Do you remember the summer projects we used to do as children?
Often a mandatory effort, it used to be nothing but a tick in the box at the end of summer vacations to get this done. After submitting the project we used to forget about it and chase the marks that would be required to build our rank in school.
I remember building a door bell as a summer project for physics. It was appreciated both in school and at home. My dad said that I had the potential to be a scientist, I was aiming for a Noble Prize. It was put up on our front door and for a while I felt smart. But soon that was forgotten in the flurry of Monday tests and mediocre mid term results.
Can you imagine a scenario if your summer project helps you secure a scholarship to study at the IITs? Or helps you intern as an assistant to CEO ?
Scenarios like this can definitely foster a change in the education system. Where application of knowledge is more important that just memorising facts and figures.
In the recently published GE Innovation Barometer report 2013, the captains of the industry have a simple ask of the education institutions. That is to make education more practical and business oriented. Also according to the report most corporate managers feels that innovation as a culture should be fostered in education institutions.
Things brings us to two questions?
First question- Is our education system practical?
The answer to that is a resounding No. I still remember the first day of 11th standard. It was a big day at the school as usually many many students from other schools would join DPS RKP in 11th. The chemistry teacher whom I never got along with was introducing us to Organic Chemistry (A subject I never understood and still struggle with).
One of the new comers just stood up and recited all the 20 conditions that were essential in identifying and differentiating between the organic and inorganic compounds. The teacher was impressed and the all of us awe struck.
It was years after that incident that I actually started questioning the growing adulation that our country has towards theory. I am sure that student had never been to a senior lab or knew practically how to differentiate between an organic or inorganic compound if she were physically presented with one. I know now that this is one of the areas of concern for the industry and as rightly pointed out in the report.
Coming back to the opening of this piece, I feel that the summer project was something which was practical and can help the students apply themselves in the classrooms. Otherwise there is a limit to where the theory can be useful.
The other question is Can innovation be inculcated in the school curriculum?
In the current format my opinion is no. It can't be. Today we have extensive school syllabus that gives no time for students to apply that knowledge and create a process of finding solutions to the problems we face today.
Innovation is not about one bright idea, It is about creating a culture that ensures that there are many bright ideas. It is no surprise that some institutions are better at fostering this climate. A good example in India is the Indian Institute of Sciences Bangalore, which for years has a culture of innovation. A similar example is with Tokyo University which continues to create Nobel prize winning research scientists.
So in conclusion creating an atmosphere of innovation and making students more business oriented are both facets of the same story. We need to change our system in India and this includes changing the way education services are delivered.
I feel, of late, everyone is passing the buck around for who should be responsible for innovation. Blaming schools for not being innovative is a step in that direction.
ReplyDeleteI would like to believe that the most innovative we (as human beings) have ever been has been in school and from then onwards, we progressively get less innovative. We are perhaps the least innovative when we work and we can thank the corporate culture for that.
School, contrary to popular perception, comes closest to giving us an environment of absolute freedom where we are not constrained by budgets, vision/mission and heirarchy and other mumbo-jumbo that is routinely fed in corporate life. You had the freedom to make that doorbell and the school appreciated it. Why did you stop making other inventions? Was it because you expected encouragement and did not get that at school or were you pushed into believing that innovation was unimportant and you were better off focusing on other academic pursuits? I dont have an answer to that because despite studying at a govt. school I dont recollect an instance where anything students did was trivialised by the school. If anything, we and our parents would trivialise our own efforts calling it "not so good".
I believe schools dont have the responsibility to foster innovation (and no one else does). They have the responsibility to provide for strong foundations for academic pursuit and enquiry, which is what they do. Schools allow kids to question what is being taught and encourage them seek answers on their own.
If corporates need innovations to spur their revenues, they need to put in efforts to create that kind of culture and not insist on people clocking 9 hours a day or showing "results" every month because they committed a budget to it. Why should someone who is "innovative" join a firm if he has to work under such constraints? That explains why the most innovative of brains in the world continue to focus and work in colleges/ univerisities and not the corporate world.
It is easy for corporates like GE and others to pin point out problems in a report. The fact of the matter is that they dont want to work towards a solution.
Hi Arch
ReplyDeleteI think you are asking some very tough questions and I am afraid you may be right on all accounts.
Why did I stop innovating? I am not sure, I think it was a combination of parental pressure and my own desire to please them.
I think corporate culture has a big role to play in innovation. Anyone who has worked in Google or 3M would vouch for that. I think your view of corporate is true for vast majority of corporate.
Also I think your contention that most corporate want to pass the buck is also true.
Sum total of all I think Companies need to change the way they operate in order to create a system of innovation and not necessarily pass the buck on to educational institutions.