CHENNAI: Students needing coaching classes to crack competitive exams shows failure of school education system, said educationalists and students in response to a recent observation by the Madras High Court.
Data submitted by the Tamil Nadu government to the Madras High Court on Monday, showed that only about 2 per cent of the students admitted into government and self-financing medical colleges in 2019, passed the National Eligibility cum Entrance Test (NEET) exam without enrolling in private coaching centres.
A Bench of High Court Justices N Kirubakaran and P Velmurugan who studied the numbers observed that medical education is not available to the poor people and is available only to those who underwent coaching classes by spending lots of rupees. "Moreover, this will also put the rural students in a disadvantageous position, as they lack facilities of coaching," it said.
However, former Vice Chancellor, Anna University, E Balagurusamy said that the most important inference that should be made from the data is that the school education system, as a whole, is incapable of
producing enough qualifying candidates. "The data shows that students from government schools, private matriculation and CBSE schools need additional coaching to crack an exam that is based on school syllabus. This shows that the quality of education is poor," he opined.
He further said that by principle, any government should oppose extra coaching and enhance the school education to the point where any additional training will be redundant. "The data shows an attitude problem as well. Students have normalised the fact they need additional coaching to clear a competitive exam," he said.
A Riaz, a student from a government school in Chennai, who cleared NEET last year said that students have a fair chance of clearing the test if they are thorough with their school syllabus. "I was weak in physics. The government's residential programme helped me tackle questions in the physics section more strategically," he said. Riaz, however, secured only a dental admission in a private college that he could not afford.
PB Prince Gajendra Babu, general secretary, State Platform for Common School System and an education activist argued that in order to crack NEET, students need to be equipped with strategy as much as subject
knowledge. "Most coaching centres, teach students how to avoid negative marks, how to work on strengths, instead of being thorough. So good subject knowledge alone is insufficient," he said.
He added that most students have to either undergo intensive extra coaching or attempt it multiple times. "Only affluent students who can either afford good coaching or a gap year without studying or working to prepare stands any chance of cracking the exam," he said. Gajendrababu opined that school teachers themselves should be able to consistently provide competent training, for a student to clear the test without additional coaching.