Is the quality of education in Bhutan deteriorating?

The deterioration of quality of education is the much discussed topic in Bhutan, in online forums or in open areas in the recent times. But the question that arises in my mind is, is the quality really deteriorating? If so what are the parameters that are taken into account for quality evaluation and what are the measures that are in place to address the problem? Today, every walk of life attacks the people who are in teaching. Teaching profession is down-looked and some even claim that teachers joined into teaching because of dire need of employment.  If the so called deterioration is taking place it’s not simply the teachers to be blamed. Every one of us, be it the bureaucrats, policy makers, curriculum developers, teachers, parents and even the students (another main component) must be the stakeholders and work hand in hand to uplift the quality. I feel there is an error in the system itself.  How frequently is the curriculum in the Bhutanese education updated? And when curriculum is updated or developed, is the consideration taken care of  players in the real field? Moreover, there is a mismatch in the educational background of the teachers and the subjects they handle. Teachers are not the all-rounders.  Irrespective of the educational background the teacher has, he/she has to handle the subjects when there is shortages of their counterparts in schools. The subjects cannot be kept untaught simply because there is no teacher with the required educational qualification. For an instance after my graduation I served as temporary teacher in Trashiyangtse LSS in 2008 and although I have my degree in Geography, I had to handle  subjects such as science, history and social studies and sometime later even E.V.S ( in Dzongkha) for class III and not the geography subject (actually MoE recruited two of us as Temporary Teachers in Geography). The other fellow landed up teaching English along with geography.  It was simply because there was damn shortage of teachers in these subjects.  I wonder whether I did justice as I lacked enthusiasm and the zeal to learn sciences in my schooling days and although I studied history in my PU, the subject was in Dzongkha. 

Like wise after an year long PGDE course some teachers are placed in the primary schools and lower secondary schools as rural posting and more so because there is no requirement of PG teachers while in some schools there is acute shortage of qualified teachers to teach the higher classes. Another question arises here in my mind. Will the PGDE teachers be in the position to do justice in  terms of pedagogical skills and will they be able to implement what they learnt in their degree?  I feel if the placements are done according to the type of training the teacher has undergone, the quality can be assured as ones knowledge and skills can be utilized in the optimum level and so will be the ripple effect. 

Finally, our society as a whole need to change our mindset towards teachers and those who have the zeal and inclination towards teaching profession must be encouraged by creating conducive environment. Teachers' services have to be acknowledged rather than point fingers to the whole set of teachers when even a minuscule mistakes occur in the teaching system. Sometimes mistakes are bound to happen as teachers are not perfects, they are imperfects like any one of us. Like wise, measures must be in place to retain the seasoned teachers. Then only the dire shortage of teachers will be solved. Moreover, I feel those who want to switch to other profession must be given the tickets to do as I don't feel they would do the justice when their enthusiasm for teaching is exhausted. 

Odd as well as prime

Blessed Rainy Day is considered to be a day in which all the waters on the earth's surface are considered to be blessed and purified and hence taking bath during this day is believed to cleanse the sins of all body, speech and mind which are accumulated over ones lifetime. Friday, September 23, 2011 was yet another BLESSED RAINY DAY in my life  which was celebrated home away from home country. Yet when it comes to celebration of such events and occasions it matters the least whether one is in ones home country or away in foreign land. Despite the fact that we had packed classes during day time as usual three of us ( Tshewang, Peljor and myself) celebrated and cheered the occasion in our own way. We didn't join the other twenty seven fellow countrymen who are our seniors in service as well as in terms of age not because we didn't want to mingle with them but simply we had our own plans. We never bothered them terming us black sheep among the whites since we thought our plans would be a mere fiasco and more so individualism has to be respected as its neither a dictatorial nor an authoritarian reign and I must say I don't regret for not joining the group.

Kicking off the punch session

The kick off session started with a cup full of punch (the cup's capacity was just 475ml) until the bucket, half filled with the punch which was kept covered tightly  the other night so as to get fermented was emptied.The punch gave us real kicks, no wonder my eyes which remains almost all the time red was full of blood-shot. I don't exactly remember how we had our next much awaited item- the dinner session was we were flat drunk. Thank God dinner was kept ready prior to our drinking session. The next day we had packed classes again which we could not afford to miss it albeit the punch had an unforgettable hang over on us. The saddest part is, in next Blessed Rainy Day myself and Peljor won't be here to celebrate with Tshewang. We console him by assuring that we will have our punch at Kanglung on Saturday 23, September 2012, the BLESSED RAINY DAY eve in his name without worrying about the hangover the following day as it coincides with weekend.

