Aneesh Parnerkar
Engineering or Medicine? This is what comes to mind when we think about this system of education as these are the “wide” range of options that parents give their children when it comes to taking decisions regarding “their” future. Every other person I ask wants to get into IIT-Bombay as a computer engineer, but “due to unknown reasons” most of them fail. This is not where it ends; this is just the first phase. They will study for another year and reappear for the same exam – all this by “their own will”. When a person is forced to do something against his will, no matter how many times he tries the result is not going to change. This seems as if a child who doesn’t know English is trying to write an English essay all by himself. Why don’t people understand that their lives will be the same with one less engineer or one less doctor? All are not right-handed, some prefer the left hand too. The people in our country don’t seem to accept that one can be a little different in one way or another. As a result of this non-acceptance, those who spent so much time putting their heart and soul into something they never really loved, those “broken minds” settle into becoming a banker or a government employee or someone left with nothing but a life of regrets, again, by their “own will”.
I, offer my thoughts not as a hater of the Indian system of education but as a believer of “difference” for those planning their future. My father always says, “Sharpen the saw”. Don’t waste time trying to make a blunt saw work and then “utilize the rest of the time to repent” when it breaks. Sit back a moment, spend some time sharpening the saw and then try to use it to cut through and you will understand that the answer you were looking for was always there in front of you. So, if you believe in your passion, let it free; don’t think about failing because the consequences of this decision, no matter good or bad, will forever be yours.
My final advice as well as complaint against Indian education is that students are ill-equipped to chase their dreams as all they know are the five subjects taught in school.
If schools can assure their students that they can succeed even without abiding by the rules in the book, then it would mean that schools are imparting actual knowledge to their students as no one ever cares whether you know the structure of the respiratory system or not.
There is something in education.
Even a half dead man knows 2 + 2 is 4,
But a toddler should learn to think even more.
Teach in such a way,
That, “4-2 is two” shall he say.
There is something that we need
To let our aspirations lead.
That something isn’t qualification,
It’s visualization.
The author is a student of class 10 in Smt. Sulochanadevi Singhania School, Thane. He is an aspiring writer who wishes to make a difference through his work as he feels writing is the most powerful medium to change people’s life for the better. He can be reached at aneeshparnerkar@gmail.com.