Super 30 – Unique Educational Program Targeting Underprivileged

Introduction

Super 30 is a unique education program targeting the students from poorer sections of the society. This idea took shape in Patna, Bihar back in 2002. The program is run by a person called Anand Kumar under the aegis of the Ramanujan School of Mathematics founded by him. Under this program, 30 meritorious and talented candidates from the poorer sections of the society each year are trained to help them to crack the IIT-JEE entrance examination conducted by the Indian Institutes of Technology. Since its inception, the institute run by Anand Kumar has been making steady progress with more than 75% of the selected students making their way to Indian Institutes of Technology across the country. Recognizing the contribution of this program, many accolades and recognition have come in the way of Anand Kumar.

Super 30 Program

This program was instituted back in the year 2002 in the backward state of North India, Bihar. This program is run by a locally known mathematician Anand Kumar, who wanted to give something back to the society from where he came up. For this purpose, he constituted an institute by the name Ramanujan School of Mathematics. Since 2002, the Ramanujan School has been taking into its fold 30 meritorious and talented students from economically backward sections of the society for training. The aim of this program is to equip these meritorious students to crack the IIT-JEE examination. As told before, the institute has been making steady progress with at least 75% of students making it into the Indian Institutes of Technology. As this Ramanujan School is repeating this feat regularly since 2002, many accolades have come in its way. The reputed Time Magazine had included the school in the list of Best of Asia in 2010. In the same year, the school also received a word of appreciation from the United States of America President Barack Obama.  In November 2010, the Newsweek Magazine had taken note of the novel scheme coined by the Mathematician Anand Kumar and included his school in the list of four most innovative schools in the world. For making it happen, he was awarded with Maulana Abdul Kalam Azad Shiksha Puraskar in 2010. This is the highest civilian award given by the Government of Bihar given to a person.

Funding for the Program

Recognizing the good work done by Anand Kumar, many individuals and institutions had come forward with the offer of financial assistance to Super 30 program. They even proposed better infrastructure and accommodation for students, study materials, etc. However, Anand Kumar had decided against it and continued his Super 30 program with his meager resources. He finds the corpus for conducting this program by conducting coaching classes to other students for money. In later years, the pass percentage increased and reached the crescendo with all passing the coveted IIT-JEE examination in June 2015.

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Different Ways to Make a Kid Love Reading

Introduction

There is only one way to increase the awareness and IQ level in children. This way was found long time back. It is nothing but reading. The children should not be reading the book just for doing the assignments. Instead, they should love and enjoy reading the books. Most parents buy board exam books in the hope that their wards would read all of them. That is not always the case. A study has proved that wards with reading skills have the ability to clear the exams with ease and move forward in life.  As the days progress in children's life, only two percent of them still harbour the love to read books that are at advanced level.

Early Inculcation

The habit of reading never really gets ingrained in childhood as there are plenty of opportunities for the children to get distracted. Your kids love shuffling through pages in books as toddlers, looking at the pictures.  They may even enjoy reading as elementary school-going children.  Life offers so many other ways to entertain themselves that reading may become more like work than play.  They never get to that delicious place where reading a book is more fun than almost anything. Hence, we need to inculcate this habit with great labour in our children early in their lives. Otherwise, they may not develop serious reading habit in their lives.

• Read to your child from the earliest age: Every child would listen to story at the bed time. Just read to them story books and effectively narrate the stories to them.  You can always hold back the information and tell them to read the books to get more information. Buy board books and cloth books as some of your child's first toys. Carry them around with snacks in the diaper bag. Whenever you get some break, grab a book and read to your child and help him to understand the story from the books.
  
  
  
  
  
•  Begin visiting the library regularly:  Some children get fascinated by seeing others reading books. Hence, you can try visiting the library regularly with your child. You can use the time in the library to read and narrate stories and select books for him.  My kids would never sit still at library "story times," but if your child likes them, by all means go.  Keep library books on a separate shelf in the living room or kitchen so you don't lose them, and so you can always easily find something new to read.
  
  
   
  
  
• Read to your child as often as possible: You should be trying to read out stories and simplify the situations in them whenever possible. One such time when you can try is to make them sit before the food. Listening to the reading is just like listening to a radio. When they listen, they can look at the food and savour its taste while chewing and listening. Occasionally, you can show the pictures depicted in the story books to them. This would make them listen and hold them to a place.






