Reconsidering the SLC

Fondly, or terrifyingly, labeled the "iron gate" by Nepalis, the School Leaving Certificate (SLC) has been the final examination in the secondary school system for a long, long time now. Once upon a time there was also a thing called O-levels in Nepal, but it was soon shot down by the government for whatever reason I can't fathom. Anyway, the point is that the SLC has been here since formal education has existed in Nepal, and very little has been done to update it. It used to be inclusive of the 9th and 10th grades, now it's just the 10th grade, but that's not a significant change in terms of teaching techniques and exam questions. I have heard many say that this change just made it easier to achieve distinction, and not much else. So it just changed the numbers a bit. Other than that, a few subjects were added to increase the exam's breadth as time went on, but that also doesn't do much in terms of teaching techniques and exam questions. So we have the entire country's children studying under a system that has been running since the past two or three generations.

I completed my 10th grade elsewhere so I didn't have to take the SLC. Therefore, I do not have any first-hand experience with it, so let me know if I'm missing something here. Almost all friends I made after the 10th grade had taken the SLC, and they let me know a lot about it. I tried to research more on the system, but there isn't much about it on the internet. So going purely by what I have heard repeatedly and seen when my cousins have prepared for the exam, I have to conclude that it is a rote-study based exam. I have heard this one too many times. "Ghoknu parchha" as said annoyingly in Nepali, means exactly that: rote learning. So why is this a problem? Because rote based study is not going to get you a proper education. To back this statement, I will try to connect some dots.

Here I present to you a few facts. On average, Nepali students that take the SLC perform poorly in the A-levels and International Baccalaureate (IB) programs, even if they had achieved distinction on the SLC. The A-levels are an established Cambridge-based system that is renowned all over the world. Nepali students who take the A-levels or IB and do well are more likely to get admission in good colleges outside of Nepal. A lot of students that finish their schooling in Nepal want to study in good colleges outside Nepal. Nepal's colleges and universities are largely subpar in comparison to colleges elsewhere. So now let's connect the dots. Nepalis not winning Nobel Prizes, as an example, says something about our lack of academic success. The SLC and further education in Nepal have failed to produce academic excellence in all these years. To put matters into perspective, Bangladesh and Pakistan, countries at a similar developmental stage as Nepal, have Nobel laureates. They have different education systems that seem to have worked, even if it was only to produce one Nobel laureate each. You can make the argument that Nepal just got unlucky and that one Nobel laureate isn't much of a sample size, and that is fair. But how would you explain why SLC students perform poorly on average in the A-levels and IB, unlike IGCSE or O-level students? The A-levels has produced a good lot of Nobel laureates and it has widespread recognition. Clearly, the SLC is doing something wrong that the IGCSE and O-levels seem to be doing right.

So what is the SLC doing wrong? The SLC has mass amounts of rote learning and little to no analytic or creative learning. This can be seen easily in SLC exam sheets, where there are book-definitions and mechanical questions galore. There are little to no questions that encourage students to process information and utilize them in different ways, except maybe in math. What are Newton's three laws? How does knowing that help you become a better physics student if you don't know how to use these laws? The A-levels, on the other hand, ask questions that force students to step out of rote-based learning. Memorizing chemical reactions isn't going to help you when it comes to predicting how two things you have never seen will react. Students that know the mechanisms of relevant chemical reactions will be able to answer this question, but students that memorize reactions will not. The A-levels try to make you a constructive and creative thinker, and that is extremely important when it comes to educating young minds. The IGCSE and O-level programs also do this, but sadly the SLC doesn't.

As an ending note, I can't help but conclude that Nepal's average citizen is more ignorant than, say, Bangladesh's average citizen. Our students grow to become people that shape our country, so it is pivotal that we improve our education system and change the SLC. It's never too early to start, as today's students are Nepal's tomorrow. The sooner we fix their education, the sooner we fix the future of our country.