Dream

(The dream remained unfulfilled yet he doesn't regret as no one  can escape what fate has in-stored for him)

Like any other school going children Padma too had a dream during his earlier schooling days, a dream to be a good human being who would serve the society, a dream to pursue law as his subject. But he must confess that he wasn't a hard working guy unlike his contemporaries. Even to these days he is unable to get rid of the old habits, the laziness. Yet he was blessed to have good circles of intelligent, sharp and hardworking friends in his MSS schooling days who excelled in their studies. Their excellence and fabulous performances had added advantage as they used to discuss what ever they knew irrespective of the discipline. Nevertheless Padma lacked interest and enthusiasm to learn sciences and mathematics and as such even when they were voluntarily ready to help him solve the problems, he used to tell them that he doesn't have problems with these subjects. Along with all all  his group friends (the group consisted as many as ten+) he too successfully sailed through the labyrinth of the Bhutan Certificate for Secondary Education (BCSE) in December 2002. But no wonder his marks weren't that consistent as my sciences and mathematics marks were as low as D and E grades whereas Arts subjects' grades were fairly good. 

                                 

They got admission in HSS in different schools as they opted different streams based on our interests in the subjects and the availability of slots. Few of them got admission in Jigsher HSS, Khaling which was one of the most opted schools in their time owing to its study culture and reputation in the country. Padam's MSS group friends were then in Science Stream. As such English and Dzongkha were the only subjects common to them. He was in cloud nine having secured admission in the school he wished for. It was in eleventh standard (Arts Stream) that he started to have strong urge to fulfill his dream given the fact that there were a very good set of teachers and the conducive environment to learning. 

Jigsher HSS, Khaling

Padma didn't know how fast year 2003 passed away. No sooner did he realize the year came to an end and the next academic session has begun , the year he had fallen for one of his juniors, a ninth class girl named Choden. He doesn't know if it was love at first sight or simply an infatuation. Whatever may be he was lost in her thoughts despite the fact that she never reciprocated his confession after mustering hell lots of courage with difficulties. There after Padma  failed in his duty to study thinking of her least realizing that he had big dream to fulfil, the dream which demanded lots of sacrifices which is the crucial point in determining the fulfillment of his dream. But by the time he realised December was knocking his door and ISC examination had already stepped in. He however struggled at the eleventh hour with the revisions and managed to pass with good score.Yet, the dream of  pursuing degree in law was shattered and it remained  just the unfulfilled dream until today as available slots which were limited were already opted by those who excelled out of which five were his own class mates.  What strikes his mind today is may be law was not his piece of cake and may be was destined to be in some other field that he is in. He feels its of no use pondering over the past as life must go on and believes its the contentment in life which matters a lot.

Fooled

-but blessing in disguise 

Sunday, November 6, 2011 wasn't April fool's day yet I along with my room mates were fooled. I had done with five theory papers and I was relaxing since the practical papers were only on November 8 and November 9. But my room mates had theory papers to be revised. One of my room mates who stays late night revising for the exams was still in bed when I received a call from Mrs. Sangay Zangmo and Mrs. Tshering Yuden who are my mates at around 11:30 AM.

Mrs. Sangay asked me if they had done with their examinations, when I responded they still have two papers each she asked me to prepare lunch for four of them who are in the Central CMR, a shopping mall since they were hungry. I didn't believe at first. To confirm I made a call and they insisted that they would be arriving by around 12:00 noon for the lunch. After giving second thought we assumed that they meant it albeit never did they come for meals in our place. This made all three of us to engage our hands in cooking. They once again called us asking our room # which made us to believe they were not lying. The meals for seven people were finally ready and they never turned up.

When the clock ticked 01:00 PM I asked them where they have reached only to get disappointed to learn that they fooled us. We were worried of the food getting spoilt in a hot places like here in Visakhapatnam. They told us that they were just kidding and even if we had prepared the meals they asked us to have it on our own. Can any one imagine that the meal prepared for seven people can be consumed by three of us? To our dismay the refrigerator was also dis-functional. I remembered my elder brother ( a lay man) back at home who always cautions that when we throw away food it will simply rot while when it avoids us we will starve to death. We landed up inviting one other friend of ours for the lunch only to hear his dialogue in the half way through the meal in which he said he was invited out of no choice yet enjoyed the meal. Four of us tried to bottom up the meals considering that it will get spoilt but couldn't. The meal was enough even for breakfast for three of us. We didn't throw away the food because we know resources are scarce and in the third world countries many people die due to starvation.

