AlphaBetting

A strange word or rather a coalition of words caught my eye in The Hindu this week. Someone, I don’t remember the author or the article, but it was about a statement by someone regarding a minimum qualification for journalists. People, well journalists in particular were not so pleased by that.  The word that caught my eye was Academic Inflation. It does raise one’s brow doesn’t it? I have this bad habit of observing words, vocab if you want to call it. I like to observe and think and rethink about meanings and reasons for use of certain vocab. I think I was 16 years old when my sister took me as a ‘subject’ for her psychology practical exam. I was given a test and in the end she announced that I had poor verbal abilities.

Ouch!

Years later, the CAT 2012 proved her right. 

OK so my vocab sucks, maybe that’s why I’m interested in looking more closely at words and that’s how this caught me. Academic Inflation. It really is something, and it’s happening all around. How many times have you heard your peers saying “one degree just isn’t enough anymore”? My sister herself took up masters because she thought just having a bachelor’s degree was worthless. (I’m not sure how much she loved the subject, lemme not get on her bad side over a blogpost)  My dad had also told me that I really need to pursue a master’s course. He too thinks one degree isn’t enough. Forget these people, I can point a finger at anyone in a crowd and say he has atleast 1 friend, if not himself, in the US studying MS. It’s the trend. Two degrees is mandatory. 

My nephew was being admitted to a school and the enrolment application form said that both parents need to have a master’s degree. Seriously?? OK parents being graduates is common these days, but PG?? Come on!! So the value for education is decreasing. Today your kid can get a school admission if you’re a graduate, tomorrow you need to be a PG and then a PHD??

In economics, inflation is a rise in the general level of prices of goods and services in an economy over a period of time. Or a reduction in the purchasing power per unit of money right? So Academic Inflation would mean the reduction in credibility providing power per unit of education? Or something like that.

We’ve heard most people saying that they go for a master’s degree to add more value to themselves, but a degree is not a certificate of competence, is it? So what does that mean? The people who do masters are actually people who are incompetent to survive with just a graduation degree? Then doesn’t that make them less intelligent? 

With increasing popularity of Steve jobs and the kind; on the one side we have a propaganda about studies or structured education not being a necessity, and on the other we have people scrambling and swarming exam halls and classrooms because they want to be more credible. All these mean, the higher your educational qualification, the lower is your competence? 

 

So if we take a clean sheet approach where each person is stripped of their qualification or background, and graded based on their ability to think, work and other performance measurement criteria, then where would each one stand? Nooo we don’t want to do that… Cuz its just easy to throw around my weight cuz I have a fancy MS or a Phd.. but wait... So does everyone else in my country!! I’m gonna buy more degrees! Another Phd perhaps??

Nine Over Mine

The breezy Wednesday morning had more to offer than just blowing air and ice cold water in the tap. The first smiles of the morning were delivered when I saw my nine year old cousin’s name in my inbox. There was a mail from my aunt, who wished to share her son’s first article in the papers with me. 

My cousin Sanath is a 9 year old school going child who likes playing Cricket and is a huge fan of Rajini Kanth. He loves Tamil movies and songs, and off late has found a liking for the Kannada movies of Puneet Raj Kumar. 

Being born in a family of teachers and administrators, Sanath is insistent on solving problems.

HOW I COPE

I worry that my teacher will shout at me if I do not take the books correctly. Therefore, I have made it a habit to check twice that I have kept the books correctly as per the time table.

When I get very angry or irritated, I follow my grandmother’s advice to drink two glasses of water. I also try to figure out if I am hungry and if this is true, I eat something. Many times, I feel my anger goes away along with my hunger.

Sometimes, I feel stressed before the final exams and at such times, I pray and this helps me to calm down. 

Whenever anything happens that makes me feel very bad, I talk to someone – my mother, father or grandmothers, about it depending on who is there at that time. Also, I try to keep in mind what my mother always tells me when I get upset about something: “For everything, there is always a solution. All you have to do is remember this and think calmly.”

~ Sanath

The write talks about coping with problems from a 9 year old’s point of view, but it makes sense to all. The point Sanath makes in his write is to seek help.

