The Voices From Within

The Nonsense Called Education

March 23rd, 2009

So what did you learn from your 12 years of Malaysian education?

It has always been about the As isn’t it? A person’s ability and level of intelligence is always based on the number of As that he scores.

Lets go through a day in the life of a form five student. Take for example, Peter who has dreams to be an artist.

Peter wakes up at 6.00 in the morning, five days a week. He takes the bus to school and prepares himself for six hours of education.

There, he learns everything from human reproduction, additional mathematics (which you’ll never apply later in life), chromosomes. Everything but art. Disgruntled, he loses the interest to study.

“I want to draw. Not to learn how some stupid molecule combines”

One can hardly blame him for thinking that way.

What I simply mean is that the education system should be based on a student’s interest rather than just pushing them through the wide door that they suppose everyone must take.

“Dalam era maju dan saintifik ini, generasi yang datang kena bersaintifik juga ma”

Utter and complete nonsense.

There will definitely be enough doctors, engineers and astronauts for the coming generation. Don’t you worry about that.

Do not use this excuse to subject every student to undergo the exact same syllabus and encouraging the tuition syndrome and not to mention the dreaded memorising syndrome!

How beneficial will that come about?

True, you might say that they are still naive and aren’t matured enough to choose what is good for them in the future, but I dare say that at the age of 16, a student’s mind is matured enough to have a general idea of what he or she wants to do in the future and the school instead of molding them into someone they don’t want to be, should rather shape them into the person that they aspire to be.

I am in no way condemning those who have an interest in science, chemistry and what not.

What I’m saying is that there should be a balanced system in place that caters to the needs and wants of every student who is unique and special in their own right.

As Alex says in his blog,

Malaysians need to promote critical thinking and analytic skills as a way to improve creativity. Only if the education system is revised and improved could we spur new generations of creative minds – the country’s missing link to originality.

Think people!

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