Moalims

The fundamental limitation of our education system is that it does not believe in any second chances. The recent, heart-breaking revelations by Akif Azeem, a young brave survivor of the APS tragedy, about how the education system failed him, is a dark reminder about the absurd and punitive rigidity of our education system. The gut-wrenching story is not only about his loss, or our loss, but also about how we do not create space for those who do not fit a particular mould. Expecting survivors of a tragedy of the highest magnitude to compete with everyone else in the nation in the board exams, is both unfair and unreasonable. Imagining that students of such trauma will be able to do just as well as others who have never witnessed such horror is not only naive, it is also insulting to the memory of those who lost everything. While Akif is brave, bold and eloquent, many others resign to their fate, realising that the country for which they lost everything supports a system that does not believe in providing them with a fair shot at their dreams.

The story of the APS survivors and their struggle is perhaps the latest, and the most prominent reminder, in a string of tales of the unfair system. There are countless stories, many that I have witnessed myself, where a personal tragedy, a trauma, the death of the most important person in your life, or even something as simple as being acutely sick on the day of the exam, can make a difference between having your dream fulfilled or throwing away all your aspirations. The system also does not afford second chances to those who fall short, not because of their actions, but by the decisions of a male-dominated society. A brilliant young girl, married against her wishes at 18, has no chance to come back and be competitive for medical school a few years later. A mother, despite all her wisdom, energy and passion, cannot become an engineer after she has raised her children. Even a doctor, forced to choose the profession because her parents thought this would make her more eligible for good rishtas, can never become an engineer.

Those who support the status quo provide basically two arguments in support of the system. The first one is the classic argument of analogy about ‘other’ countries. The argument goes something like this: this happens in all other countries and indeed you have to be lucky to reach somewhere. First, this is simply not true. Many nations have realised that a single incident, out of your control, should not simply seal your fate. Second, universities in these nations realise that second chances often attract people with tremendous passion and vigour, who value the opportunity and use their scholarship, energy and enthusiasm to make the most of this chance.

The second argument is about the size of our population. We are told that if we make the system more flexible, it will cause chaos and break the system. This is not an argument that supports the status quo; instead it points to a fundamentally fractured system that is unable to handle anything out of the norm, which means that there is all the more reason to reform than to support the current system that is failing our youth. Finally, pointing to institutions like the open university is hardly solving the problem since they do not offer the breadth of professional degrees that are in high demand.

The bottom line is that the pipeline of our education system, which feeds into professional schools, is not designed for diverse, intellectually rich, culturally cognisant and motivated students. It could not care less about life-changing experiences of individuals who can bring with them the ground realities of a complex society. Instead, it desires robots that fit a certain unbreakable mould. The mould, over the years, has become even more restrictive to the point of suffocating innovation. When those who, out of no fault of their own, fail to get a fair shot at their dream — it is not they who fail, it is us, who fail in keeping our promise to them and to the future.

Published in The Express Tribune, September 1st, 2015.