If only our pride grew shorter with age…

Why grow up??

Good memory you have ya, I hardly remember anything I did as a kid.

Was kind of a late reply.

Mine was a little quicker; I said

The trick is to never grow up. That way you don’t have to remember the things you did as a kid cuz you’d still be doing or atleast thinking the same things.

I thought more after she said:

Ah! How I wish to be a kid again.

Children’s day is not far; remember to let yourself loose this children’s day… Right now I gotta get some sleep... so bye good night! 

Little did I know then that I would be thinking about this chat while at bed playing catch till sleep was offered. It wasn’t long before I realized that I had just said something that I had never really believed. Suddenly I had told someone that I didn’t like growing up. Shocking. I really wanted to be a grown up. I was always treated like a kid. Something less than grown up - insignificant. I don’t know if it was my goofy way of talking and staying funny in an immature way or just my appearance, but I was always looked upon as an insignificant kid. I was always irritated when people called me or said that they thought of me as a kid, especially girls! Huh! Wait till I take my pants off, you won’t call me a kid then! 

Thinking about the insignificance of kids, it reminded me of an episode of Two and a Half Men; where Charley tells Jake “you’re a kid, it doesn’t matter what you think”

Well, I did laugh at it.

Staying over the thought of television I remembered a popular Hindi movie where Ranbir Kapoor gets yelled at for being too immature by a girl who later becomes his lover. Ranbir doesn’t retaliate in denial. He comes out and yells back at her admitting that he is a kid, and if trying to prove yourself right  or worrying about future is all that grownups do then he never wants to grow up. 

I appreciated that scene, but always thought responsibility made me happy.

Another such episode was from DraganBallGT. A scene where Goku, Pan and Trunks were looking for a DragonBall under water. Guku just takes off all his cloths and jumps into the pond. Pan gets grossed up looking at her nude grandpa. She yells at him and tells him that he is an adult and should behave like one. To which, Goku says:

If being an adult means swimming with your clothes on, then I never wanna grow up.

It’s just marvelous how almost nothing bothers a kid. Children surely are the little lamps that spread joy and love everywhere they go. An old story that’s still shared among people of Vasantapura is the story of Raaghu Bhattar and Shiva Swamy of Vasantapura. Shiva swamy and Raaghu Bhattar were big men of the village, one a devout shiva worshiper and the other a strict vishnavaite. They never saw each other and never entered each other’s temples. They were the modern day version of vasista and vishwamitra.

It was the days of the yearly village fest in vasantapura. The whole village was on the streets and there were just as many visitors from other villages; some were city dwellers from the nearby Bangalore. The scene was just lovely. Bouquets of Music and Dance performances in the village’s center square, vendors of a hundred kind occupying every inch of the road and women wearing cloths of every imaginable color, all saree clad; each like a traditional Indian woman.

 Raaghu Bhattar and Shiva swamy were very busy, talking, meeting, smiling and bowing at every visitor. They had to keep their contacts with the rich devotees. Though they were both happy and occasionally spoke to the same person, they never once looked at each other.

 It was after the dust had settled and evening prayers offered that everyone took to the center square again. A kid tugged on shiva swamy’s dhoti. He was crying. A three year old lost kid was lifted on to the shoulders by Shiva swamy who went about the square trying to make the kid from crying. He knew very well the kid was Raaghu Bhattar’s grandson. Yet he held the kid in his arms and walked over half the village. 

 To this day, the dwellers of Vasantapura speak of this tale of how an insignificant three year old melted the heart of a high priest who detested the other pillar of the village. 

Maybe that’s why being a kid is so nice. Being insignificant and not bothered by it, not bothered by position and status, and the least bothered about what others think of us.  Maybe it is the urge of proving our significance that makes us old; the conscious struggle to make a place for ourselves makes us lose the meaning of belonging.

 People generally see the dawning of responsibility or being able to take decisions or simple earning and feeding as coming of age. But is it really worth it? Is money and pride really worth the innocence and carefree childhood? 

Everyone grows up into an adult at some time. But that doesn’t mean the child in you has to die.

After all, Child is Father of Man.