In a world that has officially gone past the starting post of the Knowledge Revolution and in which nations are chasing the prospect of progress and development by wooing knowledge industry giants, isn’t it a pity that our education system is still such a throwback to the 19th century? Ninety per cent of our schools and universities are underpinned by rote learning and a demand for unthinking discipline and obedience. Those who do not conform are quickly flagged and worn down or isolated. Our school-factories have no time for individual genius or for that matter, to give extra attention to students who need the support.
Even as the world changes outside at rapid speed, our classrooms have opened just a crack to let in the faintest rays of change – the laptops are coated in chalk dust and text books rule the time table instead of giving way to learning through projects that teach independent thinking and research from the Internet. Experts say that the kindergarten goers of 2018 will enter a Year 2045 workplace in which more than 50pc of today’s jobs will be obsolete and replaced by new ones that don’t even exist today! Look your child in the eye, parents, and tell her the truth – none of us are prepared for this, least of all our education system that we entrust our child’s mind to for at least two decades.
Bahrain has a richly textured school system in which national and international schooling is carefully monitored and implemented. We have Indian, American, IB, GCSE and Tawjihiya syllabi laid out for parents to pick from for their children. Unfortunately, I do believe that while the Ministry of Education is very careful to ensure that external standards are met, there is just not enough dialogue about the future of education.
The ministry’s efforts to hold schools responsible for a healthy student-teacher ratio, classroom size and study material are all commendable. But most systems are still following the same pattern of instruction and examination that were followed three decades ago – and I’m using that as a nearest benchmark. We can no longer afford to just make moderate innovations that appear creative. Where are the moves to accommodate blended learning, flipped classrooms and BYOD (Bring Your Own Device) – these are new methods that I was unaware of until I spoke to some educationists about this column. They simply don’t exist in the mainstream educational context in Bahrain.
In an earlier column, I had spoken of the gig economy. Well, it is already upon us since careers are adapting to the freelance economy and we need to teach our children how to apply their skills in shorter terms to a variety of situations. Instead, we still have the very Asian ‘tuition’ situation in which many teachers (not all – there are so many dedicated mentor-teachers) attach themselves to schools only as scouting ground for after-school tuitions. These promote rote learning and give students (and parents!) a warped quality of life that is positively Victorian! Children pulling 14-hour work days with after-school lessons and parents putting their lives on hold for two or three years when the high school-leaving exams loom ahead ... these are routine occurrences.
These are the areas that the Ministry of Education must look into. We need officers in the ministry who have brave new ideas about education – ideas that go beyond bureaucratic rule-books and prepare our children to own their future. We must act at least now – after all, we are approaching the third decade of the 21st century – to save our children from our soul-less schooling concepts.