Education for Acquiring Knowledge, A Universal Fact but a Paradox to Me
“Disciplining yourself to do what you know is right and important, although difficult, is the highroad to pride, self-esteem, and personal satisfaction.”
- Margaret Thatcher
Fellow homo sapiens,
Today I am directing my time and patience to pen this monologue about a dilemma that is bugging me for quite some time. We all know one of the basic ‘fact’ of life that, we get education to acquire knowledge. But this universal fact appears as a paradox to me. This will become clear as the readers traverse through the monologue. Certainly we acquired the basic knowledge from the education — we got from preschool till high school. But that knowledge was about the most basic of knowledge required to understand, to make sense of the modern world. That knowledge is about teaching us morality, to make us civic, to understand and enjoy joys of life and the most important of all, the ability to dream. In my context, the lower level of education was not about ‘Theorems’ or ‘Laws’. It was to shape my etiquette to understand and adapt to the current world. But now as I switch to the undergraduate level, it was now time to acquire knowledge in order to survive in this competitive world.
But as my undergraduate days begin to pass, it starts to become clearer and clearer that I seem to have left out a important variable in my life’s equation. Can you guess what it is? No it’s not the lack of a love life(no, I am 110% straight) but rather personal satisfaction. But now you may get confused about why this idiot author is taking about personal satisfaction when he is able to study his own chosen field. Well, let me start by telling you all that if you are not a retard then you may have realized this by now that any branch of engineering is a vast amazon. In my case it is ‘Electronics and Communication Engineering’. Saying you like electronics is not the same as saying you love studying all sub-disciplines of it. Let’s not kid ourselves by telling that we love every aspect of anything that permeates this universe. It’s just how it is. Plain and simple. Some may like to specialize in analog design and other in digital design or in communications. Some may like specializing in robotics. But I find this to be shattered by our current outdated university syllabus. Our syllabus is basically the food analogue of ‘Biryani’. My first year was a total mess. Being an electronics student, I was learning mechanical drawings, learning to stabilize buildings while making a metal hammer.
But as the second year rolled, as my field related course started to appear, I started to discover that all these subjects were purely theoretical. We were taught only outdated techniques. Our syllabus is not industry based. The lab sessions were dull and boring. All I learned in lab was how to copy another’s lab sheet. The lessons you learned in the lab is inversely proportional to the number of A4 sheets bought. I felt bored in the classroom. Attending classes now felt like a chore. Getting 70% attendance is the only motivating factor for me to attend the lectures. Now I had to make a choice. I didn’t felt like I was getting knowledge. After first year, my technical abilities were not increased as much as I had expected. There was a whole world out there in electronics that I was starting to explore and wanted to learn but all I was getting was this constricting syllabus. So, I started to do self study on my own interest fields and started gathering technical skills. I started to less and less study my ‘syllabus’ academics. So, gradually my grades started to take a dip. The changes were apparent. I had to explain my parents about the reason for this and believe me this wasn’t easy. Also I would like to aware the readers that the syllabus and the actual teaching methodology in our university is biased towards software side of the spectrum. You cannot, for the most of the time distinguish a computer engineering student with an electronics counterpart. So, any hardware enthusiast like me will feel like a orange among a basket of tomatoes.
Now in my third year, I was not personally satisfied. I came to a conclusion that a difficult choice now had to be made. Either I could continue this trend and let my grades take the fall like my friends falling in love or forget everything else but the academia. Surely, you might say that make a compromise. But I have already experimented and it concluded that they are mutually exclusive. You have to leave out one because both of the paths take lot of time, dedication and discipline. Electronics is an odd kind of field. It comprises of a hardware and a software side. Its not easy like a computer student who only needs a laptop to code. Hardware skills take time, devotion and dedication to acquire and master. It also requires money which increases as the years go by.
So here I am now taking the former choice. I am willing to span my wings that was once clipped by my education. But once in a while, I am afraid that there is a tiny part of me,however small, that makes me critically think if I made a mistake. Here, I am getting my knowledge by forsaking my education. Funny! Isn’t it? That one of the universal fact has seemingly become a paradox to me.
Zerone is an undergrad publication at I.O.E, Pulchowk focusing on People (their creative side, their thoughts, their lives) and Technology (the new, the old, everything).
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