Education - Just Marks/Grades or Acquiring Real Knowledge?

[MuchMore]

They were upset with me because I got only 87% in physics and 94% in maths

LOL

If you are scoring that much then rest assured no matter what your parents have to say to you - they ARE proud of you.

 

[Highlander999]

the 40% mark for the fresher year can only have been handed to us by the gods.

And 2nd year as well for us up here in Scotland Gotta love the 4 year degrees

 

[shravi]

Shittage going crazy :laugh.

...king cricket, user and muchmore too. You guys should publish a book.

 

[Varun]

People want degrees, and people want degrees with big brand names. No one has a place for someone who knows everything yet doesn't have a degree.

There are many many kids who make it to the top without degrees.

varun_rustagi added 3 Minutes and 45 Seconds later...

No. Many coaching centers start 'Foundation Courses' from Class VII itself, which, accroding to them, is some preparatory thing which would "help" them in Class IX, the class from which they 'officially' offer IIT courses. So basically, it's the same as their IIT classes. I can even show you a link where an IIT coaching school owner has expressed his desire to start courses from Class VI!! This is seriously sick.

Yeah! Only problem is that they are forced to join that.(By their parents)

I have seen many a students say it across the net that they go to schools only to 'show their face'. How do you expect a teacher to teach properly if he/she finds that the majority of the students are not paying any attention to him/her as they already know what he/she'd be teaching courtsey the coaching schools.

Only 5% students respect teachers. Schools nowadays are all about going crazy for girls/boys whether they have coaching or not.

varun_rustagi added 3 Minutes and 49 Seconds later...

the futures of the remaining 4 lakh 67 thousand are thrown to darkness. I think these figures say a lot.

Why the hell you think they are thrown to darkness. About 50K of them get selected into other engineering colleges and 50,000 get selected into DU. So what the hell is this darkness ?

That's a grossly unfair generalization. A coaching school offers them "assistance" from Class VII itself, takes hefty sums of money from them every month, and then, when they fail in an exam, it suddenly becomes their own fault?

I'm talking about those who just join this and then run about girls/boys proposing them and breaking up after soemtime.
About 1 Lakh of these type of people.

 

[King Cricket]

Yeah! Only problem is that they are forced to join that.(By their parents)

My point rather was that there is no need to take coaching so early for entrance exams, when despite taking coaching, you wouldn't find many 'average' pupils cracking IIT-JEE. And it's not that these coaching centers teach many average students anyway, they conduct a separate entrance exam before admitting students to filter out the good from the not so brilliant.

Only 5% students respect teachers. Schools nowadays are all about going crazy for girls/boys whether they have coaching or not.

I agree with you on school education not being up to the mark, but I still would prefer self-studying to attending tutions/coaching. Oh well, each to their own opinion.

Why the hell you think they are thrown to darkness. About 50K of them get selected into other engineering colleges and 3.5 Lakhs get selected into DU. So what the hell is this darkness ?

You sure about the 3.5 lakh thing?
Darkness was too strong a word I concede, and it was probably a word which didn't exactly convey my point. Actually, what I was trying to insinuate is that as we do not have a proper higher educational infrastructure in place, students have to give one entrance exam after another to get to top universities, which follow totally different patterns. So, in the midst of all the hullabullo, if they are not able to do well in one of them or two them, their future is 'dark' in the sense that they would probably end up in some ████ uni which would make life all the more difficult for them.
Even big name universities which glitter from outside and attract students in hoards can be ████ and heavily influenced by party politics, as in BESU or Calcutta University. So, instead of having all such chaos, it's best to have just one entrance exam for a stream for the sake of a student's convenience.

Anyway, let's end the discussion. My posts won't change your views one aota, and the same goes with yours. So let's save our members here from the trouble of going through these ridiculously long 'essays'.

 

[Kshitiz_Indian]

Why the hell you think they are thrown to darkness. About 50K of them get selected into other engineering colleges and 3.5 Lakhs get selected into DU. So what the hell is this darkness ?

50k? I've just had a look. AIEEE's central counselling is offering just 9990 seats this time, add up IIT's 8k, and around 20k of other reputed engineering colleges (not the meerut rubbish). You get around 38k seats if my math is right. Compare that to around 13 lakh people that gave AIEEE this year. Does it look so big anymore? Add the fact that around 35% seats are reserved for reasons best known to the government, and 50% seats in all NIT's are reserved for candidates of their own state. You can do the math from here.

I'm not really sure about the 3.5 lakh figure about DU either. Where are you getting that from? Even then, DU hardly offers engineering degrees.

Above all, plus that there are 38k engineering seats in total, but for one who just wants to pursue one specific branch, there are hardly around 3k. That's not much at an All India level, I can tell you from experience.

 

[Varun]

Reconfirmed again...
It's about 50,000 seats in DU and additional 50,000 for B sc. courses in different parts of India, 50,000 total B-Tech seats in India and 10,000-20,000 family businesses.
I don't know about the remaining.

Note*- It's just an estimate.

varun_rustagi added 2 Minutes and 27 Seconds later...

And why we are discussing only about IIT ? Medical, Commerce and Arts are subjects too and have a relation with education.

We should discuss this with reference to the whole aspect of education, not only Non-Medical Science.

 

[Kshitiz_Indian]

Reconfirmed again...
It's about 50,000 seats in DU and additional 50,000 for B sc. courses in different parts of India, 50,000 total B-Tech seats in India and 10,000-20,000 family businesses.
I don't know about the remaining.

Note*- It's just an estimate.

varun_rustagi added 2 Minutes and 27 Seconds later...

