Rants on education
If I could only write one blog post, it would be this one. Not only because education is an issue of critical importance and needs to be addressed asap, but also because some of my anecdotal experiences across high school and college are tumultuous enough to establish how urgent some of the problems are and the fact that they are systematically propagating still. It took me this long to get to it honestly because I did't know where to start, how much to write, and how much to share without being too embarrassed or share too much information about the individuals from my experiences. This is definitely not a whistleblowing post as much as I'd love for it to be one, but I don't wish to scapegoat individuals that are a few out of the thousands misusing or gaming a system that is unjust to millions.
I could write pages and pages about how the teaching pedagogy should foster critical thinking over rote learning and likewise but let's be a little more objective and address some of the more urgent critical issues. Before I start yapping about student debt in the USA, rising cases of academic misconduct, the less-hollistic-more-elitist college application process, etc, let me take a step back in time to early school days in India for the purposes of clarity and context (not because I wish to unload my childhood trauma). If you are worried this is some trauma post, stick to the end, there's some stories with happy endings too.
As a kid, growing up in India, I was made to believe that the society is highly meritocratic and that the individuals that put in the most academic effort will rise above the others in life.