People who talk too much

(This was written three years ago)

Let me describe two instances which drew my attention and concern in the recent past. One was a meeting with a member of a Municipal Corporation (MC) who was the Chairman of the School Board. He is the chap who is responsible for the governance of schools run by the MC. The second was an article that appeared in DNA, a daily prominent in Mumbai. It was an article about malnutrition death in the city.

In the first instance the MC was facing a situation where the children even after reaching the seventh or eighth were in no position to read or do basic mathematics. The problem as identified by the MC was that the teachers were not teaching properly. They were not present in schools most of the time, they were not ensuring attendance of children in the classes by meeting the parents and a host of other such complaints against the teacher. In order to improve the performance of teacher it was decided that the incentive structure had to be modified. The idea was to conduct a test of children of a particular class. The performance of the children in the test would be used as a proxy indicator of teacher performance for that particular class. (Most classes have just one teacher) With this measure rank all the teachers under the AMC and then structure their incentives accordingly. This was expected to improve the teacher performance in the schools run by AMC. On the face of it, this sounds as a very pragmatic solution. The proponents of this solution were driven by the philosophy of ‘we are in a crisis; we must do something; doing something is better than doing nothing’.

The problem with the whole idea in above case is that the solution is based on a very rudimentary understanding of the problem of teacher performance. Their rationale for the structuring of incentives is that ‘that is the way it works in corporate world; perform or perish. We want the same system in our schools’. Now do you seriously think that successful corporates are run that way. There is a whole HR department which focuses on performance of employees. The employees are selected through a rigorous procedure; they are given sufficient training and learning opportunities through out their career, sufficient opportunities for career growth and above all decent pay and adequate support systems. It is after putting in place a whole environment where performance is possible that employees are expected to perform or perish in a corporate organizations. Where ever these perform or perish idea is pursued without putting in places processes and systems to aid performance, failure has been the result invariably. Now coming to the case of government teachers, in all these facets of HR there are serious deficiencies. Teaching as a profession does not attract the best of talent because it does not pay well and nowadays does not have much of a social status. (Some matrimonial ads say that teachers need not apply). But arguably you don’t need that kind of talent. (I have serious reservations about the usage of the concept of talent and also about calling some one less talented. But that is besides the point here and I will not dwell upon it). There is no prospect for teachers to grow in a career, the training that is normally given to teachers is pathetic and the kind of duties that they are expected to perform including things like election duties and the like puts a lot of pressure on them. Now in this kind of environment if you expect the teachers to perform, you got to be talking through your hat. But the solution that was proposed by AMC people is very attractive to people as it closely resembles the visible part of corporate HR. People are ignorant of those finer invisible points of corporate HR. This solution if implemented is only going to worsen the situation further for the same reasons as to why such half-baked ideas don’t work in corporates. I don’t want to go into the details of improving teacher performance. My only intention here is to highlight the dangers of ‘doing something as it is better than doing nothing’. It is critical to have a deep understanding of the issues before looking at applying correctives.

Coming to the second instance. There have been a few cases of malnutrition deaths of children in Mumbai recently. A few cases of malnutrition death points to thousands of cases of malnutrition affected children. Now the deaths took place among some tribal communities living the suburbs of Mumbai. The journalist in the article came up with solutions for the problem. The solutions proposed were

Introduce a cess tax on the lines of education cess tax on petrol in hotels and restaurants. Use the proceeds of the tax to provide food in the malnutrition affection regions
Excess food in parties be diverted to malnutrition areas

The solutions again sound fine. But again the issue is there is a very inadequate understanding of the problem of malnutrition. Malnutrition is not about not having adequate food. The seeds of malnutrition are sowed in the wombs of the mother. It is essential that mothers be given sufficient care and attention during the pregnancy stage to tackle malnutrition. Again issues like sanitation, access to clean drinking water and protection from very much preventable diseases like diarrhea, cholera and the like are critical to preventing malnutrition. Now in our cases these things are taken care of because of factors like our wealth, our ability to negotiate with the government and our education. These three factors are unavailable to the poor and there is a total systemic failure in delivery of services to them. There is a total breakdown of the systems in the areas where these poor people live and it is manifested in the lack of sanitation, lack of health care facilities, inadequate shelter and lack of access to safe drinking water.

Now you might very well ask, the above listed efforts will add to the overall efforts to solve the problem. It wont damage the efforts. I will argue that it will damage. This is an opinion that came in a leading newspaper. This will contribute to formation of a public opinion and also inform the policy of the public systems to some extent because the people in the public systems are not inured to the discourses taking place in the public. Now imagine if the resources of the public systems in terms of time, effort and money are invested in solutions of this nature. It will be like throwing money down the drain and the problem will remain unaddressed in spite of the ‘best efforts of the government’. We are not exactly resource rich to waste resources. Each penny has to be invested with a lot of thought. Now lets say the article did not appear in the newspaper at all. Some politician decided to address the issue. To him also, if he does not engage sufficiently with the problem, such solutions would occur easily with the same disastrous consequences. If you think they would consult doctors and health officials you got to do a rethink. They will dismiss the experts in these areas as ‘people who talk too much’ and do nothing.

Some experiences from being in schools in India

I am tempted to share some nuggets from my experiences of being in the education sector although at the periphery. Listen to this and you would wonder whether there is any hope at all of having a good schooling system in this country.
 
A higher secondary school teacher: "The different seasons are explained by the fact that earth has an orbit which is elliptical and when the earth is farthest from the sun it is winter and when closest it is summer."
 
A teacher in high school: "I did my BA not B.Sc. I do not know negative numbers."
 
