Your child failed, but you don’t fail as a parent!

“Beta, future ka kuch socha hai ki tumhe karna kya hai 10^th ke baad ?”, “Aree woh Sharmaji ke dono baccho ne IIT/IIM se apni padhai complete ki hai aur ek humara beta hai jo pata nahi B.Com bhi pass karega ya nahi”, “Kuch nahi ho sakta tera …atleast kuch nahi toh apni behen ko dekh kar hi kuch kar le varna koi bhi ache college mein admission milne se raha aise marks pe,”  Need I say more of such dialogues that we hear on day to day basis from our Indian society and parents and all our near and dear ones. All this actually comes to my mind first when we talk about our Indian education system, where admissions into prominent IIM/IIT/NIT, universities/colleges on the basis of percentage, marks, grades can make or mar a child’s future prospects. Besides the admissions and the assessment scheme, the stress and anxiety, parental and peer pressure can cause long-term impact on his overall growth as a confident individual.

Our system is highly focussed on theoretical aspects rather than developing the problem solving, analytical and logical thinking skill-set, lack of creativity, rote learning & cramming up formulas/thesis and reproducing it in the 3 hour long examination and then jettison out all what had been studied the previous night. This system of examining the child is detrimental not only to his development but also to the institutions and corporate houses who will admit/absorb him/her on the basis of such marks and degrees. There has been a long time debate on this among the educationists and the academicians that our system needs a “total makeover”. In Swami Vivekananda’s words, “We want that education by which character is formed, strength of mind is increased, the intellect is expanded and by which one can stand on one’s own feet.”

In a country like India, where we are highly influenced by  Bollywood films, Heroes & Heroines,  where cricket is religion and Sachin is known as the “God of Cricket” , where biopics are made on the lives of Mary Kom, MS Dhoni, Milkha Singh, whose stories when captured on big screens earn huge profits if  it happens to “click” with the audiences. But the point is, these movies haven’t changed much of our perspective of “Padhai Karo, Khel Kuud Kam”  cause padhai se naukri and naukri se societal status. Movies like Taare Zameen Par, 3 Idiots and Tamasha emphasised  on this subject of “Letting your children follow their dreams, tapping on their hidden potential and encouraging them in all their endeavours rather than bogging them down with career and padhai ka pressure and the famous line “log kya kahenge”.

I know it’s easier to say than getting things done in India but a movement for CHANGE needs to start from somewhere and why not from home which is regarded as a child’s first school where parents should provide emotional support and mental stability by  backing  the child even if monetary constraints exists, schools and colleges should try and assess the child’s performance at regular intervals, encourage extra-curricular activities and impart practical learning by providing the necessary infrastructure and with the help of our current Modi Sarkar in power that is very much possible and society and leading corporate houses can help by providing the necessary finance via scholarships, sponsorships and training to the needy and deserved in line with their screening process for the same. Even famous brands like Cadbury Bournvita- “Tayyari Jeet Ki ad series conceptualised by Ogilvy & Mather is based on progressive parenting. It sends out gentle reminders in each and every TVC where the essence of the ad is their motivational dialogues emphasizing that the real focus of education should be on learning cause in today’s day and age real learning has taken a backseat, “achi aadatein aasani se nahi banti, tumhari mushkilo mein mera bhi hissa hai” and one of the TVC even ends with the lines where the school principal is seen telling parents “Aisa koi report card nahi bana jo bacche ki kabiliyat bata sake’. Brands like Navneet, VIP, KFC are also communicating such varied messages via their theme based commercials.

Lastly, even Google Inc CEO Mr. Sundar Pichai is of the same view that “Indian education should allow a system of creativity, project-based, experimental learning. We should teach students to take risks and not penalize them for being different”. My take is let your child make his/her own career choices, do not influence their decision making process but be a guiding light throughout the process cause later on in life he/she will not regret their decisions nor hold you responsible for their failure rather they will boast among their friends that “I am blessed to have parents like them who supported and trusted my decisions always.”