A fantasy called a technical course
Euphemistically or otherwise, the way we humans describe technology is ‘down-to-earth’, ‘objective’, ‘practical’, and ‘useful’. The paradox is that good and sound technology always emerges out of the fantasy thinking of a dreamer… but it is rightly said that even these dreams need to be laced with facts and figures. So what is technology really?...
Down with score heirarchy
My mind has always associated ‘results’ with a day when my name was never called out first… and came after the top 3 had stolen all the applause from the class. I always did well, but the charm of having done well was lost when all I had to do was to walk up to...
The choice is between being a strategist or a schemer
The most important battle for a student is when he stands face-to-face with a situation and does not really know if his actions will make him a strategist or a mere schemer. Winning is a very real objective to his mind and the route that he adopts is what will have the firmness of a...
I’m sure even the Gods will love to e-learn!
Technology is something that has fascinated even the Gods… even those teeming thousands from the Indian mythological tales. Our own Ramayana and even the Mahabharata are filled with so many incidents that go on to prove that the Gods were madly in love with technology. When I told this to my nephew, he cautiously asked...
The rings of confidence
The Olympic motto is the hendiatris Citius, Altius, Fortius, which in plain English means “Faster, Higher, Stronger”. Most of us will also know that the five-ringed symbol “represents the union of the five continents and the meeting of athletes from throughout the world at the Olympic Games.” What most of us need to know is...
The certified conspiracy
“Opportunity is not like a shooting star, there every once in a while, but like the moon, there every night – you just have to look for it.” It appears that when Kayla Clafton wrote these lines she knew I’d be writing this small article on the state of education in India in the year...
Does a Degree make you a Success?
Not everyone with a degree is successful, not every dropout is a failure. We all know this very well, we subscribe to this opinion, and yet we go and run after degrees at the slightest pretext. Is it a mere degree that will fetch us the crown called success? Is such a success real… or...
The truth is in our thoughts
There is a lot of real and unreal that has become a part of what we call education in today’s context. There are facts that exist on paper but are otherwise non-existent, there are stories of unbelievable success that go unrecorded, truths that are whispered and then forgotten, false triumphs that remain embedded in files…...
Who’s afraid of social media?
The other day when I met a friend from my school, all we discussed was how well we were connected and how fast we were able to reach out to our friends when needed. And I am talking of the seventies here. Surprised? Well, you should be, considering the way technology has redefined communication. With...
Run and jump to woo the world
‘Even looking at this piece of art on the wall makes me breathless,’ she said. ‘Then you should be jogging every morning.’ ‘No, I don’t mean breathless in that sense…’ ‘The sense doesn’t matter,’ I replied cutting her mid-sentence, ‘What matters is that you are fit enough to stand the entire day looking at paintings...
Do we really want a revolution in education?
Revolution is a confused word. It defines itself as ‘a dramatic and wide-reaching change in the way something works or is organized or in people’s ideas about it’ and then turns around to stare at me as it redefines itself as ‘motion in orbit or a circular course or around an axis or center’. One...
Be irreverent. Be the best!
I read only yesterday what Robertson Davies, a Canadian novelist and a journalist wrote: “The greatest gift that Oxford gives her sons is, I truly believe, a genial irreverence toward learning, and from that irreverence love may spring.” This is, I said to myself, the secret of success… particularly if one wants to make a...