And why we are discussing only about IIT ? Medical, Commerce and Arts are subjects too and have a relation with education.

We should discuss this with reference to the whole aspect of education, not only Non-Medical Science.

I was only talking about Engineering. I think Medical's situation is worse...

 

[sohum]

The problem can be described by economics. There is a massive demand for good education, which is directly proportional to our population. There is a severely tiny supply of good education. The gap has to be filled somehow, which is why the "black market" of private tuition classes has grown. As with any black market, it is completely unregulated... which is what leads to undesirable practices to "cheat the system" such as cramming and what not.

Hence, the solution is extremely difficult in the short run, almost impossible, since it's tied to population growth.

There is definitely change from the previous generation with regards to the attitude towards education. However, similarly, the growing middle class means that the demand for education has grown to temporarily hide that change. The mindsets of people are changing, primarily because of increased access to information. I think you can observe similar trends in religion as well, in India. I think religion in India is morphing into a more passive form. Of course, given our dense population, inertia is going to mean that change will take a long time to propagate.

sohum added 3 Minutes and 47 Seconds later...

Moreover, with the thing called 'Internet' you can learn ANYTHING you wish in CS/IT field.

You can "learn" anything you wish on the internet, but how accurate is that information. For example, you can read thousands of articles on how brain surgery is performed, but that does not qualify you to be a brain surgeon.

Computer Science is far more than knowing how to program. A programming language is simply a tool. Knowing C++ is like knowing how to use a hammer. Understanding computer science is knowing how to use that hammer to build a house. You can learn to use a hammer through the internet, but you're not ever going to know how to build a house without actually experiencing it--the purpose of colleges was to pass the experience of real people onto students whether that be theoretical experience or practical.

 

[AbBh]

There is a lot that is wrong with the system in India. Sadly most students don't even realise that. If you do, you should be happy instead of being disappointed. The system can't keep you down. Foreign education would be the best option. If you can't go overseas to study for some reason, the road is a lot tougher. Try to make the best of what is available here and try to learn on your own at the same time.

You can "learn" anything you wish on the internet, but how accurate is that information. For example, you can read thousands of articles on how brain surgery is performed, but that does not qualify you to be a brain surgeon.

Computer Science is far more than knowing how to program. A programming language is simply a tool. Knowing C++ is like knowing how to use a hammer. Understanding computer science is knowing how to use that hammer to build a house. You can learn to use a hammer through the internet, but you're not ever going to know how to build a house without actually experiencing it--the purpose of colleges was to pass the experience of real people onto students whether that be theoretical experience or practical.

Brain surgery is far more complicated than computer programming. If you mess up a brain surgery, somebody is going to die. The penalty for writing a buggy program is far less severe.

The information on the internet isn't always accuracte but that is the case with every other method of learning. You'll find a lot of rubbish in books. You'll find teachers who don't know what they are talking about. You have to choose the source you are going to learn from with care.

Its better to learn off the Internet than to learn from some of the colleges here. Their syllabus is outdated, teachers are underqualified, and a lot of the information in the books is simply wrong. Not only are they teaching outdated C++, but they are encouraging wrong design principles. The programs you are asked to write in exams sometimes ask you to implement a solution in a fundamentally wrong way. I can only speak about Mumbai University, but I think the case is similar all across India.

 

[Kshitiz_Indian]

I can only speak about Mumbai University, but I think the case is similar all across India.

I guess I'm about to find that out soon...

 

[Highlander999]

The information on the internet isn't always accuracte but that is the case with every other method of learning. You'll find a lot of rubbish in books. You'll find teachers who don't know what they are talking about. You have to choose the source you are going to learn from with care.

Very true. People often assume because it comes from a book it must be correct. One of the things I have learnt at uni is to critically analyse an author's opinion and viewpoint and work out why he is saying what he is. For instance, I was evaluating a source written by an American Jew who lost his family in the Holocaust who was basically saying it was every German citizens' fault, yet because I pulled it from the library many would assume his view point is valid when in reality he is incredibly bias. On the flipside, I found many good accurate responses to the author on the web which backed up their viewpoints, its all down to using your own intelligence and using what is useful to form an opinion no matter where you get the source from.

 

[Varun]

^Completely agree with Tom.

It is the opposite in India, students are interested only in doing the limited school work, 90% of them don't even think to research something outside it.

 

[AkshayS]

^Completely agree with Tom.

It is the opposite in India, students are interested only in doing the limited school work, 90% of them don't even think to research something outside it.

Agree with you, that's the problem.

We've limited time to do such loads of homework.
On a day when I'd get more homework, I really copies it whole from the reference book or the text book.

I do not like homeworks at all, and surely I hate the way Teachers gives us the homework.

Homework surely wastes our time of studies.

 

[Varun]

Agree with you, that's the problem.

We've limited time to do such loads of homework.
On a day when I'd get more homework, I really copies it whole from the reference book or the text book.

I do not like homeworks at all, and surely I hate the way Teachers gives us the homework.

Homework surely wastes our time of studies.

Though I think Homework should be reduced but I don't really think it's a waste of time and it should be abolished.
Many a times I have got homework which increases my knowledge but my classmates rather than seeing the good aspect of it just copy it from others who themselves copy it from refreshers.
That's our poor mentality, no need to blame homework.
Our teachers aren't fools to give us weeks to submit our homework or just make us do Q-A in classes.
It's our poor mentality that we take homework as granted and only sit to do it a day before we have to actually submit it and spend the earlier days chatting on facebook and orkut (Waste of time) and trying to impress our friends.
We need to manage our time ourselves, no one other is gonna do it for us.