The Wanton Waste of Human Potential
Today’s news articles on DU’s first cut-off list got me off my seat, if only because something I had felt strongly about for a long time landed a swift one on the seat of my pants, and the sting was hard to ignore. SRCC asked for a 100% score on the Class XII exam for an admission to their B.Com Honors course. Not to be outdone, Hindu asked for 99%. Till this morning, I held these institutions in awe. At this time, I am questioning my sense of judgment in this matter, and, indeed, my intelligence.
These two colleges, and indeed many others around them, are supposed to be places we send our kids to get educated. I felt too lazy to look up the dictionary, so I just used the right mouse button on Microsoft Word for “educated” and looked up the synonyms. Here’s what I got
1. Cultured
2. Knowledgeable
3. Well-informed
4. Well-read
5. Sophisticated
6. Skilled
7. Learned
8. Erudite
I just found it interesting enough to ponder how many of these 8 qualities our education system imbibes in our students, and by consequence, to the people of this country.
The Race for the Degree
We believe, at least we’re told, that India has a good education system. It creates more engineering and management graduates than most other countries in the world. Our kids are good at Math, and its got Barack Obama all worried about the future of America, because Indian kids consistently beat their American brethren at Math and spelling. We read this stuff in the news ever so often.
Seeing the way Indian universities, in particular the ones in our metros, work their trade, I don’t think Barack Obama should be worried. Kapil Sibal should. Here’s why.
Our education system doesn’t educate people. Our educators only teach subject matter. Our students don’t learn, they only accumulate degrees. We have incredibly successful training academies that prepare students not for engineering, but for how to crack the IIT-JEE; not for management, but for how to crack the CAT. Consequently, the ones who are successful are mostly those who crack the examination code and not necessarily the ones who really do learn, or have the potential to. Science students accumulate Commerce and Management degrees. No one says they shouldn’t, but something is wrong when a number of students pick science subjects so they can score high marks, and then do an Economics or B.Com course. Some do get engineering degrees; later they go and get management degrees. So what engineers and mathematicians is Barack Obama sweating over? All our chaps will do is out-calculate and out-spell Barack’s chaps, then go and get a management degree and work for a bank run by one of Barack’s chaps. We need an education system to educate our kids, not a factory that churns out degree holders. We need an education system that encourages learning, not one that rewards kings of the multiple-choice question format.
Waste of Potential
Another reason for Kapil Sibal to worry a lot is the wanton waste of potential we indulge in year on year. After all, human potential is supposed to be our differentiator in the 21st century. We already have a problem with the low numbers of well educated people in the country. Our economy is booming and it requires more and more qualified workers. We missed the manufacturing bus, so we need to have people who can fill service industry jobs. Yet the attempt to create capacity is pathetic, instead, we are creating more and more elitism with respect to colleges. So those amongst the work force who are best poised to fulfil the needs of the job market will either leave the country, or get pushed out of the opportunity to get a good education, and employers won't find the right people. That potential is squandered by the nation year after year. Look at where the United States is with 265 million people. And look where we are with 4 times that many people. The United States has spent energy and money on developing its human capital, and then enabled them to innovate. We are telling the young generation that they’re not good enough because they didn’t crack the code of scoring marks in an exam, not because they can’t innovate or be successful at something real.
I’ve heard a counter view. The counter view is that kids should learn to compete in the environment they live in. In my view, this is an anachronism. It may have been relevant 15-20 years ago when the country did not show the potential to flourish. Today it does, and our education system is choking that potential by not being inclusive and by being incapable or unwilling, or both, of developing the country's human capital. As a mute spectator, our government is an even bigger culprit, because human development is its job. If you do have the old “compete in the given environment” view, you may want to think about it. In our environment, wasting even one student with potential is a crime, and so we have to change the environment to one of inclusion where each student gets an opportunity to learn in a great institution, and not one where institutions do their utmost to keep people out. I believe going private is the way to create the scale to support this. Elimination of the elitist and exclusionary attitude of the best known DU institutions and colleges by creating more high quality capacity will force a rethink on their part.
Employers, too, contribute handsomely to the problem. As a hiring manager first, and as a member of a head hunting team, I have learnt a lot about the way employers think. The common refrain is if a potential employee is from a great school or company, chances are he will do a better job than someone who isn’t from a great school or company. At least the hiring manager won’t get into trouble for hiring great pedigree, whatever the performance of the candidate. In fact, in many cases, employers will look for a cultural fit, which basically means they want somebody like themselves. So, in effect, they place a premium on candidates from great schools or institutions and the what skills they have often become a secondary factor in decision making. In other words, employers often don’t believe in meritocracy. They believe in the process of elimination at best and downright elitism at worst. In many cases, employers, especially body-shoppers and even offshore development houses turn qualifications into a commodity and regularly sell a higher qualification at a lower price to their customers. A classic example is when an engineering graduate from India works on an IT helpdesk in a company based in the US.
I shudder to think what educators asking for 100% marks for admission will teach our next generation. They seem to have used their intelligence very sparingly in the first place. It’s no use for them to blame the system. They are the system. How many people get 100% marks? And if they do, how do they get those marks? I would put people with 90% marks or higher through some very stringent tests to understand whether they are really knowledgeable in their subjects, or did they train to score marks. If they did get those marks based on knowledge, I would spend a lot of time researching what makes them tick and create educational methods imbibing those learnings so that more kids could become real super stars. I really do fail to understand how someone can be equally adept at English, Math, Economics and Commerce to the extent of getting 100% in each subject. So what really is the game? Are they just creating a process of elimination because they don’t have enough seats? What about thier duty as educators? Do they not look beyond their noses, or in this specific instance, beyond the gates of SRCC? Why have they slept individually and collectively till this day? Why have they not created capacity till now? Or are they just plain arrogant? I suspect its more about posturing, elitism and exclusion to enhance the reputation of their institutions. If you’ve been to DU during admissions (25 years ago or now, it’s no different), they still don’t think it’s necessary to install a shamiana under which you can stand while waiting 2-3 hours to submit your form in 40+ degrees heat. You can forget about things like fans, water coolers or even utilizing large indoor facilities like auditoriums to sell and collect forms. These are the people who truly epitomize what I mean by the qualified uneducated.
So will we continue to create the “qualified uneducated”? Will we continue to create qualified engineers who sell soap or mutual funds? Will we continue to create degree holders who seldom if ever demonstrate any quality in their thought, word and action? The jury is out. I hope we can find a solution to this, otherwise we will have to find a differentiator for the 21st century other than human capital. And suffer this arrogance and ineptitude every summer.
Cheers
Sanjiv
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