The Terrible State of Schooling in Bangladesh
You look at enough successful people and you start seeing the patterns. When you ask them about their story, too often it starts with — “When i was a kid..”. It is not surprising that whatever happens in childhood has a profound effect on our psyche. I cannot speak for other countries, but I worry for Bangladeshi kids.
8:00 am — 2:00 pm school followed by endless academic coaching. School exams, coaching exams, and the pressure to always be better than some cousin or friend. And then parents wonder —
“Why isn’t my child performing? Why are they lacking? Where did I fail?”
I’ll tell you why today. Because they don’t have time for anything fun in their entire life. So what do they do? They try to fit in their entertainment and their socializing between the academic routine. Thus the talkative kid. Can you blame them?
The harm is huge however. These kids who try to fit in all their human needs inside a classroom never learn excellence. Football should be played in grassy fields. You should hangout with your friends under starry skies, not when the teacher isn’t looking. We fail to provide the context needed to experience the wholeness of life. The result is a generation of mediocre kids that are kinda happy with their lives. We’re obsessed with formal education, but nowhere near the top educators in the world. I’m sorry parents, your unfulfilled dreams cannot be transferred to your innocent children. This is not love.
For starters, parents have to understand that they can be wrong, that there are bad parents, as much as it hurts our collective ego as a society. Any group that has low barriers of entry will produce bad candidates.
Consider MIT. The barriers to entry are high standardized test scores, good grade-point averages, and stellar extracurricular activities. Therefore the candidates are more or less successful. What are the barriers to parenthood? None. Just sex. And guess who wants to have sex? Everybody. Is it surprising then that there are bad candidates? Then why do we act like it is always the child’s fault?
We have to provide context for all the experiences that a growing adult needs to flourish. Sports, art, psychology, and the list goes on. Jay Shetty highlighted the problem perfectly. He said that growing up he had three choices — a doctor, a lawyer, or a failure. Thank God he chose failure, because now he is now a part of Forbes 30 under 30 and has 1 billion views worldwide. How many more artists have we killed? Blood on your hands society. And its a vicious cycle. Children who grow up with their dreams stepped on grow up to become parents that just don’t believe in dreams anymore, ones who in turn crush more dreams, and so on and so forth. Break the cycle. Please. Before it’s too late.
