PSF members and friends would find this recent Frontline issue titled, Miles to Go, very interesting and useful. If you want to know why most of us who are school teachers or just parents, must read so much theory- the very first article titled “Let’s go back to school” sets it out: “The practitioner says: “You theorists keep complaining and critiquing; what are you doing to change the system?”. The theorist says:” You practitioners don’t look at the biggest picture and reproduce old problems in new ways.” This debate is but other manifestations of the inherent contradictors of education, and we seem to be lacking the appropriate tools to tackle this contradiction. “…. It goes on to quote Marx’s article on General Education written in, 1869- “One the one hand, a change of social circumstances was required to establish a proper system of education, on the other hand a proper system of education was required to bring about a change of social circumstances: we must therefore commence where we are.” To commence where we are, we ought to treat common sense as our collective enemy. We ought to discuss education widely and deeply… this special issue is one intervention towards that end.”
Where are we in Puducherry with relevance to school education. As the New Education Policy rolls, out students, teachers and parents are all struggling, more so in Puducherry than perhaps anywhere else, where the abrupt shift to CBSE has created a crisis in learning, where enrolment has plummeted and many poor students have had to shift to private sector.
There are in all 10 articles in this special issue. Two of which are on how NEP relates or does not relate to the Right to Education, and the gains from RTE and the threats it faces. There is another article on the language policy. There are three articles on schooling and inequity, two with special reference to the caste system and one on minority education.
There is one article on the operational challenges of managing a multi-level classroom called “Classes within a class” and a very hopeful and positive article, called India’s Sputnik moment, on the importance that finally foundational numeracy and literacy has gained in the NIPUN programme, but there are also many cautions. But my favourite was the article “ Schools as Sites of Dissent” that points out that “ while massive reforms are needed to bring real equity into schools and universities, individual faculty members can and must initiate critical dialogues in classrooms and fire up young imagination”… “Being entrusted with students education brings with a responsibility of not only teaching them to be better writers/speakers…(or in Puducherry mean better doctors or engineers), but also helping them become critical thinkers and responsible world citizens.”
I think it is time for school teachers and parents to get into the debate on school education policies.
Sundararaman
