Reflections on quality of education

We should corporatise our education in the private sector, more so our higher education which requires huge money to cater to its huge needs unlike the school education. And if we have to have private sector participation in higher education (as the public sector can’t bear all the burden) we can’t but think of the corporate sector which only is capable of attracting huge amounts from all sections of the society unlike all others

President Pranab Mukherji has called for focussed attention and intervention of all the seekers and stakeholders of quality education, namely the policy-makers, academics, industrialists, endowments creators, parents, students and the enlightened citizens to bring about a qualitative change in our higher education which, according to him, has been of late very much deteriorating.

He has very rightly and also at the very right time pleaded for a concerted intervention, attention and action of all of them, as the hitherto piecemeal exclusive and separate attempts on the part of them have not been so eloquent and so effective.

While what is needed most according to him is the availability of resources to create adequate facilities in higher educational institutions, it is not lack of finance alone which is affecting the standards of education (which the President has very much regretted at many a place wherever he has recently addressed), but also lack of will power to make a combined effort to improve the tone and the tenor of the institutions to function with right kind of academic atmosphere and discipline.

The President has felt that while some may be deficient in finance, adequate infrastructure and staff, some others even though not so, don't make much use of whatever they have. Some of them also spend lavishly, luxuriously and extravagantly.

Some others believe in building institutions like empires and either underutilise or unutilise their funds. Much of the land allotted to the traditional universities and colleges is also in excess of their present and future needs and the governments have to have a re-look at them and decide as to how to make the optimum use of those lands.

The President was also not very happy with the way of appointing Vice Chancellors, Professors and the other teaching staff and also with the way of constituting the syndicates and executive councils, and with the politicisation of the universities by using students and staff for non-academic purposes.

Ideological intrusions into the institutions according to him have also been proving a big bane to the healthy intellectual growth of our institutions as they convert them into political hotbeds.The President seems to have two kinds of interventions and attentions by the society in mind to set right the standards – through financial and non-financial interventions and attention.

First, to furnish our institutions to function comfortably if not luxuriously has to be done at various levels in various ways by pooling and procuring funds from internal as well as external sources. For this, we have to involve many charitable and service-minded organisations to aid and assist our institutions in addition to ensuring that the government itself allocates more funds than it is now doing. We have to involve the NRIs also in a big way in building our institutions which we are not so much doing at present.

In my view, we should corporatise our education in the private sector, more so our higher education which requires huge money to cater to its huge needs unlike the school education. And if we have to have private sector participation in higher education (as the public sector can’t bear all the burden) we can’t but think of the corporate sector which only is capable of attracting huge amounts from all sections of the society unlike all others.

But for doing this, the rules of that sector should be differently framed as compared to the rules related to all other sectors to attract not only money but also to see that it does not become exploitative. While the selection system of students in private corporate sector should only be by merit, the weaker sections interests in them should be protected by arranging loans to deserving students through banks by floating specialised banks for that purpose or by converting some of the existing banks into such banks.

The governments should underwrite the loans so granted. This is probably the best method of financing the studies of the weaker section students than the present methods of financing them by some other methods, as it makes the students realise that the loans have to be repaid by them when they settle down in life and that they have to study well to be eligible for them.

They will also, therefore, make them more responsible and more disciplined. The governments also have to see to it that the universities and colleges are fair and transparent in making staff appointments and promotions and also in constituting the executive councils and the other academic and administrative bodies.

Improvement in standards of higher education also requires the intervention and attention of the enlightened citizens and the parents too and the society as everyone in the society ultimately gets affected one way or the other if they are not improved.

There is no one who is not a stakeholder in education, as the educational well-being or ill-being touches the lives of one and all in one way or the other. One should not, therefore, think that it is the concern of only the students, parents and the government or the institutions. The well-being of the institutions should, therefore, be the concern of one and all.

What is needed, however, is the objective and positive approach of the stakeholders to these matters but not the subjective, political, partisan negative and self-seeking approach. It is time we shared the concern of the President regarding the sharp fall in educational standards, in his speech at the Diamond Jubilee Celebrations and the 26th convocation of the Birla Institute of Technology, Mesra (Ranchi), on January 10.

The concern of the President is being brought to the notice of the Telangana government which is very much seized of the matter of improving the quality of higher education in the state, which suffered very much during the last few decades as the students, teachers and everyone in universities and colleges in Telangana were very deeply involved in the Telangana movement for the formation of a separate Telangana State, which of course they achieved for good.

The government of the state as separately constituted would be now free to take the steps very much needed to bring about a qualitative change in higher education, particularly now when it is about to appoint the new Vice-Chancellors and constitute new Executive Councils for the universities. It is also right time to bring about effective coordination and cooperation between the universities and also all other bodies directly or indirectly related to higher education, so that the overlaps and wastages do not happen particularly in the field of research.

In this connection, I would like to recall the speech made by the then Prime Minister P V Narasimha Rao at Karimnagar while inaugurating the Shatavahana PG College. He said that the universities and the PG colleges affiliated to them when they plan and formulate research work should keep the issues, problems and needs related to the regions where they are located, and try to help the government and the society grapple with those needs, issues and problems instead of doing it on some subject or topic of their own fancy whether it is socially, educationally and regionally relevant and useful or not.

PV also added that the present tendency of university teachers to encourage research only to produce the PhDs aplenty and of the students only to acquire PhD degrees aplenty should be discouraged, as such research may only benefit them but not the society in toto. It is therefore suggested that in future the government should make our universities and their affiliates to function like the "Regional Research Centres" for their many purposes of planning and administration involving the students and the teachers in research related to them.

This way of doing research will also make the PG and PhD courses more practical, effective and employment-oriented. The culture of higher education would also become more professional than general, more societally-oriented than the self-oriented.