Nevertheless, three of us had a sumptuous delicious meal after a week's time or so since three of us were into noodles as examinations kept us engaged with books which was blessing in disguise on one hand and on the other a wastage of the precious time of my room mates, a time wasted in cooking meals as one was busy practicing his theorems while the other had to wake up and lend his hand despite the fact that he slept just at dawn.I say wastage of time resources as time wasted cannot be retrieved back and hence wastage of all the resources.

Lesson

a lesson learnt through the betrayal of trusted friend
(written as a personal retrospection after being betrayed by the friend to whom a complete trust was bestowed)

Lord Buddha has rightly said " An insincere and evil friend is more to be feared than a wild beast; a wild beast may wound your body, but an evil friend will wound your mind". Pema had trusted Mr Tenzing, a friend of him who had been known for more than a decade's time (to be precise since his seventh standard in 1999 through undergraduate days in college till 2010). But to his utter dismay Pema has never known him in reality. He was blind in believing him to be a sincere, honest and trust worthy person which in reality is not. Dzongkha saying བློ་གཏད་པའི་མིའི་ཧིང་བརྐུ།། ཧིང་བརྐུ་བའི་མིའི་ཨརཝ་བརྐུ།།  has a deep meaning in it.  It was on 11.08.2010, a night prior to     his departure for studies that he handed over two envelopes to Mr Tenzin in which Nu. 1500/- and Nu. 1000/- respectively were put in along with the letters scribbled, which were to be handed to Mr. Dorji who was leaving  for Kanglung. Pema would have handed over the same himself but since he couldn't meet Mr. Dorji personally due to time constraints it was handed over to Mr. Tenzing who promised that he would do the honour. But in reality he never did what he promised. He instead took advantage of the trust and confidence Pema had in him. The letters addressed to Pema's cousin(who is a student) and one of his college was never delivered. Breaching the trust placed upon him Mr Tenzing torn off the envelopes and used the amount for his own good. If he has the courtesy of an honest and a good human being, he should have sought the permission or the least he could have done is at-least informed him. Its makes Pema to wonder what kind of leaders would he be if he were one, if he is that greedy after such a small amount. Pema is sure Mr Tenzing would sell of the whole nation to quench his greedy thirst given the chance. The worst is that Mr Tenzing never told Pema that he used the amount until his enquiry upon getting emails from his cousin and colleague in September and October 2010 respectively saying they didn't receive his letters and the amount.

The shocking reply Mr Tenzing gave was that he used the amount because of urgency as he was flat broke owing to the fact that he bought a plot in Phuntsholing worth Nu. 3 Lakhs. What kind of right  he had to tear off the envelopes and use the money when he bought the plot? Won't he considered thief since the parcel was never delivered? Nevertheless, he never said that he would not pay the amount back. He promised umpteen times to Pema that he would pay it at the earliest which is not paid even today. At one time last year, in October Mr Tenzing even asked him the contact numbers of his cousin and his colleague stating that he has sent the amount to them through his to-be wife's account (in her ATM) and later lied again that ATM in Kanglung was defunct. Then he said he used the amount again since he visited his village. Thereafter, he kept on pouring out his fake promises that he would pay at the earliest which was never done. The latest of the very many lies he lied was on 16.11.2011 in which he said that he would deposit the amount in Pema's account on 21.11.2011 but it was yet another lip service. On that day, he mentioned that he was out of station while some of their other friends met him in Thimphu on 20.11. Now Pema has learnt that for Mr Tenzing, tomorrows will be there as always and he can never confide him anymore now as there is a saying in Dzongkha  as follows: 

ཤིང་ལ་ལན་ཅིག་སྦྲུལ་་གནས་དེར།།                 

ཕྱི་ཀྱང་མཐོང་ཚེ་འཇིགས་པ་ལྟར།།              

བརྐུ་དང་རྫུན་ལ་ཅིག་ལ་བཞུགས་པའི།།                   

མི་དེར་བརྟགས་ཏུ་དོགས་པ་བསྐྱེད།།

Whatever may be, Pema doesn't have ill feelings towards him rather regrets for his own idiocy to have complete trust on him. Yet he is grateful that he learnt a lesson not to trust a friend like Mr Tenzing who is like a bee with honey on its wings and a sting on its tail. Pema's only wish is may he be reformed so that like him other friends of Tenzing are not betrayed through his flatters and deceitful friendliness.


To Mr Tenzing and few others the amount may seem too trivial. But the question is  Mr Tenzing has used the amount through unfair means by shattering the trust. Moreover, to a student how trivial the amount may be, it matters a lot. Like wise, the value of the money never remains the same. It's value gets depreciated due to the escalation of the prices of the commodities as the production cost arises. Hence, a bucks in hand is worth two in the far far unseen future.