Up to certain extent I believe Indian K 12 Education is suffering from policy paralysis. I still doubt whether any time ever we ask the end user & main stake holders of this system exactly that - what they want? Where our focus should be? What is the demand and how to fulfill it? What other countries are doing? In my all-case studies, I found in education we talk too much of philosophy. Across India, I have visited many good schools and quite ornamented and flowery Vision Statement in the lobby. They too have all good words in their mission statements. They have all good things to speak. But these are not quantifiable & measurable. Today every parent is having hard core consumerist approach. Hence, they also want everything should be quantifiable and measurable. They want outcomes not result. They want Knowledge to be imparted to the students. And above all schools should make the students Skillful by using which their wards can face the today's adversity. They can have a sustainable life as an upcoming Citizen. Does our curriculum support these all? Are we teaching for these reasons?  

Opening few more schools or allowing hundreds of colleges and private universities to mushroom is not going to solve the crisis of education in India. And the irony is – we are in a country where people are spending their parents’ life’s savings and borrowed money on education – and even then, not getting quality education, and struggling to find an employment of their choice. Millions of students are victim of an unrealistic, pointless, mindless rat race We also live in a country where the people see education as the means of climbing the social and economic ladder. If the education system is failing – then it is certainly not due to lack of demand for good education, or because a market for education does not exist. Just see in your surrounding how a private tutor or a Coaching Institution is flourishing.

A paradigm shift is needed in K 12 education. We provide Learning Patterns to our kids in the lower classes. Primarily they learn “how to learn”. Some time we distract that badly through “teaching and testing”. We produce lot of disinterests in their mind in the primary classes. Further, they don’t want to learn but we only “teach”. They are suffering with lack of common sense. They are lacking in decision making ability. They can think but again lacking in critical thinking. We geared towards “teaching and testing” knowledge at every level as opposed to teaching “skills”. There is good saying - “Give a man a fish and you feed him one day, teach him how to catch fish and you feed him for a lifetime.” We need to teach our students skills, to enable them for a lifetime. “Information” is largely forgotten after the exam is over. Still our focus is on cramming information. The best crammers are rewarded by the system with A+ grade. This is one of the fundamental flaws of our education system. Government tried to eradicate the same by imposing CCE & RTE under which we made our students more carefree and distressed with no detention policy. But what is the outcome? You are the true witness how the students completing their Formative assessments and how our teachers are assessing them. Hats off to Google where you will find all projects and answers ready-made! Only you have to cut and paste. So far Summative assessments are concerned this is all school based. Due to the lack of monitoring and lack of vigilance it lost its moo purpose and maximum of them are getting very high percentile. With lack of skill and knowledge, they are unable to crack the professional Exams and becoming the prey of Coaching classes. Many students are committing suicide and unable to bear the stress. A city in India has all the factories of creating Doctors and Engineers. While visiting that city one could easily gauze how the students are surviving there! Our education system rarely rewards what deserves highest academic accolades. Deviance is discouraged. Risk taking is mocked. Our testing and marking systems need to be built to recognize original contributions, in form of creativity, problem solving, valuable original research and innovation. I wish we could do this successfully then the day is not far when the Indian education system will be changed to a meaningful purpose. Cramming & memorizing is not learning. the biggest flaw in our education system is perhaps that it is rewarding “memorizing” above “Originality”.