Student life these days is one of self imposed silence and restraint. Most students feel that if they criticize anything related to their academic work, faculty or the institute that they will be victimised later. Sometimes this fear is justified. Sometimes not. It all depends on the circumstances and who you might be offending (knowingly or unknowingly) in the process.
From the Faculty's' side, 'Marks' are the most potent weapon that they use for and against the students. Both the faculty and the students know the power of marks. Sometimes the students will go all out to gain higher marks over their peers. Sometimes the lecturers effectively use the marks to control the students. This is where the worst things can happen. Students who are most likely to be critical or question the status-quo have a good chance of getting into the bad books of the lecturers and face the consequences. Often the consequences can be harmful in one way or the other.
Some lecturers try to over play on the importance of marks and make the students 'marks-oriented' instead of 'knowledge oriented' from inception. This can cause unnecessary divisions among the students. This will reduce the opportunity for the students' desire the address important issues collectively. Often this is for the benefit of the faculty and the institute. It is a kind of 'Divide-and-Rule' method. This eliminates any collective resistance from the student body. This is detrimental to democracy and accountability.
Lack of accountability leads to frustration and mistrust. This can also extend to the academic work apart from assessment issues mentioned above. Students, when they find it difficult to trust the Teachers and the institute will lost faith in what they do. The standards will suffer as a result. They will try to complete the course merely to gain the Degree instead of focussing on knowledge and skills. When the products of an institute are not competent as expected, the industry will suffer. There will be a bad chain reaction.
When issues are discussed informally and in private you will find that the students are aware of the problems and what can be done to mitigate the same. However, they will chose to remain silent as they find the risks too high. Especially in fee paying institutes, rarely a student will want to gamble with high fees they pay and end up repeating exams or the years.
At present many virtual platforms are available for the students to discuss their plight. Often exploit such forums like Facebook etc,. to express their feelings. However the lecturers may be 'too distant' from such forum or not interested in what the students will have to say. The lecturers often try to play to 'both' teams; the 'Institute' (because of money and power) and the 'Students' (because of their conscience and power)!. It is doubtful whether this is possible at all. May be the answer for the lecturers, is NOT to play for any team, but the be independent and focus on academic work. It is not known whether such a position will be a pragmatic one.
2 comments:
I don't think this is something new. Since the time of disapamok, this has been happening, where the best student got the teachers daughter as a prize. Get into the good graces of the teacher and you get good grades and a prize! Everyone either has experienced or knows of the teachers son scoring the highest in the class. Its simple exploitation.
Contrary to your notion, I believe this is an exact replica of modern day democracy.
I guess that's why most of the university students are marxists!
I do not agree with Arkitektonic neither do with illegal architect, because there are some very emotional students those who do not play safe and do what they like to do to gain something out of nothing in the university academic process. Therefore, not all the university students are markists or Marxists.
In addition, it is student’s choice to decide what they should do with their own life, they are intellectual enough to understand whether they learn or show that they are learning to masters. I think it has nothing to do with masters, Masters are not teachers in the university they are just figures (just like politicians).
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