FEW things make me happier than the opportunity to work with university students, particularly women, encouraging them to think in new ways and to be more confident in expressing their views. Over the years, they have given me feedback that has stunned me. Recently an intern commented that while at her prestigious university the students give many presentations and receive marks for them, they never get feedback from the professors on how they did. She was delighted that I gave individual feedback. I鈥檇 heard that comment before, at an Indian university: the students were surprised and thrilled to receive individual attention.
An intern from Pakistan once commented, 鈥榊ou listen to us!鈥� I asked the Bangladeshi interns if things are as bad here. 鈥楴ot at our university, but at a typical one, sure,鈥� they replied.
Rather than listen and encourage, students are exposed to rote memorisation, 鈥榣earning鈥� their lessons by droning on in a monotone the information they were given in class, committing it to memory without any thought to its meaning or significance.
The tendency of education to be aimed at cramming students鈥� heads with facts rather than encouraging and teaching them to learn to analyse ideas and think logically is not new. But it is particularly worrisome in these times of misinformation saturation on social media. How is one to know what to believe or what sources to trust? A basic grounding in logic and analysis would be a helpful start. So would understanding the applicability of what is taught in school to the world in which we live.
An Indian friend recently visited me with her 14-year-old daughter. The daughter was bright and eager to be challenged. We talked about the difference between public health and medicine, and I quizzed her on a public health versus medical approach to various illnesses such as cancer and diabetes. We talked about urban planning concepts. We even wandered briefly into practical applications of arithmetic. (It continues to distress me that many or most Bangladeshis do not appear to know that arithmetic has a connection with reality. For example, when told I will be away from two till five, they count on their fingers rather than subtracting two from five. Ouch.)
Faced with my quizzes, my honorary niece looked at me, alert and eager. She struggled a bit with answers, as is expected, but never gave up. She looked interested when I talked to her about serious issues. She even seemed to appreciate when I recited Shakespeare, for goodness鈥� sake!
Yes, I am talking about a particularly bright, well-raised, and altogether lovely young person. But she is by no means unique. In my frustration at people doing simple math on their knuckles, I taught a hotel receptionist in Southeast Asia how to calculate how many months between October and March, or how many nights a person is staying if they check in on the 16th and out on the 21st, in seconds. 鈥楳y friends will think I know magic!鈥� he exclaimed in delight as he worked with me.
My colleagues and I have had hundreds of interns, mostly from the Asian University for Women. Some have been less than keen, but most eagerly take up the challenges we pose for them in the internship. They love hearing new ideas and being given difficult assignments. We have worked with other young people through Camp Cool 鈥� a two-day residential training for university students on various topics. We have started taking our public speaking classes beyond the usual milieu and into rural schools. The students eat it up.
The eagerness with which so many young people respond to these intellectual or creative challenges makes me think how badly our school system is failing them. Rote learning does not help students learn to think or to do problem-solving. Many students long for the opportunity to develop and use their skills. Everybody has talents, many of which are ignored in a rigorous but rigid curriculum.
Youth is too important to waste. Let鈥檚 make sure that we encourage more of our young people to explore different topics, to think outside the box, to discover what excites and motivates them, and to know the difference between outrageous conspiracy theories and science. We can find creative and fun ways to help them along. After all, we are in dire need of their bright ideas to solve the multiple crises that they are inheriting from us.
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Debra Efroymson is the executive director of the Institute of Wellbeing (Bangladesh).
