Both your cover story and editor’s letter (EW June) made compulsive reading. The latter because it lays bare the dismal state of Indian education in light of international standing and the former as the ubiquitous, all too familiar, resigned acceptance of an examination board that is the ‘best’, in a quagmire of mediocre, often substandard education boards. It felt akin to reading about an Indian soccer ‘star’ reviewing strategy and tactics totally ignoring the hard fact that we stand #163 in FIFA (Federation of International Football Associations) rankings.
Furthermore, it’s ironic that despite the fact that the National Achievement Survey 2015 has in effect declared the CISCE board the ‘best’ in India, there remains, as voiced by chief executive and secretary, Gerry Arathoon himself, a deep insecurity about the exodus of CISCE students to CBSE schools for higher secondary education. CISCE has announced that it will now follow the CBSE curriculum and examination pattern for science and mathematics. This exodus and ‘modification’ of CISCE’s syllabus/question pattern is a result of the misconception that the CBSE syllabus is more ‘conducive’ for candidates who aspire to succeed in the IIT-JEE (joint entrance examination).
But nothing can burst the all-pervading academic Indian bubble of delusion that dismisses global rankings, or is just blinded by plain old ignorance.
Robindra Subba
Director, The Himali Boarding School, Darjeeling
World of difference
EducationWorld (June) has created history again by ranking India’s 33 school examination boards by interpreting data from NCERT’s National Achievement Survey 2015.
I’m not at all surprised CISCE is ranked the country’s #1 examinations board. My own children followed the CISCE syllabus in school and as an English teacher in Mar Thoma College, Tiruvalla, Kerala for three decades I can easily tell the difference between students from CISCE and other schools.
Prof. Bejoy Varughese
Principal, Mar Thoma Residential School, Tiruvalla, Kerala
Teacher training need
Your cover story on NCERT’s National Achievement Survey 2015 (EW June) exposes the dark side of India’s school education system. It’s a disgrace that the average national score of class X students in standardised objective tests was below pass mark — less than 50 percent. It shows that students are completely unprepared to answer questions which test their problem-solving and cognitive skills. Unfortunately, their training in schools has equipped them with mere capability to reproduce memorised answers.
Though you have rightly emphasised the urgent need to reform the syllabus formulation system to promote HOTS (higher order thinking skills) of students, this won’t be possible unless considerable investment is made in teacher training and development.
The world’s best syllabus will yield negligible results unless it’s delivered creatively and efficiently by well-trained teachers.
I hope Union HRD minister Smriti Irani has taken note of the NAS results, and that the imminent New Education Policy will give sufficient importance to syllabus commonality across the country’s 33 exam boards.
Chiranjeevi Srivastava
Delhi
Grades inflation exposed
The results of the National Achievement Survey 2015 (EW June) are a marked contrast to the unbelievably high scores recorded by class X students in the recently concluded state/national board exams. While in the NAS test, the national average score of class X students is below 50 percent, in the board exams huge numbers of students have scored 90 percent plus, with some even scoring 100 percent. This clearly indicates that the country’s 33 exam boards are recklessly indulging in grades inflation. This is dangerous as it gives students and the colleges they are seeking admission into, incorrect estimates of their capabilities.
The NAS results are an urgent wake-up call to the country’s exam boards, particularly the state boards, to overhaul their syllabus formulation, examination and assessment systems.
Malini Shetty
Bangalore
Freedom outcome
Congratulations to the CISCE management for being ranked India’s #1 examinations board (EW June). Those of us who have studied in ICSE schools, have never doubted the board’s excellent academic standards. I hope the spectacular showing of CISCE in NCERT’s NAS has also silenced bureaucrats in the HRD ministry and its imperious minister, who last year demanded that the board justify its existence by submitting documentation to prove government approval of its memorandum of association.
You are bang on in your assessment that CISCE has been able to trump CBSE because it’s free from the asphyxiating control of government.
Frank D’Souza
Mumbai
Deep schizophrenia
The recent attacks on students of African origin in Bangalore and Delhi are reprehensible and have been rightly condemned (‘Foreign Students in India: Great Expectations Belied’, EW June). They reflect a deep schizophrenia in our society — colour prejudice and racism. It’s ironical that most Indians slavishly admire white-skinned people, notwithstanding the reality that most of us are dark complexioned.
The government needs to launch public awareness campaigns to instil pride in people of their Indian ethnicity and learn to respect the ethnicity of all. It should also severely punish those who encourage racism and colour prejudice.
Daniel Kumar
Chennai
No shortcuts
I enjoyed reading the perceptive interview of Dr. Sugata Mitra, professor of education technology at Newcastle University (EW May). He is right in his analysis that Indian schools still follow the Macaulay-designed education system whose prime objective was to produce subservient clerks and factory workers.
In the great majority of India’s 1.40 million schools, students still learn by rote, teachers discourage questioning, syllabuses are outdated and examinations test memorisation skills. Except for a handful of top-end private schools, they are all stuck in the 19th century.
Dr. Mitra’s solution to permit students to self-learn using the internet is a great idea. But I am not hopeful this is feasible particularly in India’s over 1 million government schools, most of whom lack basic electricity. We need to change the examination system, update curriculums and invest heavily in teacher training if we want to uplift our school system. There are no shortcuts.
Chandrika Ramamurthy
Bangalore
Correction please
Re. the Institution Profile on Ardee World School, Sector 52, Gurugram, published in the May 2016 edition of EducationWorld, it has been incorrectly stated that “the K-12 AWS is the first school in Delhi/NCR to offer Montessori education up to class VIII”. Instead of class VIII it should be class V.
Please make this correction.
Hema Rawat
The Ardee World School
Gurgaon