Daily Times

Being an ex-Aitchisonian I have had the privilege of being taught in probably the best school in Pakistan, and that may make you wonder why I have set about writing this review on education then. There can be only one reason: our education today is not educating us; it is not achieving the goal that we set out to accomplish as we enter the classroom for the first time.

Many parents in today’s Pakistan believe that, by hook or by crook, if their children can somehow make it into the country’s few private schools, they have a good future. To an extent, they are right, as the government run school system has virtually collapsed. However, my experience of 13 years at Aitchison College, Lahore has given me a different insight to life and education. I differ from the view that a good future is all a human being needs. To produce a student who is tolerant of others, who is humane and compassionate and one who is civilised is a bigger need of today’s Pakistan than just securing a good future.

After my more than a dozen years of education, I now see life from a completely different perspective. Sometimes, I look back with sorrow at what my education could have done for me and what it did not. The point I want to focus on is that today’s education system in Pakistan is not producing gentlemen anymore; it is not producing heroes anymore; in fact, it is churning out westernised citizens who may hold the world record for the best O level result but is that enough? Is that why we send our children to school? This is where I think the education system has failed drastically.

The sole purpose of education is to drill some intellect into an individual so he can differentiate between right and wrong. It should enable one to analyse oneself better than any other non-self. It is meant to widen the horizons of the human mind. It is supposed to produce people who are valuable to society rather than producing geeks holding world records. There maybe exceptions but I believe our education system is deficient in the skills needed to bring the best out of the child.

The whole curriculum I studied at Aitchison was devoid of the great Alama Iqbal and his concepts of ‘khudi’ and ‘shaheen’. I was taught more about Shakespeare than Iqbal and thinking of it now fills me with immense sadness and shame. How could I have missed reading one of the most influential poets in the last 500 years? Reading about Iqbal now fills me with so much drive and passion to achieve my dreams in life and had I done this during my school days, I may have set even greater targets. I may have gone for the impossible. I may have as Robert Frost says, “I took the path less trodden upon and that is what made the difference.”

My schooling never gave me the true picture of Islam that I am now starting to grasp by reading up on it myself. Proclaiming itself as an Islamic state, the level at which Islamiyat is taught in Pakistan all the way up to O level is so basic and elementary that it fails to have any profound effect on shaping one’s life as it should. Memorising a few Hadiths and a few verses from the Quran are enough to pass the Islamiyat exam. The Islam that I ought to have followed and about which I should have been taught thoroughly at school was not part of the curriculum. It was in fact the least taught subject at school; we just had one Islamiyat class per week. The result is evident in today’s pupils. Teachers are treated with absolutely no respect. They are mocked at; they are laughed at and their names are made fun of. A recent incident in Lahore where a student beat up the principal of his school portrays the exact picture I am trying to present.

The respect that I used to give to my teachers is a thing of the past. Over the last decade especially, respect for teachers has gone out of the window; I have the firsthand experience of seeing my classmates abuse their tutors and it is so shameful to say that the teachers cannot do anything about it. Who is to blame? Some may say it is the student, some may say the teacher, I think it is the education system. Today’s education is not educating us anymore. In reality, it has made us more arrogant and more intolerant than we have ever been.

I believe the new breed of teachers in Pakistan have a big role to play in this. Let me first define the role of a teacher. For me, the role of a teacher goes far beyond than just teaching what is in the books and the syllabus. They must groom the child into an individual who can face the challenges that await him. They should bring the best out of the child. But the problem is, this is neither the priority of the students nor the teachers. Teachers are happy to sit back, and see their students pass onto the next class, their mission accomplished. Teachers of today are more engaged in making big money out of the profession and many are doing so, with great success. This can be seen by the vast numbers of tuition centres that have sprung up in almost every part of not just Lahore but all over Pakistan.

I also feel deeply ashamed to see the way we have treated our native language, Urdu. It is heartbreaking to see that students take no interest in the language and speaking Urdu is looked down upon with contempt. Most of the private school students prefer conversing in English; it is seen as something urbane. They would rather opt for a subject other than Urdu just because it adds no value to their future goals. This is again where I converge on my earlier point; is securing your future all there is to life? For me personally, learning about our culture, our language, our history, our religion and getting education as a whole is far more important than just having a secure future.

This is after all what the Quran says in Surah Anfal: “Verily! The worst of the animals amongst you with Allah are the deaf and the dumb, and those who do not ponder over my verses with intellect and reason.”

Although a lot needs to be done to revive the education system in Pakistan, I am still optimistic that things will improve with a positive political change in the country. It is not impossible but it is certainly tough. Curriculum needs to be revised. Currently, almost all of the western influenced books that are part of the curriculum and are packed with inaccurate descriptions and narratives need to be chucked out and new syllabi need to be drafted. Teachers need to understand their roles as not just teachers but as mentors too. If our schools cannot produce a law-abiding and a cultured Pakistani even after 13 years of training, they are surely failing in their roles as educational institutes.

The writer is a final year Biomedical Student in UK and can be reached at rehan_13@hotmail.com