Call to reform school education

COIMBATORE: Rattled by the Annual Status of Education Report (ASER) which has said that students from Tamil Nadu had an Intelligence Quotient (IQ) lower than the national average, academics have called for reforms in school administration and teaching methodology.   The ASER 2011 report, compiled by a voluntary organisation ‘Pratham’ and released in New Delhi earlier this week, revealed that only 62.8 per cent of standard I & II students in TN can read an alphabet or word, which is lower than the national average of 72.1 per cent.  Besides, only 69.3 per cent of standard I & II students were able to recognise the numbers 1 to 9 against a national average of 73.8 per cent.    Noted academician S S Rajagopalan rued that the situation continues to remain unchanged for the past four to five years.   “Unfortunately, Tamil Nadu is not ready to accept the findings of the ASER survey, arguing that the State was number 1 as per their own finding.”     According to him, there is an urgent need for administrative reforms in school education. “The government must ensure real education is taught in class rooms. Private schools, which are increasing by the day, have resorted to the memorising technique to show good results,” he added.    Coimbatore-based Mani Higher Secondary School principal K Sathya Narayanan felt that the entire society including parents and teachers should be blamed for this poor performance.     “Schools want students to write and speak in English, whereas the students are comfortable only in their mother tongue. Not all students are capable of picking up other languages,” he reasoned. “If we have to improve the English language skills, parents should provide facilities to children to read newspapers and watch English news in TV as well as radio, as education continues at home. Teachers should also avoid mixing up regional languages while teaching,” he added.