Education: Investing in the Future of our Country

I am a TCK. To those who don't know, that's an abbreviation for third culture kid. In sociologist David C. Pollock's words:

"A Third Culture Kid (TCK) is a person who has spent a significant part of his or her developmental years outside the parents' culture. The TCK frequently builds relationships to all of the cultures, while not having full ownership in any. Although elements from each culture may be assimilated into the TCK's life experience, the sense of belonging is in relationship to others of similar background."

Yes, that's straight from Wikipedia. Anyway, I'm a diplomat's son, and I have lived significant proportions of my life in multiple different countries. As such, I never really identify myself as a person from one particular place. My parents, on the other hand, are pure, home-grown Nepalis. They love their daal bhaat, and they'll scold me and my brother if we talk in English in front of them. I and my brother never really identified with this, because the average Nepali parent-child relationship is very complicated. Nepali parents and children never really bond until the child comes of age because of the significant scolding (and beating, in some cases) by the parents. However, the biggest reason Nepali parents and children cannot bond is because romantic relationships are not approved until you are old enough to marry. Anyhow, enough beating around the bush (pun unintended); my point is: I have recently started having meaningful conversations with my parents. Talking to them helped me understand their love for Nepal, and it also made me a bit more attached to the country. A recent encounter in particular is of note because it helped me come up with a solution to the education problems in Nepal. In fact, the conversation just happened less than an hour ago, and here I am typing away on my laptop.

The conversation began when I decided to tell my father my perspective on why Nepal's population is largely illiterate. I explained to him how there were many factors that made each other worse in time. For example, I talked about the whole "doctor-engineer" problem, where parents all over Nepal want their children to become a doctor or an engineer since they receive word of a pregnancy. Now, if you are not a Nepali, you should know that we have another problem where we think older people are inherently smarter and more knowing than younger people. This may not be the case with everyone, but in my experience, it is far too ubiquitous. As such, if a child (of age anywhere between ten to twenty years old) tells his parents that he wants to become an artist, singer, athlete, or any "non-prestigious" occupation, his parents will scold/beat him and force him to become whatever they want him to become. To make matters worse, they generally consult with people that may know little to nothing about you and your capabilities, like your uncle, who happens to be a doctor/engineer. Now, before you scream "make all of them watch 3 Idiots (famous Bollywood movie)", I will move on to the next problem.

Teachers. Yes, that is the next problem. The average Nepali teacher will beat you more than your parents will. Why? If you ask me, I'd say a lot of them are frustrated. Why? Because people that generally become teachers are people that could not make it into the "doctor-engineer" type occupation. I know very few who actually chose to become teachers, and they are, unsurprisingly, better at what they do. Also, teachers are not very respected, but I wouldn't respect a person if they hit me for every mistake I make. Anyhow, this problem ties very easily to the previous problem. Remove the "doctor-engineer" problem and we'll see immediate improvements in this problem. All of a sudden students who want to become teachers are allowed to become teachers, and they won't have to live with the disappointment of their parents, which leads to less frustration and less child-beating. However, that is not enough. Public schools in Nepal are trash. Criticize me if you will, because there may be a few good public schools out there, but most of them are just terrible. Parents that care about their children's education WILL send them to a private school. So why are public schools in Nepal trash? Because teachers get paid less by the government than they are in private schools. So pay them a little more, or a lot more, and they come swarming into public schools because a government job is much more secure than a private job, and it has other added benefits. Increase the number of public schools in the country and suddenly Nepal's education isn't as bad anymore. Nepal's population becomes more literate, and a lot of our problems are solved, including the "doctor-engineer" problem. But wait, who can make this happen? The politicians. Are they making this happen? No. Why not? Because we don't have a constitution. Why don't we have a constitution? I'm not going to get to that, because it would double the length of this already-lengthy blogpost.

Ultimately, you have to tackle a problem at its root. This problem has a lot of roots, so you can start anywhere. However, the people that can tackle these problems are too busy fighting over what to write on a piece of paper, or book, or whatever it is you write a constitution on. In fact, they have been fighting over this for over four years. At this rate, candy will cost around ten Nepali Rupees in a few years.

I will post more on my thoughts on Nepal's politics as I research more about it. Stay tuned!