WHAT DOES THE ENTRY OF CORPORATIONS INTO THE INDIAN EDUCATION SECTOR MEAN?
The announcement of the entry of Reliance, HDFC, Wipro and other big corporate names into the Indian education sector raises many questions.
Why is it that we always talk of education as if it were nothing more than schooling and attending universities and writing exams? Schools, even good ones, are usually very badly structured to promote learning for the future. The corporate entry into the education sector will simply exacerbate the problems of education if they only open new schools that do the same things in the same way as the old schools, but only with more impressive cosmetics. Many of the so-called "international" schools in India are good examples of this, because they have been promoted by people who have little understanding of learning, but have plenty of cash to park into what they see as a new marketing opportunity, with IB, IGCSE and other exclusive foreign "brands". Broadening educational access is one of the new strategic emphases in the IB, but what are the Indian IB schools doing to promote this agenda?
Are the corporates going to promote new structures of learning based on contemporary understandings of the learning process? Are they going to provide new and affordable learning opportunities for the masses using the declining costs of IT and broadband? Are they going to make it possible for students who can't go to school to receive a personalized education on demand? Are these students going to be able to acquire a qualification based on performative demonstrations of their understanding? Are these qualifications going to lead to jobs? Will corporate education qualify students to contribute usefully to improving their own communities? I certainly hope so, but all this cannot be the task of the corporate sector alone, but also of community level organizations. The role of the state should be to enable and incentivize the community level organizations and corporates to do what each does well.
It is time to develop performance indicators ("balanced score cards") to measure the contribution of the corporate sector (and indeed all learning service providers) to education not just in terms of RoI and market share, but also in terms of enhancement of social and intellectual capital. We need convincing evidence (not always *measures*) that the schools they support develop a broad range of future oriented skills and dispositions, not only for students, but also for teachers. Here is a partial list: ability to use and interpret data, communicate sensitively with people of different cultures and social backgrounds, conduct scientific and conceptual inquiry supported by analytic reasoning, develop sound arguments, exercise social and emotional intelligence, solve problems creatively, reason soundly on ethical matters, enjoy and create a broad range of aesthetic experiences, reflect usefully and deeply on their learning, engage in activities that challenge them meaningfully, and also improve their respective communities.
Do our employers value these skills and dispositions? Or believe that they also make for a richer and more productive life? Are the corporates interested in moving education towards these kinds of goals? Or is the education sector going to be captured by a drive to maximize market share by fooling parents with money into believing their children are getting a superior education simply because they acquire a foreign diploma?
Why is it that we always talk of education as if it were nothing more than schooling and attending universities and writing exams? Schools, even good ones, are usually very badly structured to promote learning for the future. The corporate entry into the education sector will simply exacerbate the problems of education if they only open new schools that do the same things in the same way as the old schools, but only with more impressive cosmetics. Many of the so-called "international" schools in India are good examples of this, because they have been promoted by people who have little understanding of learning, but have plenty of cash to park into what they see as a new marketing opportunity, with IB, IGCSE and other exclusive foreign "brands". Broadening educational access is one of the new strategic emphases in the IB, but what are the Indian IB schools doing to promote this agenda?
Are the corporates going to promote new structures of learning based on contemporary understandings of the learning process? Are they going to provide new and affordable learning opportunities for the masses using the declining costs of IT and broadband? Are they going to make it possible for students who can't go to school to receive a personalized education on demand? Are these students going to be able to acquire a qualification based on performative demonstrations of their understanding? Are these qualifications going to lead to jobs? Will corporate education qualify students to contribute usefully to improving their own communities? I certainly hope so, but all this cannot be the task of the corporate sector alone, but also of community level organizations. The role of the state should be to enable and incentivize the community level organizations and corporates to do what each does well.
It is time to develop performance indicators ("balanced score cards") to measure the contribution of the corporate sector (and indeed all learning service providers) to education not just in terms of RoI and market share, but also in terms of enhancement of social and intellectual capital. We need convincing evidence (not always *measures*) that the schools they support develop a broad range of future oriented skills and dispositions, not only for students, but also for teachers. Here is a partial list: ability to use and interpret data, communicate sensitively with people of different cultures and social backgrounds, conduct scientific and conceptual inquiry supported by analytic reasoning, develop sound arguments, exercise social and emotional intelligence, solve problems creatively, reason soundly on ethical matters, enjoy and create a broad range of aesthetic experiences, reflect usefully and deeply on their learning, engage in activities that challenge them meaningfully, and also improve their respective communities.
Do our employers value these skills and dispositions? Or believe that they also make for a richer and more productive life? Are the corporates interested in moving education towards these kinds of goals? Or is the education sector going to be captured by a drive to maximize market share by fooling parents with money into believing their children are getting a superior education simply because they acquire a foreign diploma?
Labels: Curriculum, Education, Learning, Schools
posted by EDUVISIONARY at
3:15 PM
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