdash a situation that is alright in a place like Manshytralaya but not recommended in the real worldI may be jumping the gun of course because this is still reportedly at a planning stage Maybe the reporter got it all wrong too so I suppose I ought to give the education department the benefit of doubt for now Yet I cant seem to shake off the possibility that some government will at some point in our future foist an idea as spectacularly stupid or worse upon our young unsuspecting studentsIts amazing that the education department hasnt even begun to tackle issues that actually matter For instance a couple of years ago India ranked second last among 73 countries participating in the Programme for International Student Assessment PISA which is conducted annually to evaluate education systems worldwide by the Organisation forEconomic Cooperation and Deveshylopment Secretariat Few schools in rural areas have decent classrooms latrines or drinking waterThe safety of children in schools is not guaranteed even in urban areas There arent enough seats at some levels and way too many institutions offering subjects that have few takers at other levels We excel at rote learning and discourage curiosityEarlier this year a national employability report pointed out that more than 80 per cent of engineers in India still remain unemployable And yet none of these issues appear to have been tackled with even a modicum of seriousness by any department Why Maybe the education departments master plan is to create a generation of students in Maharashtra who know nothing about the world exercise their intelligence as little as possible and become selfcentred clowns unable to find solutions to any of lifes problems In other words the department wants to create a generation of students qualified only to become politicians in MaharashtraWhen he isnt ranting about all things Mumbai Lindsay Pereira can be almost sweet He tweets lindsaypereira Send your feedback to mailbagmiddaycom