The deluge of ninety percenters that routinely follows in the wake of class X and XII board examination results declared in May, highlights an urgent need for close assessment of India’s school system. Having had the privilege of studying in India and in the West, of becoming a schoolteacher by choice, and of teaching in India and now in the US, I would like to offer a perhaps different perspective on this issue.

India represents a huge paradox in education. While many of the infirmities of K-12 education regularly aired are true — poor quality teachers, teacher and student absenteeism, rigid curriculums — it’s also true that Indian students are highly respected and welcomed in foreign universities (and not only because they pay!), and they fare exceptionally well in university and careers abroad. This paradox merits an explanation.

First, it’s important to understand that the Indian school education system is highly heterogeneous. The village school vastly differs from its urban counterpart, and city schools — private and public — are vastly different from each other. Likewise, boarding and day schools differ in aims, objectives, character and ethos. One school cap certainly does-n’t fit all.

Nevertheless, all K-12 institutions share similar problems. The most obvious perhaps is the chronic shortage of effective teachers. While this is not the occasion for a detailed analysis of this phenomenon, the plain truth is that post-independence India has failed to make the teaching profession sufficiently attractive, to draw the best graduates into teaching. And the failure is not merely in terms of the relatively poor remuneration of teachers. The core issue is inadequate emphasis on teacher training. Teacher education institutions of the stature of the IITs and IIMs for example, are conspicuously missing, with the result that the socio-economic status of teachers has been neglected and degraded. In turn, this has translated into poorly taught classrooms.

Moreover, there is the problem of numbers. There just aren’t enough schools to satisfy the demand for acceptable quality education. The consequence is that K-12 institutions offering superior learning outcomes can dictate onerous terms and conditions to their clientele. And following liberalisation and deregulation of the Indian economy in the 1990s, a large number of non-educationists have entered education. Schools and colleges are increasingly being promoted by businessmen, and run as hardcore business enterprises. Even in some of the best private schools, the board of governors comprise members who haven’t the first idea of education, but who enjoy great powers of patronage. Students must, therefore, not only put up with bad teaching but poor governance as well.

Then there’s the age-old problem of curriculum and course content. Indian education institutions depend heavily on ‘content’. Although this dependency has its virtues inasmuch as it gives students a thorough grasp of the fundamentals of various disciplines, and also enhances exam writing skills, there’s no doubt it stifles creativity.

In sharp contrast in the West, education — including K-12 education — is rapidly transforming into skills acquisition and development. Proficiency with technology, ability to research and reference, teamwork, development of leadership, communication and lateral thinking skills are being given greater attention to foster all-round excellence.

The challenging infirmities of K-12 education in India are rooted in a woeful lack of research. Until recently, NCERT (National Council of Educational Research and Training) was the only organisation with any degree of credibility engaged in researching school education. Of late, some private players have entered the research arena, but mainly to promote their own products and services. Of course, NGOs have also done creditable work in this sphere, but given the sheer scale and multiplicity of problems, these initiatives are pathetically inadequate.

Another largely neglected subject is the quantum leap between the curriculums on offer in high school (classes IX-X) and higher secondary school (XI-XII). The consequence is that a class X topper is quite likely to come a cropper in class XII school-leaving exam. This is because the Plus Two system was introduced in the hope that those who opted for it would pursue university education, whilst the great majority of class X school-leavers would settle for vocational education. But one of the greatest tragedies of post-independence India’s national development effort is that there are few takers for vocational education. 
 And in the final analysis, as long as education is used to propagate political ideologies, it cannot serve its true purpose. In school education, NCERT is often the mouth-piece of government. The situation is probably worse in higher education. In his revealing book Patriots and Partisans (2012), historian Ramachandra Guha has brilliantly analysed the decline of Indian universities due to political interference.

In Indian academia and society in general, there’s urgent need to respect innovative ideas and ideators, and let the latter lead the way.

(Dev Lahiri is a former headmaster of Lawrence, Lovedale, Welham Boys’, Dehradun and currently with the Wasatch Academy, Utah, USA)

Also Read: New era of blended learning has begun