Points for parents to ponder

THE air is thick with anxiety and expectation. In every other home, the talk is about entrance examinations, tutorial colleges, admission to the preferred course, and of course, the great big ``what if?'' What if I do not get through the engineering or medical college entrance exam? What if I don't get more than 90 per cent in the 10th board exam? What if all my friends get in and I don't?

In a world that seems to present us with a bewildering array of choices in terms of consumables, places to go, clothes to wear, and television programmes to watch, the one sphere where there seems to be more restriction than choice is education. Or it may be more correct to say that we behave as if we have no choice. The closing off of options begins quite early in a child's life. No matter what the parents do for a living, most children want to become doctors or engineers. Very few will say with pride that they want to be nurses, or historians, or teachers. Those are options that exist only in the absence of the Big Two.

Obviously, not all the thousands of children who apply to a medical or engineering course will get admission to the course, much less to the college of their choice. Those who ``fail'', often become depressed and lose all sense of self-esteem and, more important, end up feeling that they have no choice left. Some resort to desperate measures while others half-heartedly look for other things to do, convinced that they have missed the bus to a sure-fire career.

We all know that there are lots of interesting things for people to do, and lots of important functions to perform, that have nothing to do with either engineering or medicine. Then why is it that these other pathways are not even peeped into by the vast majority of school leaving children or their parents? Why is it that they are considered ``last ditch options'' or as second- level alternatives? Why do we rob all our children of their last few years of childhood and force them into rigorous ``boot camps'' that prepare them for possible careers in medicine or engineering even if they exhibit no interest in or talent for it?

Apart from commerce, which is one strong alternative to the two professional streams, there are not many students who consciously and purposively choose to enter regular degree programmes in science or arts. Fewer still enter such programmes with an appreciation for the many career options they can lead to.

Even in cases where the children have some notion that they would like to pursue something ``different'', most parents feel that there is less prestige (and therefore desirability) in these alternatives. For instance, a girl who recently completed her tenth class exam was exploring the idea of preparing for a career in some area of biological research, but her father, time and again, said, ``But with biology, the first option is medicine - the rest is only if you don't get into medicine!'' The sorts of issues that were playing on the child's mind were perceived prestige of the occupation, what relatives would say and think, and financial security. While the last is a real and serious concern, the first two are mirages that need to be addressed firmly.

Children get their notions of what is acceptable and desirable largely from their parents and their peers. While there is not much one can do about peer influence, parents can do their bit to give their children a healthier and more realistic perspective on their future options. We need to break free from this mindset that the world has nothing to offer our children if they do not get into medicine or engineering, or that they are intellectually inferior if they choose to go into less prominent fields. We need to make them see that these are only two among a variety of options, and give them the confidence that success does not depend on what you do but how well you do it. We need to create the space for them to see and hear things that are new and exciting, in the hope that they will carve creative and fulfilling futures for themselves, in a multitude of different ways. So for every ``what if?'' they know that several answers exist, that several answers are not only possible but highly desirable. That should be the direction career counselling takes.

USHA RAMAN

Send this article to Friends by E-Mail

Section  : Features
Previous : Know Your English
Next     : Someone has to care