Getting smarter

Every year, we hear about students scoring marks in Board exams which leaves us complete baffled. How does a student score 99.5% in a Board exam? Is it that the exam papers have become simpler or is it the students have become smarter?  And frankly speaking, we see children are much smarter today than what we probably were.

But another thought also comes to mind - anyone with good capacity to mug up things can score good enough in exams in India, without actually understanding what they are studying. There are times when these are the very students who fail when it comes to applying the theory in practice.  At the same time, there are talented students who do not perform well in exams, get poor grades but end up doing very well in life.

Getting good marks cannot be equated to practical skills and dexterity; we cannot compare oranges to apples. Our IQs have improved but the education system we have tests theoretical knowledge with little emphasis on practical knowledge.

Can we learn swimming by merely reading a manual? We need to change this entire system of “mugging up”; which also explains why our graduates come out unemployable.