• Don't push your child to learn to read: Don’t force your child to learn reading. If he gets interested in knowing more things, he will try to learn reading naturally once after getting the preliminary skills. Your goal is not to help him sound out words. Instead, you are expected to instil a love for book. Teaching him to read will take all the fun out of reading. 
  
  
  
  
  
• Don't stop reading to him once he learns to read:  Read to him every step of the way until he does not object your reading to him.  Continuing to read to him will keep him interested as his skills develop.  While reading out stories to children, they are expected to ask questions. This would give you the fodder for you to have an opportunity to open up a friendly discussion with them about values they have learned and choices they have come across.

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Cycles Bearing Internet Cart to Roll in Indian Villages

Introduction

The cycles with attached Internet cart is going to visit in different Indian villages to train the rustic women on the Internet medium. This is part of Make India Digital initiative, which is one of the pet projects of Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi, to make Indian business completely digital. This novel idea is designed by Tata Trusts in partnership with Google India Private Limited. The initiative aimed at empowering rural Indian women with the power of the Internet is christened as ‘Internet Saathi’. The partners to this project have officially rolled out it on July 3, 2015. At the launch, the Chairman of Tata Trusts Ratan Tata told a small gathering that the access to the Internet has changed the way people are acquiring knowledge in the world. The same was acknowledged by the Google South Asia and India Managing Director and Vice-President Rajan Anandan who spoke about the skewed scenario of internet access with men outnumbering women in both rural and urban India.

Internet Saathi Project

The joint initiative of Tata Trusts, the philanthropic organization of Tata Sons Group, and the Indian arm of Google Pvt. Ltd. has decided to help the rural woman folks to reap the benefits of the Internet and empower them for a better tomorrow. The proponents of the “Internet Saathi” project have chosen to call the vehicle of change as Internet Cycle. According to the partners, this project is designed to provide basic training on the usage and benefits of the Internet. For this purpose, the novel initiative is going to send specially designed Internet cycle carts to their homes directly.  This project was ideated on the sidelines of the Indian Prime Minister’s call for making India completely digital. In this project, Tata Trusts and Google India have roped in known computer and laptop processor chip maker Intel to provide the content for the content for the Internet training. Intel is already helping Google India in rolling out the Helping Women Get Online (HWGO) initiative. Tata Trusts is going to make use of its rural support network to build the case and carry forward the novel scheme in different parts of the country.

Modus Operandi

The Internet carts in the form of cycles would be sent to villages for a minimum period of two days every week over a period of 4-to-6 months. During this time, the Internet carts will be visiting a cluster of 3 villages every week to provide comprehensive basic training on the benefits and usages of the Internet.  Once the carts complete the Internet training in one cluster of villages, it would move to another adjacent cluster to start the training cycle in fresh location. This initiative is set to pick up from Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s home state Gujarat.  Then, the Internet carts are set to fan out to the adjacent states such as Rajasthan, Madhya Pradesh and Jharkhand in the first phase. In the later phase, it is set to cover a total of 4500 villages to impart basic training to over 5,00,000 Indian women living in rural India.

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Why Students Develop Aversion to Mathematics?

Introduction

In Indian Educational System, the importance is given to by-hearting the topics. Never, the wards are encouraged to understand the topics logically and graphically. In government schools, the resources available at the disposal of teachers and students are not enough to give proper explanation to the students. Many schools though have affiliation don’t have quality teaching resources to explain the concepts in detail. The concepts are made out to the students in a dry manner without any creativity. This leads to lack of interest in the minds of students and they start getting terrorized at the prospect of handling the subject.

Need to Change the Mathematics Teaching Approach

When the same teaching methods are used to teach mathematics, which is essentially a game of numbers and theorems, the subject appears boring. Unless and until the concepts are discussed in the form of rational situations using the pictorial representations, the subject is going to become boring to the students. Most of the children start sleeping the Mathematics classes, not knowing what the class by a teacher of the subject discusses with them.  The theorems when discussed in classes as merely theorems, the students are not going to understand anything from them. This is the reason why most students flunk in the test.  The students need to be told things that form a pattern in nature follow these rules inherently. The mathematical laws form the integral part of the patterns that we see in the nature. This has to essentially go into the minds of the students.

