Exceptions are not Examples

One of the common debates, we tend to hear in the current context is ‘How important is education, in the success of an individual?”. The general sentiment today seems to be in favour of NO. We believe that schools and colleges of today, is not preparing leaders for tomorrow, rather it is just preparing a bunch of clerks.

While I understand the reasons for this changing mindset, I am still in favour of formal education. Let me substantiate this with some points.

I often tell people, that this country can develop into a strong nation, only when educated people enter politics and take up leadership roles. One of the counter argument, I hear when I say that, is that, “It is not necessary for a person to be educated to enter politics, rather that person should have good intentions” . The political leader often cited to substantiate this claim is, former Chief Minister of the state Thiru. K Kamaraj. While this is a valid example they are making, let us ponder as to how many such good exemplary leaders do we really have? On the contrary, can we ever discount the contribution of so many educated leaders such as Gandhi, Jawaharalal Nehru, Sardar Vallabbhai Patel or Ambedkar and so on?

Similarly, when we talk about education as an important factor to be successful in career, people tend to defend by saying, “Not necessarily “ and cite examples of people like Bill Gates, who was a school dropout or Dirubhai Ambani, who had no formal schooling.  Well, these people have undoubtedly made it great in life, but again how many of such examples do we have. On the other hand, think about the many educated people who have been highly successful in their careers, such as Steve Jobs, Narayana Moorthy, Indra Nooyi or Sundar Pichai.

In all the cases, it is clear that the educated people dominate the list of highly successful people. If we look at ratio of successful people who are not educated versus the successful people who are educated, the ratio may be something like 1:10 respectively. This is just a wild guess.

While it is true that there are exceptional cases of people, who are illiterate or didn’t have formal schooling but who have made it big in life, it still doesn’t make a valid point of contention. So, the point I wish to make is “exceptions shouldn’t be taken as examples.”

Now the question is, if that is the case, why do we often glorify such people rather than the educated and successful people. The answer is this.  These types of exceptional leaders are rare and it is a general trend that we tend to appreciate what is rare and what is not common.

Moreover, the fundamental reason to nurture these thoughts is to inculcate hope in the minds of people, who have not had the capacity to pursue academics or who have met with less academic success. That is to say, when someone is not successful in education, we don’t need to completely give up on them, rather motivate them with these examples, which give them a hope that they too can become successful people.  

This sort of inspiration still continues to build successful entrepreneurs and leaders and that is a good thing. While leadership seems to be an inborn trait, found in anyone irrespective of whether that person is educated or uneducated, Education certainly provides the competency one needs to be a more resourceful thinker and therefore lead more effectively.

So, while we admire these exceptional people, let us not take them as examples, rather commit ourselves to be a master of our craft, by conscious effort of learning and building our skills.

All of us are planted with the seed, which has an innate ability to succeed. Education is just like a nursery, which nurtures the seed to bloom into a flowering plant.  When an tested and trusted framework is available, why leave success to chance.

 

D. Senthil Kannan,

Managing Trustee, PALMS, Tuticorin.

Author of "Transformational Thoughts" - A Journey of learning 

Email: senthilkannand@gmail.com

Training Aid, not Trainer’s Aid

The schools of today take pride in calling themselves smart class enabled schools, as they have an audio- visual educational facility with educational content in multimedia format.

Research states that learning happens through different sensory organ and the most dominant is the through visual which contributes to 75%, listening contributes to 12% and the balance 13% through, touch, taste and smell. Therefore when multiple sensory organs are engaged in the learning progress, learning is enhanced and better retained in a child’s memory. I therefore, think it is a wonderful idea, to introduce such innovative ideas to classroom learning. Classroom becomes more fun and interesting.

So far the children have only used the listening to lectures, which certainly has a limitation for them to understand difficult and complex concepts. Now with this media, the students can see the process in wide detail, which helps them to understand better, ‘how things work’. For example, when they talk about digestive system, earlier the teachers would have found it difficult to explain, where each part of the digestion process takes place. But now a video can pictorially explain how the food travels in the digestive system and what function, each internal organ functions in aiding the digestion process.

My point of concern is that, these innovation learning systems should only work as a support to the student’s learning process and not a support to the teacher.  In other words, these systems are primarily aimed at making learning easy and not teaching easy. Teachers cannot therefore afford to totally rely on these fancy systems and go unprepared to class. These systems cannot be a replacement to the teachers, basic teaching skills.  You cannot assume that with so much of clarity in the teaching process, there can be no questions from the students. In fact, with more understanding comes more questions and the teacher has to be a level above to clarify the doubts, of the students.

Why am I saying this? It is because, one of the major problems a number of schools are facing today, is lack of quality teachers. When I say quality teachers, I mean the teachers who are 100% committed to their student’s progress. There are teachers who have taken up this profession, just for a livelihood, without actually understanding the important role they play in the lives of young children. A school cannot get away with the idea, that they can mask the inefficiency of their teachers, by using such novel systems.