More than fifty percent of teachers in a state in the central part of the country failed to clear 8th standard exams in Mathematics.
 
This one takes the cake. This is from a Maths teacher in the northwestern part of the country. "In our schools the method of proving that sum of angles of a triangle is proved by drawing a triangle, measuring the angles and summing them. But since the measuring instruments are not accurate, the sum generally becomes 178 or 181 or some such numbers. We ask the students to adjust the angle measurements to get the sum of 180."
 
This one would be a suprise for  you as to why it is noteworthy. At least it was for me.

A teacher in a workshop in SCERT: "Hindi is our national language."
 
You might have read the issue of Saraswati Vandanas in schools in newspapers. I see  them on a regular basis.
 
Going to the schools is once in a while a completely discouraging experiences. When you visit the schools, the teacher would offer water to you. Now the water will be brought to you by a child. The child will always be from the upper caste. There are huge issues in schools in this country where teachers ensure that during mid day meals children are seated separately according to their caste. There are teachers who would refuse to share food handled by lower caste children. But this should not surprise us. A look at the Malayala Manorama matrimonials would be sufficient to show us that the grip of caste is yet to be shaken off in this country.
 
But inspite of this, my interaction with teachers give a lot of hope to me. Engage with them deeply and you would find that most of them, like us, are struggling to live in ways which they believe are right. We may disagree with their understanding of what is right and wrong. But that to me is the foundation of hope. We will all make our mistakes and still add some value to someone.

The guns are coming home

Everyone of you might be aware of the terror attack in Mumbai. I am using this mail to add my two bits to the deluge of writings on it. On 26th of November,I had taken a cab from Pune along with a few colleagues of mine to reach Mumbai. We reached the Mumbai airport area around 10:15 PM. Here we split and went in different directions. I, along with a colleague of mine, headed to Borivili (which is in the opposite direction to the location of the seige) in an auto. As we were about twenty minutes into the auto ride, my colleague received a calll from his sister informing him of a bomb blast that happened in Vile Parle along the high way some time ago and some reported shooting in Colaba region. From her account it seemed that the blast had occured some twenty minutes after we left Vile Parle. Later we were told that my boss who was behind us in another taxi had actually witnessed the explosion happening about 20 metres in front of her. But the telephone call did not surprise us much as explosions were not unexpected in Mumbai and shootouts were also not unheard of in Colaba region. We did not realise that it was the beginning of a seige.

As I reached my friend's place in Borivili, I saw my friend intently listening to the news and it was then that I realised that what I had heard of earlier was no regular event but something much more terrible. I was worried and scared now because I had to catch an early morning flight the next day to Raipur and Vile Parle was very close to the airport. I continued watchnig the television as the gory assault unfolded on the television. Reports were streaming in with gory details. I watched until around 1 0' clock and then went to bed while my friend continued to watch. But not before sending a message to my parents to tell them that I was safe. After lying on the bed for sometime, sleep escaped my eyes and then I heard from the television in the next room that there were reports of shooting from Borivili also. My heart sank. I  got up again and went in front of the television but there was not much being added on that front. After waiting for some time I again went to bed. By now I had serious reservations about going the next day. I tried calling my colleague who was to come along with me. But there were connectivity issues and the call did not go through. I was dead tired and I thought I will get some sleep for a couple of hours and then make a call on going. I slept for sometime and then woke up at around 4 O' clock. I switched on the television and began to realise the full extent of the event as I saw the Maharashtra CM on television calming the people in Mumbai but at the same time cautioning them. A statement from the government asking people to stay at home in case there are no urgent works was shown as a ticker on the television. However there did not seem to be any further reports on the attack in Borivili. I flipped through different channels to figure out the truth of the matter. But it drew a total blank. So I concluded that it was only a false alarm.

Now as the time for the flight was approaching I was struggling with the decision whether to go or not. The attacks had happened largely in South Mumbai which is quite far off from the airport. But there was also the report of a stray explosion close to the airport at Vile Parle. Also the style of the attack; mainly spraying bullets at people at random meant that the airport would be an ideal place for the attackers. There was not much stopping them at that point. But after imagining the worst possible scenarios in my mind I decided to go. I got ready and said a quick good bye to my half awake friend and headed out of the safe confines of the apartment. I tried to wave down a couple of autos. Both of them refused when they heard that the destination was the airport. After this I waved down a third one who agreed. As I headed to the airport, I continued praying for a safe passage.

As I reached the airport, I soon paid for the ride and walked quickly to the entrance to the airport where I showed my ticket and got inside. I heaved a sigh of relief as I knew that I had crossed the first line of defence and would be safe behind a line of CISF soldiers from now on. After the security check in I managed to be a bit calm as I waited for my flight. It was at that moment that I realised that the guns are coming home. What used to happen in the far away Kashmirs and Nagalands was now happening near me and I was stricken with fear. Paralysed with fear,unable to make a decision and confused, I knew for once what it meant to be terrorised. (Of course this is nothing compared to what might have gone through the minds of the people in Taj et al during those days.) With these thoughts I got into the flight at around 7:30 AM and landed in Raipur safely about two hours later. As soon as I landed I received a call from my parents inquiring about my safety. I told them that I was safe and sound in Raipur and quite far away from Mumbai for the next few days.

I saw on TV the carnage that Kasab and Co had unleashed on Mumbai. I was numbed at the audacity and the sheer intensity of hatred that was being manifested in this form. Many had to die a painful death, many orphaned, many lost their children, husbands, wives, brothers and sisters. Although I escaped, I realised that the guns are coming home.