Responsibility of system to give opportunities to every child to develop his natural talent

People are looking at the schools with great anticipation.  This is a wonderful opportunity for the governments to build their credibility and return the credibility of government schools.  China has taken serious steps in this direction.
The disruption in the education of children due to Corona has increased the challenges manifold.  The shortfall in this can be filled only by new thinking, more efforts and innovations.
The education system is included in those areas, which present all kinds of resistance to accept change.  Appropriate environment for acceptance of change can be created only when the teacher-class is confident of the proposed changes and is ready to implement it by conscience and not by order.  This situation is not impossible.  It can be put into practice.
Schools are permanently imprinted in our perception.  Families send their children to school and expect their teachers to teach them everything that will enhance every aspect of their personality.  It will include the qualities and skills required for sustenance.  Enlightened families want that by arranging their life, every youth should always be ready to move forward, to engage in public welfare and national interest.
How successful both the child and the teacher were, it is judged by the marks obtained in the examination.  But by the time we come to such a situation, which is accepted by all as normal – wherever there are shortcomings, whoever’s, all the fault of failure lies with the student only!  Till date no principal, education officer or education minister has failed, only lakhs of students fail every year.
In day-to-day activities, the whole process of teaching-learning is reduced to something like this – at the behest of the center and at the level of the state government, the curriculum, syllabus and text books are prepared, the teachers are directed to complete the syllabus.  the children go to pass the examination, the boundaries and limits of these two are determined by the curriculum.  The school board evaluates the student and the prestige and creditworthiness of any school is also determined by the parents on the basis of the board exam results.  All this has been happening for so many generations without any change.
But as the spread of education has increased, efforts have also started to change it.  Today the dependence of the student for learning is no longer limited to the teacher and textbooks.  Everyone is familiar with this change.  Now every child has to learn how to find the necessary and useful from the available pool of information, how to develop the skills to keep on learning and how to be prepared to keep learning for life.
Policies have changed in education, books have changed, teaching methods have changed over time, but most of the discussions point towards the decline in quality, usefulness, acquisition of values, respect and acceptance of teachers in education.  In this time of unprecedented pace of change, alert and cautious education systems are paying attention to the fact that declaring any class as a failure in the use of human power and leaving it to its fate is neither just, nor at human level.  But should be acceptable.
It is the responsibility of the school and the system to give opportunities to every child to develop his natural talent, it is also the responsibility of the school and its teachers to identify and direct his natural talent.  For this, it is the constitutional responsibility of the Central and State Governments to provide necessary resources, training and suitable environment.  It has not been fully subsistence in the decades after independence.
The private sector saw investment in education as an opportunity to earn uninterrupted dividends, and governments were given an option to escape their responsibility.  The society was divided into two parts.  Competition increased, employment opportunities decreased, tuition and coaching expanded tremendously.  All the expectations like personality development, acquisition of human values, character building were lost somewhere in the tireless efforts to score maximum marks.  Private school fees or expensive coaching institutes are now falling out of reach of the middle class which was running blindly towards them.  With this, the income of how many lakh people has decreased or stopped due to Corona.
People are looking towards government schools with great hope.  This is a wonderful opportunity for the governments to build their credibility and return the credibility of government schools.  China has taken serious steps in this direction.  It has been traditionally said in India that the field of education is not for doing business.  China is implementing it now.  He will succeed, because there are rules to be followed – no matter how much the system is criticized.  In India, the rules can be followed only on paper.
Even now private schools may not earn dividends as per rules, but no one is unfamiliar with the situation.  The learned class should explain to the nation that tutoring and coaching frustrates the child’s thinking ability and conceptual power and thus crushes their curiosity and creativity.  This must stop, even if we have to learn from China.
The Gurukul tradition of ancient India is discussed with pride, but the attraction of the people is still confined around the private schools of English medium.  In the age of rapid change, there is much in education which is not changing.  The biggest need is to attract talented youth for admission in teacher training institutions.  The second is to radically change the work culture and curriculum of these institutions.  An example of indifference to change is the lesson plans prepared by student-teachers during teacher training.  Lesson plans, as they were made fifty years ago, are still being prepared and made today.
While teaching the philosophy of education to the same trainee, it is explained in detail by quoting eminent educationists that ‘Any creative lesson takes its form in the classroom itself.’ In this situation the most promising reforms and changes which are recommended and expected at the policy level.  going forward, its expected implementation will require a profound change of attitude.  And attitude change has never been easier anywhere and anytime.  The education system is included in those areas, which present all kinds of resistance to accept change.
The proper environment for the acceptance of change is created only when the teacher-class is convinced of the proposed changes, and is ready to implement it with intuition, not by order.  This situation is not impossible.  It can be put into practice.  It will have to start with the education departments of teacher training institutes and universities.  Many such elements have emerged in the new education policy, which are full of potential to create a suitable environment for realizing such possibilities.
It is pertinent to recall here that India adopted the Sustainable Development Agenda-2030 in 2015, according to which India too – like all other nations – must ensure ‘inclusive and equitable quality education for all and lifelong education’ by 2030.  opportunities to be achieved.  The disruption in the education of children due to Corona has increased the challenges manifold.  The shortfall in this can be filled only by new thinking, more efforts and innovations.
What is promising is that the new education policy explicitly recognizes that ‘teachers at every level have to be ranked as the most respected and essential members of society’.  Will be ready to do!