Jci. Sen. K.V. Ratnam, Past National President and a leading trainer of JCI India, used to often mention in his ‘Train the trainers’ workshop, that LCD projector or any Audio Visual medium should be used as a training aid and not a trainers aid.

Now what is the difference? There is a tendency of trainers to heavily rely on power point slides which are either created by themselves or borrowed from someone or downloaded from the internet. Without any preparation they come and present these programmes. They run the power point slides and just read the text from the screen, and give a translation of each word (as if the ones listening are language illiterate). Just in case there is no power supply, they feel stalled. They are unable to proceed further, because all their preparation is only in the PPT slides and not in the mind. Such unprepared trainers face embarrassing situations, specifically when they have a questioning person among the audience. They are unable to give the participant a satisfying answer. This is the reason, Corporate training sounds so boring in the present context and people have developed an aversion to it. In fact, training could be made very interesting by right usage of audio-visuals. There is a saying which says, ‘a picture is worth a thousand words’. The trainer should take this clue. The picture or audio visual used should aid the training process and not serve as an aid to the trainer, himself.

So, dear Teachers and Trainers, please be aware that in this internet age, knowledge is in abundance. Every piece of information you provide is already available on Wikipedia or Encarta or YouTube. What should really matter is how well you are able to present the available knowledge, which is your valuable skill.

 D. Senthil Kannan,

Managing Trustee, PALMS, Tuticorin.

Author of "Transformational Thoughts" - A Journey of learning 

Email: senthilkannand@gmail.com

Increasing Consumerism
Leads to Increasing Junk

A definition of consumerism states, “the belief that the buying and selling of large quantities of consumer goods is beneficial to an economy or a sign of economic strength”. Well, the very definition starts with a hypothesis that it is a belief. So what is the real thing?  Is increased consumerism, really doing good to the economy. Let us consider this in the light of the following facts.

 

In olden days, a product that was bought usually lasted for a very long time. Anything for that matter, be it clothes, cutlery, furniture, electronic appliances or whatsoever, the durability of the product was a very important criteria in the buying decision. However, today things have changed. We are looking at fashion, trend, the latest in lifestyle, and other external parameters rather than the inside stuff. So, the concept of longevity of a product is not of vital importance, anymore.

This in turn has encouraged the manufacturer to make products of inferior quality, because he knows that the consumer is not going to use it for long. By doing so, the manufacturer gets a twin benefit.  The first benefit is; he is able to reduce the cost of production and is in a position to offer the product to the customer at a very cheap price. For example, in case of a mobile phone, the manufacturer is aware that the person is not going to use the same phone for more than 3 years. So he decides the components to be used for this product based on this criterion and thereby is able to produce the product at a much cheaper price. From the point of the consumer, the consumer is happy that he has got a product with maximum features, for a minimum price. The second benefit is; as the manufacturer uses inferior quality components, the product becomes non functional in a few days. Nowadays you cannot find anyone to get it repaired, so you are forced to go for a new purchase. This means added business volume for the manufacturer.

The concept of repair and mending is slowly moving out of our culture. Just the same way it happened to advanced countries some years back. So there is no much option except to “use and throw”.

Look at the ways our lives have evolved. Not very long back, we had cobblers who could mend our shoes, tailors who could alter our dress that did not fit, mechanics who would repair our Radio or TV. But today, when you take a product for repair, one of the common responses you could hear is, “You could get a new one for the cost of the repair”. If you ask, “So what do I do with this?” you will get an instant reply, “Just throw it as junk.”

The market for second hand products is drastically reducing. If you wish to sell your Old Computer monitor or Old TV, you will find absolutely nobody to buy. With technological updation taking place in every sphere, there is no preference for old technology products, and ultimately you have no option except to dump it as junk. Thanks to the discount offers, intelligently disguised as “exchange mela”, by retailers who want to woo customers to buy their latest products. The junk in your house now becomes the junk in the retailer’s warehouse, which goes on to become metal and plastic scrap.

What is the bottom line? It is a huge waste on natural resources and manpower of the country, which are our core assets.  We deplete the natural resources and waste human labour, imprudently. The consumer ends up spending more for less value, leading to depletion of his savings. The junk disposed becomes a major environmental hazard. Now tell me, is this beneficial to the economy?

The answer is a definite NO. Just because we have an increased affordability does not mean we should have a careless attitude, towards buying. Next time before you buy, ask yourself do I really need it. Don’t buy something, just because it is available cheap. Don’t be carried away with free offers. Nothing is offered free. The cost of the free has been built in the product price. Think twice before you buy.

 

 

  D. Senthil Kannan,

  Managing Trustee, PALMS, Tuticorin.

  Author of "Transformational Thoughts" - A Journey of learning 

  Email: senthilkannand@gmail.com