An IIT for a vote

It sounds incredible - 20 years of education. I seem to have spent the major portion of my life "occupied" as a student in the schools and colleges of Homeland. I have studied in 3 different schools, one junior college, one engineering college and finally an IIT.

As I look back, how many teachers jump to mind that make you feel proud for even being in their presence? How many moments can I recollect from these institutes where I went 'A-ha' because I grasped something magical? How much did we actually learn from this huge investment of our lives, other than the stuff we crammed in from text books just to regurgitate it out on the exam papers? What did we finally earn other than glorious degree certificates, that do not say we know something, but that we made the examiner believe we do? Did we undergo higher education, or was it just "hire" education?

Textbooks - A student's best friend?

Teaching to the book. Sticking to the curriculum. Covering the syllabus in time. These are "mantras" I have seen most teachers in my life follow. My experiences might be too specific; perhaps down to the choice of schools I went to. But, I am in no doubt as to why I learnt nothing at school, but more from the Time-Life series of Illustrated Encyclopedia and the World Book Encyclopedia. The textbooks served up facts in a totally unmotivating fashion, while these other books encouraged you to do experiments and learn for yourself. Isn't that the best way to learn - doing stuff?

Aren't textbooks merely meant to be guides to what a kid needs to learn? Why then do schools stick to only cramming little heads with sequence of words from a textbook, when they don't understand the sentence? Doesn't that show them the trees in the forest, without them knowing they are looking at a forest? And that there are more trees they would never be shown unless they tread forward on their own?

Quantity not quality

One of the problems, especially in higher education, is the fact that the HRD (Human Resources Development) or the Education ministry, needs to show numbers. "A million graduate seats over the country, half a million engineering graduates, fifty thousand engineering post-grads. Ok, that meets the demand. Students are happy, industry is happy." I have personally watched the number of engineering seats, in Maharashtra alone, multiply over the years, as new colleges get immediate sanction and mushroom all over the place. I watched as folks two years senior struggled to get admitted, and again watched a few years later as most who wanted a seat did get one, albeit in remotely accessible, poorly developed institutes.

The colleges that sprout up all over the country, do not all meet the high standards setup by the AICTE, but still get sanction by pressure from politicians that back them. Some of these colleges are blatantly named after politicians or their mentors, and there is nothing left to one's imagination as to why they are still standing. Higher education is good business.

Take my engineering college for example. Facility-wise, it was among the best around. Splendid class rooms, well-equipped labs, and a sparkling building that reminds one of a four-star hotel. When the classes begin, some teachers fumble around calling a "semi-colon" a "semi-comma", while others just leave us in awe, not because they are exemplary, but because they are only a couple of years older than we are. In four years, I can remember maybe two lecturers who stood to gain my respect, and that is poor considering I sat through at least twenty different lecturers.

Notably, the Commission on Growth and Development, in its report on Strategies for Sustained Growth and Development noted as one of the essential "sins" that economies that fail to sustain growth commit - "Measuring educational progress solely by the construction of school infrastructure or higher enrollments, instead of focusing on the extent of learning."

Haste is waste

Of the 20 years of education, I can say without doubt that the culminating final two years were simply the best. I would say that of the 15-odd professors I learnt from, maybe two weren't impressive enough, but you still respected them. The rest, just blow you away with their delivery styles and the grasp of their subjects. You get absorbed into the lectures and you want to solve their assignments because you are enjoying the learning experience. Simply put, even for a Master's graduate, IIT is definitely the best place to be at if you want to study in Homeland. The atmosphere, the culture, the class-mates, the teachers, the facilities are out of this world. And everyone deserves to get that experience before diving into the rat race of the real world.

That said, there is a reason why those institutes are so good today. Pandit Nehru saw a dream once that India would be self-sufficient in science and technology, and nurtured the IIT system as a means to fulfill his dream. It is over the years that IIT has learnt to adapt itself and become an institute of world renown. Today, most of them are self-sufficient and do not depend on huge government grants. But, to think that the formula can be replicated overnight to meet the growing demand, seems farcical. It reeks of the same desperate numbers game that saw poor third-rate engineering colleges mushroom in the first place.

It will take years before the new IITs can come up to speed with the rest. Assigning mentor IITs to each of the 6 new IITs is not a solution. Professors, labs, computers, hostels, hell even classrooms aren't ready. Sites for 2 of the IITs are not yet finalised, but soon students may be getting admitted to them.

None of the IIT directors have a say, as they didn't when the controversial quotas were implemented, which in fact, seems to be the sole reason behind this hastiness. The government had an election-manifesto promise of implementing 27% OBC quota in higher institutes of knowledge, and to implement that in the IITs before the coming election early next year, is a way to salvage pride. At what cost? Will the standards associated with the IITs still hold? Or will they be politicised and entrapped in gimmicks too?