Monday afternoon , 3:45 pm. After trying vehemently for half an hour I finally give up. “What am I doing here?”, I think. This feeling was completely different two months ago when I finally decided to take coaching classes for my preparation for JEE.I was a lot more ignorant then. Fresh from my board exams which had gone pretty well the first questions that many asked me was ‘What do you plan to do now?’. It was a kind of rhetorical question , the answer was obvious
So I enrolled myself in one of the leading coaching classes of India with a hope that I will enter the portals of the ever so esteemed IIT’s. I was like an enthusiastic kid at first , we all are. Brimming with energy and enthusiasm and great plans for the future. Now I was pondering over the fact “Where did all that go?” I was quite certain of my success when I had seen this ad in the newspaper by a boy who had god a good rank in JEE. It said “I give all my credit to so and so instituion. I did not slog “ and all such related stuff which was mostly lies and was fed to the poor guy. Slowly but surely my enthusiasm started to wear. From enthusiastic I became optimistic.
The teacher said “So when you permute these many things these many times selecting 2 at a time you get the answer”
‘Answer’, I thought. That is the only thing I understood the rest was greek to me. I looked around I was not the only one , my neighbor was busy playing with his mobile while the guy ahead of me was busy in trying to woo his girlfriend over the phone. Hardly anyone was listening.
Such is the normal scene of most coaching classes. I am not saying that they are bad .(I owe a lot to my physics teacher) The point is , are they worth it? I’ve had many experiences of my coaching classes, few have been good rest could have been better. I’m sure most of you must have attended some sort of coaching or the other. You must have slogged away in your +1 and +2 to get into an IIT. Now comes the question . Is it woth it?
The IIT’s are increasing there seats exponentially. I won’t be surprised if after 10 years each state has its own IIT. Will the craze still be there? Probably yes. The reason being that this craze is artificial, man made , created by the media and coaching centres. As long as the craze is there they are benefiting. One should think over a point. Every year JEE is increasing its seat with liitle or no improvement in infrastructure . The net result being the quality of students and education is being badly affected. Some examples being the students of IIT Rajsthan and IIT Punjab don’t even have there own buildings .IIT Patna has a building but no labs. they are dependent on other institutes for all these ameneties. Yet people crave to go there. One more example Mr A gets such marks in JEE, he’s not selected in the main list, Mr B gets the same marks and is selected in the main list. Reason , he has a reservation. All these methods have detrimental effect on the quality of students in the II T’s. Considering all these facts would you regret the fact that you spent a fortune on the IIT coaching classes just to be a part of a useless rat race . Were you not influenced by the hype created? Would it not have been better if…..I have nothing against JEE . it’s just that I don’t think that the system it has created and what you get after it is not worth it . What about you ?
You see the coaching classes should be viewed independently from the thought of preparing for IIT. I always felt that the coaching classes were a huge help (though I hated them nonetheless) since they were training me not only for ALL the competitive exams, I had an edge in school as well and that was a major benefit. I've contemplated this several times and every time I realised that had I not gone for said classes I might have done much much worse, since at the end of the day , what matters is how much work you yourself put(comments of the toppers notwithstanding).
ReplyDeletewhat matters at the end of the day is how much effort you out in by yourself. I agree with you tough that the classes give and edge over the rest, but seeing the no of students taking the classes nowadays , i just feel it is not worth all that trouble
ReplyDeletemost of the kids who join the coaching institutes are not really aware of the amount of effort they'll have to put in to keep up with the expectations..its more like a race,they follow where the path leads & you'd agree that even today,an IIT is where one is expected to be once we get out of school..its more about the illusion that has been set in peoples' eyes that every other colg is inferior to an IIT..while parents tend to forget that not every child can be an IITian & hence while some come out with flying colors,others succumb to the pressure.
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