|
: As we trudge along towards the second decade of the 21st Century, there are fundamental changes in the way we live and work, and hence the need to transform education.
Several studies in the last few years have looked at international student mobility. Allowing for the inherent inaccuracies in such projections, it is however getting clearer that the emergence of global employment opportunities, new youth demographics and the inadequacy of national systems of developing countries to adequately respond to the challenges of the Knowledge Economy, will continue to drive demand. However, the possibility of existing models of higher education to cater to this demand is very bleak.
Some analysts calculate the outgo of money through the hundred thousand plus students who go abroad for their studies, and try to argue that if that money were available for investment here in India, it would perhaps be better. But the fallacy in the argument is that money is only a very small part of the Indian education problem. It is well known that 95% of our university graduates are unemployable in any meaningful manner. So putting more public or private money down the drain will hardly serve any purpose. Our overzealous regulatory authorities will create one uniformly low quality educational opportunity for all. So, when a few hundred thousand students go to institutions in half a dozen countries, there is a great diversity of experience and knowledge which they gather.
The 2025 studies have projected a ninefold increase in student numbers from India and China, and this is very likely to be realised. But it is important to take note of a few concurrent developments. The studies referred to above built a model upon just a couple of factors that would drive demand, and did not contemplate any acceleration due to what may be called disruptions in the external environment. But that is exactly what has happened in the last decade say from 1995—2005, and by the time we enter 2010, even more fundamental changes—maybe traumatic for some—would have taken place.
Our traditional model of good education is very simplistic, almost at the level of tribal hunter-gatherer model of subsistence. We seek to identify naturally occurring good learners (through rigorous entry tests such as the IIT-JEE or the CAT nationally, or the SAT, GRE, GMAT internationally) and similarly attract naturally occurring good faculty, and put them together on nice self-sufficient campuses. The model works, and...
More from Economy
| Single Page Format | 1 - 2 - Next |
Discuss this story on expressindia forums
|
|
 |
 |
 |
About Us | Contact Us | Advertisers | Site Map | Make us your homepage | Work for Us | RSS | Subscribe | Electronic Edition | Privacy Policy© 2010: The Indian Express Limited. All rights reserved throughout the world
