KOCHI: Kochi is fast becoming the Kota of South India as more and more coaching centres are mushrooming up in the city, bringing along with them a mechanized system of imparting education. Students are drilled for long hours on a set of topics, with pre-defined methodologies which leave little scope for development of creativity in children. The result is a uni-dimensional child, who lacks social skills and is prone to frequent bouts of depression. Another fallout of such a system is that it barely leaves any time for children to get involved in physical activities, leading to poor physical development. The rat race for entering IITs has created an atrocious culture with no attention being paid to the holistic development of the child.
Taking a cue from the above scenario, CBSE issued a circular, dated February 6, 2014, to restrain coaching culture and banned the conduction of coaching classes within school premises and holding coaching classes during school hours. Despite this order, many of the coaching centres are brazenly flouting these rules. In this context, FIIT-JEE is collaborating with Sarasvathi Vidya Niketan School, Mamangalam, Elamakkara and conducting classes within school premises during school hours.
The programme labelled Integrated School Program or Pinnacle program comes with a price tag of Rs 6 lakhs to 9 lakhs, an amount which is more than the total cost of engineering in most government institutions.
The coaching institutes also run programmes, wherein the collaborating school merely acts as a dummy school and students skip school classes altogether and attend sessions within the premises of coaching institutes.
On a whole, coaching institutions are probably running the largest educational scam in the history of free India, involving corruption on a massive scale. It is no secret that there is widespread collusion between local CBSE officials and schools/coaching institutes.
The schools are pre-notified about any visit by central CBSE inspectors, so that coaching institute gets ample time to pack its stuff and barely leave any traces. It's a pity that CBSE enacts rules for the benefit of students at large, however, local officials fail to follow through. Such myopic vision leads to irreparable damage to our society and is seriously jeopardizing our national mission of 'Education for all'.
As a parent, I am extremely concerned by the commercialisation of education, which makes it beyond the means of a middle-class family to impart quality education to its children. Besides, the pressure tactics utilized by coaching institutes, in the name of results and toppers, is driving students into depression and leading to suicides among them. I hope that proper initiatives are taken up to curb the menace of commercialisation of education.
(The views expressed are those of the author)