While traditional gurukulams in ancient times probably provided all-round education and were highly student-centric, in the more modern style of education, there’s always a gap - between the skills and knowledge required in real life, and those that we learn in school and college.  Of late, more and more people realise that this gap is becoming wider, and there is a national focus on this issue.

Education also needs to be more holistic, teaching learners the values of compassion, gratitude and cooperation. Problems like bullying, ragging and violence are only symptoms of the lack of compassion.

We can make our education more effective simply by understanding our learners and their personality and motivational factors, by engaging in student-centred or active learning, through meaningful classroom assessment techniques, and through team-based learning. These methods enable learners to move from ‘recalling’ to deeper levels of understanding – ultimately leading to application and creativity.

What everyone wants from education At the beginning of my workshops, when I ask teachers what would they want their students to be after their course or after they pass out of college or school, often, their answers do not include statements like “they should know all the facts of biology or computer science or they should be able to write C programs” etc. They invariably talk of their students facing challenges of their job and life, to be able to think and apply their knowledge in solving real problems and to be good human beings and citizens of society. Of course, somewhere there is an implicit assumption that knowing the course content is important, isn’t it? Having such goals is laudable, but where have we provided the ingredients for such learning to take place? It is like expecting a sweet dish without adding sugar while making it.

And since I have been in IT industry for almost half of my 27-year-career, the sentiments by the employers echo the goals cited above. On one hand, they complain that people don’t have the foundational knowledge - here we mean not just recalling facts and concepts but understanding, applying and higher order thinking (critical, analytical, creative) about the subject. On the other hand, there is also a void in their ability to integrate their learning to real life or business needs, independently and cooperatively work towards a timed deliverable, and of course their ability to understand and communicate. This last subject has received considerable attention in the last decade or so – to the extent that communication skill dominates the job preparation strategy. What students fail to understand is that communication is also the vehicle for learning their subject – whether it is economics or engineering.

When industry says that 85% of graduates are not employable and that they lack soft skills – what most of us don’t know is that these soft skills will make another 5% to 10% of these graduates employable. A majority of our graduates lack subject or domain knowledge because they do not know the language, because language is the vehicle for learning. They are unable to read standard text books, understand the material or write answers in their own words. Due to this handicap, they resort to memorising. If they had command over the language, they would enjoy their learning and also become good at it.
   
    Employers are looking for deep understanding of the subject as well as soft skills. But since they come as separate capsules in the curriculum, students do not integrate them. While group discussions on current affairs and being able to confidently talk on general topics is important, it is equally important to talk about one’s subject confidently and fluently.

Traditionally, teachers, who are not directly teaching English, are not responsible for the correctness of language in the subjects they teach. When students turn in assignments and answer scripts, they grade them based on subject content. Even if they feel strongly about the quality of writing and speaking, they feel they are not empowered to comment or grade on the language. It is out of their purview. This is partially true. Very often, they may not feel competent to evaluate the language. Due to these reasons, though the medium of instruction is English, many students have poor language skills with the result their very education is extremely difficult. And when they graduate, they find themselves seriously handicapped in this area.

The idea is to see that language and soft skills are to be integrated into everything the student is learning rather than as a separate skill; and to brainstorm and recommend practical approaches to address the issue.

To summarise, communication skill (or English) is not something to be learnt in the Humanities department to be forgotten in the stream of specialisation and then again remembered in the graduating year for placement. And unless people have some content their communication may not take them anywhere.

Another crucial skill is the ability to evaluate one’s own work and know when and where to make improvements. Delivering work is not simply ‘doing to the best of one’s ability’ but delivering to some standards (set by the company or the boss). One should know when those standards are not met and what needs to be done to get there.

How education can be improved

Well, we were talking of the need for making learning more useful for real life. At the outset, let me state the most obvious but the most debated – the goal of academic institutions is not to train graduates in all the skills/tools required for the industry from time to time (this is what happens in every curriculum revision) but that students should have foundational knowledge as defined above and have the ability and interest to transfer these skills to a new subject or application. They should also be able to sift through lot of new information and identify what is important or useful for them and discard the rest. Simple as this looks, most of us struggle in our jobs and find our footing by trial and error. Many companies have elaborate induction training to make the transition. Smaller companies cannot afford such training and so they don’t take freshers.

But believe me, this can be achieved by changing the way we teach and the way we design our courses (not as a series of topics to be ‘covered’ but as a set of ‘student centered’ goals). This whole body of work can be referred for convenience as ‘active learning’ or student centered learning.

Whenever there is a debate about employability of graduates, everyone thinks it is adding courses to the curriculum. The labs, the projects, the industry visits, and the seminars – all the current ingredients provide enough scope; they need to be leveraged to produce a holistic education. Students should be motivated to extract the learning from the system instead of trying to hoodwink (copying, buying projects, using guides) and get away with marks minus the learning. This tendency to cheat will reduce if we stop making learning as drudgery and engage the student in it voluntarily and enthusiastically.

My work through Teacher’s Academy

All the stakeholders in the system – the parents, the students, the managements, the teachers and the society must be educated (made aware) on these issues. The next challenge will be to enable the teachers to look at themselves in new roles – facilitators, counselors, mentors, guides and co-explorers in the journey of education – and not just as a ‘sage on the stage’. They may accept this in principle, but certain pedagogical skills will be required to make this change actually materialise. And a word of caution: we cannot expect instantaneous results. There will be disappointments on the way. Everyone is used to a certain way of teaching-learning, and they will resist, or not adapt. It will take at least a year of concerted effort to see perceptible change in student outcomes. And someone needs to keep reminding the teachers not to give up, but keep trying.

We conduct workshops for teachers in inter-related disciplines on making goals, learning activities and assessment. And since we know that a 2-3 day workshop is not going to bring the paradigm shift that is needed, we provide some sample material and templates to guide the teacher in this direction. This material is prepared in an intensive camp involving motivated subject experts who have tried and tested these learning methods. Periodic visits and e-assistance is available for institutes who take up the change both for consultation to teachers and on the utility of new techniques.

The author is an expert on teaching learning process and regularly conducts workshops for teachers and students. She is a consultant at Centre for Education Technology and Learning Sciences, IIIT-H and Honorary Director, Centre for Faculty Development and Management, NMREC, Hyderabad. www.inspiring-teachers.com