HSLC Exam : A lop-sided competition
- The Sangai Express Editorial :: April 07, 2022 -
The High School Leaving Certificate Examination or more popularly Matric examination for the academic year 2021-22 began on Tuesday.
This particular examination is a very crucial one for it can either be a major stepping stone toward future careers and professions or an indomitable stumbling block.
How well prepared are the students is doubtful given the protracted disruption caused by the Covid pandemic.
Nonetheless, one can say with certainty that a section of students prepared thoroughly for the exam.
They prepared for the crucial examination through private tuition and by studying at home but not all students cannot afford private tuition.
Given these facts, Matric exam has never been a fair contest or level playing field.
Private school students who can afford private tuitions have been topping the merit list of HSLC Examinations every year.
Government school students are nowhere in the competition. If any Government school student can make it to the merit list, it is a very rare exception, if not a miracle.
Pandemic or no pandemic, private tuition or coaching has become one compulsory feature of education in the State.
Obviously, private tuition entails extra expenditure which is quite a big amount if calculated on annual basis.
Many families have been investing their hard earned money in sending their children to private tutors which otherwise could have been invested for generating more income.
In fact, private tuition has taken a heavy toll on the State's economy. Nowadays, almost 90 per cent of students studying in private schools go for private tuition.
Then it is pertinent to question if something is amiss in the classroom teaching.
No doubt, private tuition equips students better to face examinations but at the same time students have been accustomed to a culture of spoon-feeding.
The culture of spoon-feeding is robbing away the thinking power of our young students.
Students are not allowed to exercise their mental faculty to tackle a problem and arrive at a conclusion of their own because teachers in coaching centres are ever present to supply them with readymade answers.
Students studying in Government schools, in general, are not regular in attending classes and if they attend classes, they are not taught properly.
Adding to their misery, most of the Government school students don't go for private tuition either due to poverty or their parents are disinterested.
If private coaching raises the level of competitiveness, it is also one major factor for the increasing number of High School drop-outs.
Whereas the level of competitiveness is rising year after year, the arena of competition is shrinking reciprocally.
Competition and sense of competitiveness have already become an exclusive domain of private and mission schools only. This is reflected most glaringly in the results of Class X and Class XII examinations.
Right to education should be universal and it should not be denied to Government school students and students who cannot afford private tuition.
The scenario demands a thorough analysis on a comprehensive scale encompassing Government school students and all those students who cannot afford private tuition.
Private tuition or coaching is fast acquiring the status of a parallel schooling system.
There are many compelling and not so compelling factors for the rise of private coaching system in parallel to the formal schooling system.
Parents escorting their children to tuition centres were inescapable sight before the pandemic hit the State.
It is only natural for parents to invest all possible time, money and labour for best possible education of their children.
What demands immediate introspection of the whole society is the State's education system. The wanton commercialisation of education must stop somewhere.
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