COLD WAR TO CURRICULUM- NON ALIGNMENT !

Non- aligned movement- Nehruji may have been active in not aligning with the US or erstwhile USSR in their cold war days ! Non alignment movement gained a lot of attention in those days and consequently in all our text books .

I remember studying the NAM in my social studies textbook with pictures of Nehru . while that was a heroic stance to be non-aligned with the two most powerful countries of the world, I wonder if non-alignment has become genetic trait in our dwindling democracy .

There is no alignment between the high ideals of our constitution and the deplorable state of the governance

No alignment between the centre’s greed and states’ needs
No alignment between contemporary needs and content of curriculum
No alignment between school education and intermediate education
No alignment between intermediate education and graduation courses
No alignment between CBSE Board and ICSE Board and State Boards
No alignment between graduation courses and courses for Masters
There is neither vertical nor horizontal alignment in the education system.

VNAM Vertical non-alignment: Universities do not know what is being planned in graduation courses. Degree colleges do not know what is being taught in intermediate colleges. Intermediate colleges do not know what is being taught in schools.

HNAM Horizontal non-alignment: Across the school education boards also- English may vary, social studies may vary but math and science also vary in spite of being universally common concepts.

A state board student in Tamilnadu may learn ‘Sets’ in his 8th Grade while a student in AP may learn it in 9th. In MP they may learn Mixtures and compounds in 9th and in Punjab it may be in 7th.

Many times the depth of the topic also varies from state to state and Board to Board. An ICSE student may learn chemistry in-depth by 9th, a State board student may learn it in Inter 1st year while a CBSE student may learn in his alternative years from 7th.

Because of all this disconnection between Boards- students from different states and boards pass out of school with varying levels of science and math concepts.

How can science or math vary so much from state to state and board to board???

What diversity without any unity in curriculum !

After having observed the content value in all these levels- schools colleges and universities-what comes to my mind is- NAM- non aligned movement- neither vertically nor horizontally there is alignment in what Indian students are learning.

IF NCERT and SCERT are the curriculum creators for Boards across India, why cant they see the gaps in content ? Why should one board teach ‘cell structure’ and another teach just ‘cells’ ?

It is the students, teachers and parents who get confused in all this. Then come the recommendations like use S Chand for more reference or use some other voluminous books !-

It is humanly impossible for young people to refer to different books to just learn one topic.

All we are trying to do in this process is intimidate the young people by making this learning phase between 9th and 12th-as a yagna! These 4 years are actually 2 million minutes in which they are expected to navigate through volumes of books and oceans of questions !

Thanks to VNAM HNAM and the plague called competitive exams , we did not develop rocket scientists or math wizards- we have only achieved in passing out students who can pass a competitive exam but not turn them into a scientist or a mathematician !

While acknowledging the fact that research makes learning more indepth, I don’t appreciate the fact that there is no clarity in the learner outcomes of our students.

All outcomes are connected to the ranks in competitive exams –therefore all Indian students who learn science or math-learn them only to pass exams and not to develop a scientific temper or mathematical abilities.

We need a radically different education system.

Wake up Sib(al) ! Its not RTE or the Budget that is going to change the face of India- it is contemporarizing the curriculum and connecting it vertically and horizontally from a Pre primary level to Masters that’s going to give you knowledgeable people who will build the nation.

No, I am not referring to the literacy programs that we have in our country which earn degrees alright but not education.

Of course this is not the medicine for ills like, Raja, Radiia or their ilk ! It takes much more than degrees to make principled people- it takes education which transforms people into positive, progressive and proactive people !