Dear Ministry of Education
Sorry for having called the
ministry ‘dear’. You might point it to be an inappropriate salutation to
address a big organization like yours a dear. But I am helpless. I have been to
schools which are under your ministry that now I feel the ministry a very dear
one. But you know some people right under your ministry call the kind of
education system you have, useless. Some people say they sent children to
school to get educated but they come out after thirteen years of education as a
donkey. A week ago I met a frustrated graduate who said that he got government
scholarship to do a four years course outside and after he completed the course
and came back to Bhutan, government didn’t have job in Bhutan related to his
course and now he is placed as a teacher. A frustrated teacher he is he said. I
have many other stories of such kind to tell but today I have something
different to bring under your notice.
Firstly, the English text has
four sections- short story, play, poem and essay, which are expected to be
learned. But sadly, I didn’t get to learn some of the poem and essays. It is
because of fact that during examination, no questions are asked from essays and
poem that we learn in class but asked from short story and play only. Hence, some teachers omit this part and
never teach essay and poetry to the students for no questions are asked from
these parts. And the ministry might have noticed that in English II, students
perform very poor in essay and worst in poem whereas the same students perform
well in the play and short story. When a teacher never teaches what a poem is,
what its components are, how to comprehend them and how to write them, I think
it’s not fully a student’s fault for having not performed well in English
paper. If you wonder how not doing well in poetry hampers the result, I must
sadly tell you, it does.
Secondly, you might have heard
people saying, “…he has completed class twelve, and he still doesn’t know how to write an application..” I have
an answer for this one, well, the English book doesn’t have a well framed
grammar book for class twelve and other classes as well. And students prepare
for grammar looking at the type of questions asked the previous years, but
every year students see new patterns of questions asked in grammar. Students
don’t know what they need to learn. And also students are never taught to write
official letters other than leave applications which is also taught in lower
classes only. Students are also never taught how to write references and
mention the books that they used while writing assignments, which is most
needed after class twelve in colleges. I personally think that lessons on how
to write references and official letters should be given to class twelve
students.
I hope I didn’t bore you writing
all these to you. If you hadn’t known about these, I have told you, now that
you are aware of it, I will be waiting for a change to come but if you had
known all the matter mentioned above, you are just another chair warmer and a
chicken in power. I bet on that one.
Have a great day!
