By Jenniefer Dkhar
Education is generally understood as a form of learning whereby knowledge, skills and habits are etched out in the minds of an individual through instruction, training, sharing, and communicating. In a nut-shell education is usually understood as a transfer of information and knowledge from one individual to the other. In whatever way knowledge is transferred the ultimate end of education must necessarily be formative. At the end of the day it is these formative effects that will shape and help mould an individual in the way he/she thinks, believes, views, feels, acts and reacts in the society.
The Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD), an international economic organisation founded in 1961, identifies three forms of learning: formal education, informal education and non-formal education. Formal education is institutionalized teaching and learning established according to a pre-determined and pre-defined set of curriculum. This means that courses and contents are provided to a school, a college or a university. Formal education is intentional from the learners’ perspective. Informal education is a form of education outside an institutionalised setting of education. It is neither structured nor usually certified. It could either be unschooling education or autodidactic education. Unschooling education means an educational method of learning that rejects compulsory school education as a source of education. This form of education adheres to an education derived from life experiences, domestic responsibilities, family, personal interests and curiosities and social interaction. Autodidactic education is self education or learning on your own and by yourself though it is usually complemented by formal classroom learning. Non-formal education is learning that takes place in a formal educational organisation but it is not recognised within a curriculum or syllabus framework, for example community based programmes, Scouts and Guides etc. The objective of the learner here could be to enhance one’s knowledge and passion for learning.
Whatever maybe the form of education, minimum basic education must be provided to every human being and the Indian Constitution has very eloquently framed the Right to Education as a means that will give compulsory free education to all children below the age of fourteen. Basic education acts as a radar showing and provides the right direction to people. An educational institution is not merely one that only focuses on academic subjects. Rather it is a place that has a lot more role to play. It helps in building social skills leading to healthy relationships with fellow students. This helps us in developing life-long networks. At school, children are also taught the right manners and behaviour, ethics and moral values that will help them become better human beings. This is a cricual period for character and personality development. Elementary school education is an acclaimed and accepted conventional perception and practice of education outside the purview of basic academic education. In truth education must go beyond traditional confines. Our actions in life are the impact of an acquisition of knowledge either through instructions, observations or even assimilation. Education does form the essence of our actions in life. Education is not only the subjects we get in our academic syllabus. It is much more. In reality it means many essential things in life that include ethics, morality, values, principles, etiquette, responsibility, manners, behaviour, relationship, respect and approbation. Education should be a means that will help each one of us answer queries and solve problems, help us set our goals in life, teach us how to deal with people, how to plan, how to handle pressure, how to achieve success handle failures and how to learn to accept things in life. Education is important because it helps shape our overall personality.
Mark Twain says: “I have never let my schooling interfere with my education.” Tactfully put this means that schooling and education are two different units. They may be looked upon in isolation or as entities that can co-exist or more appropriately as units that should go hand in hand. While schooling refers to academic education and qualification that a person receives in school, college and university, education means any form of knowledge that a person can gather or receive from anyone, anywhere and everywhere. An illiterate person may not be academically educated but he/she may certainly be educated in his manners, behaviours, opinions and views and his actions and re-actions at home and in the society at large. Where does he achieve acclamation from society and the world if not from the environment and the ambience that he lives in? He may be deprived of a structured academic curriculum but he may have the correct and befitting disposition of a righteous heart and mind. He may be poor in terms of academic education but richer in terms of a pious and virtuous moral life. After all what use is a great academic record if the heart and actions of such a person is limited only to the various degrees that he/she may have achieved?
It is important for us to understand the importance of education that should be made available to both boys and girls. Ours is a country and society that still perceives women as less adequate than men. This is the setup that should be dismantled and done away with. A girl in a family has as much right as her brother to be given the minimum compulsory education due to all the children in the country. It is after all her fundamental right showered and guaranteed by the Indian Constitution. The society cannot exist only with men. The presence of women is of equal and significant importance. As it takes two to tango in the same way it takes both men and women to happily co-exist in the same world and on the same plane. A man and a woman have their specific assigned role to play. Should women then be still sidelined and disregarded? This needs deep thinking as Brigham Young says: “You educate a man; you educate a man. You educate a woman; you educate a generation.”
Therefore education must help us understand the profound extent of life. It must help us become individuals that can live a life free from any form of anxiety, discrimination and trepidation. Education must prepare us for life. Our existence on earth is an assemblage of people from all walks of life. Thus we cannot simply limit our understanding of education only to formal academic education. We have to co-habit and understand the tenets and canons of a happy and peaceful co-existence. This should definitely come from a structured well thought out set-up of education but it must also come from an education that we derive through observation, experiences and influences in life. Education should generate the overall growth and development of an individual. A quote from Aristotle sums up all: “Educating the mind without educating the heart is no education at all.” As much as it is important to arm and educate our minds it is equally important to educate our hearts as well. Let us all educate ourselves to realise the value and worth of our fellow beings as much as we value and treasure our individual hearts and minds.