Picking up the thread from where we had left last week, let’s continue with Sindh government’s supposed and self-proclaimed effort at revolutionising the overall education system by modernising the curriculum and bringing about radical changes in terms of ensuring uniformity of syllabus at the level of both government and private schools. Now, who can argue about the need for such an effort? No one. And, again, who can argue about the impending failure of the effort? No one! Before you get it wrong, there are reasons — valid reasons.

As happens often, if not always, in such cases, the first step announced in this regard by Sindh Senior Minister for Education and Literacy Nisar Ahmed Khuhro was to constitute a provincial curriculum commission which is expected to file its recommendations for developing a set of education system by the end of this month. The recommendations will gradually be implemented across the board on all government-run and privately-owned schools. This is, indeed, war footing, and a sort of educational emergency that we have all heard about so much and for so long.

The fact that a month has been set for such a crucial task may well be praise-worthy, but it also suggests that perhaps — just perhaps — the government is not fully aware of the enormity of the task. It is like Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif and his ministers repeatedly telling the nation — after making a ton of pre-election promises — that they had no idea that things were so bad and this bad. The Sindh government may well have to take recourse to something similar, it seems.

As things stand today on the ground, and they have been standing that way for a long time, the country’s education system is the cause of serious polarisation in society when it should have, in fact, been building bridges. The low literacy level aside, the problems start with what is being taught to those who actually make it to some education centre, and, equally critical if not more, is the huge difference in the quality of contents being taught at different strata and to different segments of society.

Together, they are playing havoc with society’s fabric, having led to a situation where the perceptions and notions of young adults coming out of the various educational streams — seminaries, state-run schools, and private institutions of various hues and shades — happen to be dangerously divergent. Alongside the prevailing financial inequality in society, the class-based education system is a quick recipe to ensure that the present levels of polarisation in society, already alarming as they are, will only grow in the days ahead.

Talking of inequality, the system at one end produces clerks and semi-skilled workers, while at the other extreme it creates people whose lifestyle depends on obvious and voracious consumption. The result is that the two classes together are perpetuating capitalism in its worst form, the lower by providing cheap labour, the upper by creating inane and selfish consumers. This naturally portends disaster for the future, as neither of the two tiers is capable of ushering in an era of self-sufficiency, equality and social dignity for the masses.

Though living in the same country, the two classes are completely alienated from each other. Dangling in the middle is the majority. Pulled by the two extremes in diametrically opposite directions, it sometimes goes in one direction and sometimes in the other. While the tug of war continues, it remains a battle which can never produce a winner.

The story does not end there though. At each level, there is further polarisation. At the bottom rung, for instance, there are the state-run Urdu-medium schools as well as the seminaries. Each of them has its own peculiar dimensions.

Though not at the same level of disparity, the peculiarities do exist at the elite level as well. It is not exactly in terms of the level and quality of education imparted. It is more about the brand one is associated with. Seeing it through the prism of vanity that is the hallmark of a certain class, one can be sure of the psychological barrier that separates the good institutions from the localised version of the Ivy League.

Those lying between the two extremes have a huge variety to contend with. From the English-medium secondary system and various shades of foreign programmes — Cambridge being the most popular of them all — it is a massive range to explore.

And when you think you have taken into account all possible divisions, think again; still left is the urban-rural divide, which, practically speaking is the most fundamental of all divides in the context of the country’s education system. And, then, there are also the cadet colleges and public schools.

That the Sindh government is hoping to come up with a uniform curriculum for all these various tiers within a month — even if it plans to implement it in phases — is something that is beyond mortal comprehension.

The pace at which the government moves — and in this case the Sindh government is surely not in a club of one — is way too well-known to worth elaboration, but a brief mention of a recent happening would do no harm. In Larkana, which happens to be the seat of the previous ruling family though not of the government, academic activities at educational institutions, including schools, high schools and colleges, across the district remained suspended for a good 80 days on the call of the Government Secondary Teachers Association (GSTA) simply because of a reported rift between the GSTA president and the local Additional Commissioner. The former believed that the latter was instrumental in the registration of some cases against him.

The government — the sitting government, mind you — preferred to watch from the sidelines. A lawyer moved the Sindh High Court, which ordered the resumption of classes and warned of action against teachers boycotting their duties.

Even then, a few parliamentarians of the ruling party allegedly close to MNA Faryal Talpur had to intervene and broker an accord between the warring parties to enable the resumption of classes.

There is nothing on the ground to suggest any different approach to the business of curriculum. At best, it will end with a few chapters on some personalities which will be followed by friction on various grounds. And then someone would intervene and broker an accord. One would love to be proved wrong, but there is apparently no chance.

By the way, what was the dispute about? It sheds some additional light on the ground realities of the land. According to published reports, the bone of contention was “a dispute over the ownership of a hotel between the Junejos and the Brohis”. The administration official being a neighbour of the Junejos got involved in the matter, while the GSTA chief backed the Brohis. It had nothing to do with education, you see.

To expect from a government that remained silent during the 80-day shutdown of the educational process to reform the curriculum in 30 days is something that deserves the coinage of some new allegory. No, the ‘asking for the moon’ won’t do. It’s worse. Come up with something new … if you can.

humair_iq@hotmail.com

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