Mathlab Online

When the Mathematics subject is taught with this fundamental reality in mind, the students start to attach some importance to this subject. This is what is done while developing Mathematical labs for the students. The labs have kits that effortlessly teach the basic laws of geometry, calculus and arithmetic. The students are given physical objects to deal with and are asked to assemble the kit following certain laws. This would help them easily correlate the theorems in better light. In Mathematics, the students either get all or none. Unless and until they get hold of the concepts and theorems, the application in various questions never comes naturally to the students. Various physical objects with certain shapes and dimensions are assembled or associated in specific ways to get the pattern as described in these theorems.  Now many software programs have been developed to let know the nature of mathematical theorems and laws and their applicability in nature. For example, certain theorems on chaos help people understand what is happening at the subatomic levels.

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Relevance of Reading Group in Your Neighbourhood

Introduction

In olden times, children and adults used to go to the park or a reading centre for a better interaction with peers. By doing this way, people used to get the information from around the world and ascertained the views of the peers. It is a different story whether those analytical views are relevant or not. This gave a feeling and warmth of a closely knit group.  With the rapid industrialization, people have no time to spare to meet others. Every second counts in terms of money. In whatever little time they have at their disposal, they want to earn as much money as possible before settling into a decent position in the chosen industry.  Slowly people are forgetting that there used to be a custom wherein people visited nearby reading centre or park to have decent discussions.

Local Reading Clubs

Some communities have understood the importance of keeping in touch. That is the reason people have started encouraging youngsters and children to form reading groups by pooling the resources so that everybody gains from that exercise. Some youngsters have even gone a step further and started local reading clubs and procure journals, newspapers and other reading materials for the benefit of the community.  In order to pull the wards away from their mobiles or television programs, the modern-day parents also encourage the reading habit and force them to visit one of these centres in their neighbourhood. The clubs organize the events in such a manner that the theme of reading is portrayed to the impressionable minds. Some clubs have even invited the literary personalities of the state to address their younger members. These clubs are now making a big impact in different parts of Kerala. Such clubs are called “Vayana Kootam”.

Reading Clubs Get Sponsorship

Sensing the opportunities, the famous publishing houses have decided to support such local initiatives and provide them with materials so that their story books and comics would be read by the young members of the reading club. For instance, Mathrubhumi and Manorama Groups in Kerala have started providing the materials for the young readers to enjoy the fruits of knowledge through reading habits. Almost on the continuous basis, the theme of reaping knowledge from the exercise of reading is showcased through various events. Even the publishing houses bring in the leaders in the literary field to interact with young people and motivate them to start reading. Recently, in a remote hamlet in the capital city of Kerala, the surviving grandfather of Malayalam literature Prof. ONV Kurup was invited to give insights into his literary journey. He shared with the youngsters the information about his findings that guided him to become an avid reader of literature.

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Do Children get Weighed Down by Over Expectations of Parents?

Introduction

The straightforward answer to this question is yes. Parents rear not only their children, but also expectations from them. The benchmark of expectations keeps on increasing each year. This often perplexes the children and they are forced to strive hard to meet these growing expectations under parental pressure. Moreover, the children don’t get a chance to express their views on their expectations. On the contrary, children are forced to work in the direction shown by their parents due to the societal pressure. This often leads to the destruction of whatever remnants of creativity retained in them. 

Parental Pressure on Children

Children become the race horses at the hands of their parents. Most often, the parents bet on their wards’ future at their workplace with their peers. In order to keep the word, parents scold or even beat the children at home, citing the peers who are doing well in their studies. When comparison is made, the children are forced to try hard to get nice marks. This backfires sometimes when children fail to cope up with pressure in their academics. In this aspect, both parents and the teachers are the culprits. There have been reports of suicides and suicide attempts on the eve of annual examination every year. The strong-willed children come successfully out of these trying times and score good marks. On the other hand, not so strong children succumb to the pressure and fare badly in the examinations. Most often, these children fail to recollect whatever they have studied due to the mental tension, not because they are bad at studies. The parents don’t want to gauge the ability of their wards as they become obsessed with the competitions with the neighbours and peers at the workplace. Due to this reason, most often children don’t get a chance to fully blossom into a budding talent.

