The essence of higher education

Title

Creator

Saiyidain, K. G.

Language

English

Source

Panorama Volume XIX (No. 12) December 1967

Year

1967

Subject

Aims & objectives of higher education

Higher education

Rights

In Copyright - Educational Use Permitted

Abstract

Excerpt from the book Universities and the Life of the Mind

Fulltext

■ Mastery of a few but essential subjects is far preferable to tasting a conglomeration of super ficially studied disciplines. THE ESSENCE OF HIGHER EDUCATION Educational grace and vir tue lie in the friendly and reverent struggle of the mind with great books and authors and ideas, compelling them to yield their gracious fruits of wisdom and meaning. Such an experience, even with a few books, can be educationally far more sig nificant than the cursory, uninterested and superficial reading of many more books of the moment. The pro cess, therefore, is two-fold. On ,the one hand, we have to enrich the curriculum with significance and encourage the reading of classics and other books that matter — books that illumine the mind and do not merely titillate the senses. On the other, we must be careful to eli minate the trivia from it, which have found a place because tradition set them there and inertia keep them there. There is, either, no spring cleaning for decades or, in some so-called progres sive educational systems, there is a to-the-minute upto-date-ness, as if the latest need or fad of the moment could be included in the cur riculum, merely because it was new. Neither the Ame rican “book-keeping of cre dits” nor the Indian prac tice of gearing all work and study to the annual or pub lic examination can provide any real intellectual educa tion. It can only prepare for specific jobs, not for any commerce with greatness. Real education involves a sincere, flaming dedication to% knowledge and pursuit of truth and a training of the mind to reach for new know ledge. It will draw into the process the head as well as the heart. If the heart re mains untouched and there is no “passion”, the student cannot endure the many dis 34 Panorama appointments and frustrations which beset this pursuit. It is good for a student, whe ther he is engaged in the study of natural or social sciences or arts and humani ties, that the road to knowl edge and intellectual and artistic achievement is steep, involving many headaches and heart-breaks. It is his business to adventure on this road with courage, for it is in this process that he can discover himself and his re alizable possibilities. The teaching method, which is consciously or un consciously favoured in most of the educational institu tions, is “spoon feeding” in some form or another, when lessons and lectures become the substitute for intellec tual activity and passive ac cumulation of information takes the place of active ac quisition of knowledge. Its results are always disastrous, for they undermine or arrest the development of all the qualities of the mind which education is meant to foster — initiative, independent work, resourcefulness, origi nality of approach. Instead, there is intellectual confor mity and diffidence, an aver sion to mental adventure and a fear of the challenge of the imagination, even in science and art. The average Indian student, for instance, is usually unwilling to face exacting intellectual challen ges and prefers shortcuts and by-ways to reach his end. Is that because he is mental ly inferior to his fellow stu dents in other lands? There seems to be no valid justi fication for such ' a belief. In fact, under similar condi tions of education abroad, many Indian young men and women have distinguished themselves a c a d e m i cally amongst their colleagues from other lands. The fault lies, in considerable measure, with educational methods and techniques normally em ployed, which are content to place their sights low, to make do with narrow cur ricula and unstimulating ways of work and not to ex pect from the students ade quate standards of excellence. There is no reason why, in a democratic set up, we should take it for granted that the life of the mind and academic interests are only meant for a mall elite and they need not find an ho December 1967 35 noured place in the life of every man, so far as his na tural talents and limitations make that possible. If this view demands that we en rich the curriculum of the school and the college with the best of our cultural he ritage, we should do so: if it implies that we encourage promising talent in every one, using active and crea tive ways of teaching and learning, we should explore that possibility to the fullest. Democracy would be stulti fying itself if it confined its ambition to enabling an in creasing number of citizens — and eventually all — to have enough food and cloth ing and houses and more and more material goods and leisure but left their minds uncultivated and failed to fill their life and increasing leisure with significant intel lectual, cultural and artistic activities. — by K. G. Saiyidain, Excerpt from his book Universities and the Life of the Mind. Panorama

pages

34+

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