The Politics of Change – Should it not start from the School
By: Amit Bhushan Date: 29th May 2014
The policy makers and debaters in India prefer to discuss policy peripheries in public for distribution and consumption by mass media rather than ‘core’ policy changes. Even the new political avatars are not open to public discussion on the ‘core’. This can be because no one wants to open a Pandora Box, from where unknown things start to fly out. ‘Core’ is what affects everybody and any changes to the ‘core’ or ‘hardcore’ policy changes can have severe repercussions for everyone and completely change the game.
Take an example regards Education:
Every party, new or old is convinced about improvement of education being amongst its top priority. What is discussed is Additional Schools, Teacher’s recruitment, Skilling Centers, Better or Grade Pay for Temporary staff, Curriculum revamp, More higher education centers including strengthening of Centers of Excellence etc. This is then religiously translated into financial resource requirements and then logic of excuses is built in around tax payer’s apathy, leakages/corruption in department, political resistance and apathy of teacher’s union.
No one talks of underutilized infrastructure or reforms to improve of outcomes in prevailing situation barring the outgoing government where some changes in curriculum front led to a little more focus on ‘comprehensive education’, although much of it remains an euphemism to ‘reduce learning by rote’. Any measurable change is still very far as far as mass perception is concerned. Instead if the government focuses to improve the assets utilization in schooling sector much greater results can be obtained with relatively lesser effort, however political capital for such changes is not forthcoming. Say for example, government can initiate penalties for school where poor asset utilization is poor. Most ‘private’ schools run single shifts and thus have poor student to ‘land use’ ratio. This results in wasteful use of ‘charity land’ often provided by the government. If the government forces such institutions to improve ‘student to land use’ ratio it is like to result in improvement in requirement of teachers and support staff, increase availability of seats to prospective students, reduce fees since cost of land & building is apportioned over more fee payers, check malpractices such as donations, improve competition resulting in improvement of quality of education etc. Off course this will open various challenges as well which will need to be managed, however under India circumstances where land and capital resources are at premium such policy is likely to accommodate more students and help in terms of affordability.
Yet such discussion is not part of any discussion forum because political parties do not want to upset existing socio-economic order radically even as they struggle to enforce Courts order regarding malpractices.
By: Amit Bhushan Date: 29th May 2014
The policy makers and debaters in India prefer to discuss policy peripheries in public for distribution and consumption by mass media rather than ‘core’ policy changes. Even the new political avatars are not open to public discussion on the ‘core’. This can be because no one wants to open a Pandora Box, from where unknown things start to fly out. ‘Core’ is what affects everybody and any changes to the ‘core’ or ‘hardcore’ policy changes can have severe repercussions for everyone and completely change the game.
Take an example regards Education:
Every party, new or old is convinced about improvement of education being amongst its top priority. What is discussed is Additional Schools, Teacher’s recruitment, Skilling Centers, Better or Grade Pay for Temporary staff, Curriculum revamp, More higher education centers including strengthening of Centers of Excellence etc. This is then religiously translated into financial resource requirements and then logic of excuses is built in around tax payer’s apathy, leakages/corruption in department, political resistance and apathy of teacher’s union.
No one talks of underutilized infrastructure or reforms to improve of outcomes in prevailing situation barring the outgoing government where some changes in curriculum front led to a little more focus on ‘comprehensive education’, although much of it remains an euphemism to ‘reduce learning by rote’. Any measurable change is still very far as far as mass perception is concerned. Instead if the government focuses to improve the assets utilization in schooling sector much greater results can be obtained with relatively lesser effort, however political capital for such changes is not forthcoming. Say for example, government can initiate penalties for school where poor asset utilization is poor. Most ‘private’ schools run single shifts and thus have poor student to ‘land use’ ratio. This results in wasteful use of ‘charity land’ often provided by the government. If the government forces such institutions to improve ‘student to land use’ ratio it is like to result in improvement in requirement of teachers and support staff, increase availability of seats to prospective students, reduce fees since cost of land & building is apportioned over more fee payers, check malpractices such as donations, improve competition resulting in improvement of quality of education etc. Off course this will open various challenges as well which will need to be managed, however under India circumstances where land and capital resources are at premium such policy is likely to accommodate more students and help in terms of affordability.
Yet such discussion is not part of any discussion forum because political parties do not want to upset existing socio-economic order radically even as they struggle to enforce Courts order regarding malpractices.