Way Forward

Every individual has innate qualities that need to be reared and channeled. The parents should identify what their wards are good at by sitting and interacting with them. The wishes of parents should give way to the aspirations of the children. Son of an engineer need not become another engineer. He could even become a writer. This needs to be borne in mind by the parents. If this approach is taken, the talents of the children could be identified early in life and properly reared to make him or her creative individual. Otherwise, the children become too timid and more dependent on their parents. In the formation stage itself the child needs to be given freedom to think independently.  It cannot come in a day or two. It has to be slowly developed under the parental supervision. If this is done with care, the children would become fearless and independent.

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Corruption in Education System

Introduction

Increasingly more people are going to places where they can buy degrees without putting any effort. They don’t have to slog hard or pay the examination fee to get the marks. If they pay adequate amount, they would be given good marks and certificates.  Many people get lured into this trap. You cannot be expected to get trained when you get a particular degree. To get proper training one need to have enough patience to sit and learn from the mouth of the experts. Such people can easily be found when few questions are posed against them.

Current Education System

Like any other form of human activity, this noble profession has been largely toned down over the years. Children require the presence of those faculty members who are very liberal in evaluation. Such teachers or professors don’t look at the points. Instead, they look at other things to remain afloat in the business. The government of the day liberally give no objection certificates to people near the corridors of power for opening new professional and non-professional colleges. The authorities don’t even look at the resources mobilized by the applicants to start a college. This is the reason why the quality of teaching has come down steadily over the years. To run such educational institutions, the government has devised a newer methodology. These universities have been armed with a rule that allows them to start off-campus premises. The classes are conducted at the franchisee positions with the help of their faculties. Only the administrative works continue at the premises of educational institutions or Universities.   These bogus educational institutions rely on the outstation candidates for running the show.

Fake Degrees on Sale

The bogus educational organizations charge the prospective candidates for the package rolled out to them. In these packages, the students are given mark sheets, degree certificates, migration certificates, etc. to help the students look for the courses of their choices. Most probably, the examination roll numbers cited in these certificates are bogus ones. These numbers are designed in such a manner that they a have strong resemblance to the genuine ones. In other cases, there are outside agencies that arrange for the counterfeit certificates at higher costs. All the aspects of certificate making would be looked at while dolling out the artificial certificate.

Filter Black Moles From Crowd

Many people have fallen prey to these anti-social elements. Many leaders and other influential people might have fallen prey to that. The AAP leader is one tip of the rotten ice that has come to the surface. There are others who are still making use of these certificates without getting caught. The people seeking such short cuts need to be brought to justice and uphold the real purpose of education. Unless the political will is there to implement the existing laws, these offences are certain to continue, putting our educational system to the shame.

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Need for Open Book System in Examination

Introduction

The current system of examination depends on the memory power of the candidate. It does not matter whether the candidate has properly imbibed the concept or not. Since the questions are designed to test the memory power, the answers to them are simple. Knowing this, the candidates have started devising newer methods to quickly bypass the convention of just copying everything to the memory. They have started using the bits of papers to write the answers to these questions and take the written papers to the examination centre by hiding them in their body.

Malpractices on the Rise

Due to this conventional system, the children writing the examination receive the help from even outsiders. In the recent past, there was news about parents helping their wards with complete answers written on papers in Bihar, India. The parents, agents, friends climb the building and reach their wards on the higher floors to pass the paper containing answers. Due to the threat, the invigilators have started responding to these malpractices in many parts of North India, especially in Bihar and Chattisgarh. With growing involvement of the general public in these malpractices, the local administration cannot do much to stop this malice. This is the reason why people in charge of bringing education reforms have been advocating the need to remove the conventional system of administering the examinations in all educational institutions in the country.

Open Book Model

The issues relating to the already existing examination system can be solved to the large extent by bringing this open book system. Here, the students are allowed to take textbooks, guides, and other relevant book materials into the examination hall and write the exams using them. However, the approach of the examiner to various topics covered in the curriculum would be different.  The questions would be framed in such a manner that the students are forced to think and apply the principles and methods that they have learned to arrive at the answers. This would dissuade the children to resort to the malpractices at the examination venues.

Benefits of Open Book System

The major benefit is that the children would not be able to copy in the examination. The application-level questions would force them to think and write the solutions. Since the resolution of the problem posed to them by the examiner can be done in multiple ways, each answer would be entirely unique in nature. There is no template that can be followed to write the examination. Above all, the students would have to apply their minds and skills to arrive at the solutions. Hence, this would promote their true learning.

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