THIRUVANANTHAPURAM: In an education system which wants education to create only concrete models, the teachers should come out of the conventional thinking process and focus on linking knowledge with social justice, said educationist and chairman of Kerala State Higher Education Council Rajan Gurukkal.
Speaking on the topic ‘Knowledge’s politics’ as part of an Advocacy Dialogue series organised under the aegis of the Institute for Sustainable Development and Governance (ISDG) on Wednesday, he said “Nobody wants one to imbibe knowledge and convert the knowledge into a realisation.”
“They (the University people) train the brain with military discipline. For them, examination is the tool to gauge the memory of the student,” he said.
According to him, knowledge should churn out the inner realm of a person and trigger him or her to intervene in the society in which he or she lives.
The accumulation of knowledge should evolve into a realisation and a group of people with realisation could collectively work for the benefit of the society.
Achutsankar S Nair, head of the department of Computational Biology and Bio Informatics, University of Kerala, who participated in the Advocacy Dialogue series said the aspirations of the lower middle class were prompting them to abandon the govt schools.
In the absence of quality education, the public sector schools will fast lose its share in the current education system. At the same time, the celebrated private schools are failing to impart proper knowledge-based education which has a thrust on values.
The trend of students and parents speaking about utility of learning particular subjects points to the failure of the purpose of education.
“Wherever there is activity without empathy, and thinking without beauty, it exposes the failure of education,” he said. ISDG Director Abraham George was the moderator.
