By Patricia Mukhim
The sudden demise of Dr Ricky Syngkon made us all wake up to the need for Cardio-pulmonary Resuscitation (CPR). CPR is needed to prevent deaths when a person has sudden cardiac arrest and his/her heart has stopped beating and they are not breathing normally; when rescuing a drowning person; electrocution; drug overdose; severe choking after collapsing; severe trauma; sudden collapse of an adult or child.
CPR is an emergency, life-saving procedure used to maintain blood flow and oxygen to the brain until advanced medical help arrives. CPR is given when the person does not respond when you tap them or shout; when they are not breathing at all or are gasping and having irregular breaths and there is no pulse detected. This important life saving skill should have been on the priority list of Health Education. It is a practical skill which we were so illiterate about until recently. We are told that Scouts and Guides and the National Cadet Corps (NCC) teach these skills to young people. So why are those same health educators not doing it for schools and colleges? And is CPR not important for sportspersons considering they are most likely to have accidents on football grounds or while performing athletics?
Come to think of it, there are so many practical life skills that we were not taught by our parents or by the schools we attended. Speaking to so many young mothers today one realises that most of them stumbled into motherhood without understanding the importance of breast-feeding. Among us Khasis we tend to feed babies as young as one month with mashed bananas and mashed boiled rice. Often the reason given by the young mother is that she does not produce enough breast milk and therefore the child remains hungry and cranky. But the truth is also that in most homes the young mother has to leave her one month old child with stay-at-home elders while she ekes out a living. The young mother herself is either anaemic or under-nourished which is one of the reasons for deficit breast milk. The mother’s milk especially the Colostrum which is the first form of breast milk for the baby is full of nutrients and antioxidants, but it only lasts two to four days before mature milk starts coming in. Sadly, we are told that we should not feed that first milk that comes out, for whatever reason..
We went through school only learning by rote and our success was measured by marks, ranks, and board results. After school we did not know what our aptitude was so we just enrolled into Arts classes. Few brighter ones joined Science and fewer Commerce. We never learnt the art of questioning; could not formulate our sentences properly. Communication skills which are integral to our personality development were not taught. How can that be taught when we were always told not to speak in the classroom. If we were found talking with classmates we were held back after school to write, “I will not talk in class,” one hundred times as a punishment. And you expect us to have critical thinking skills when all those skills were sought to be buried in a graveyard called the classroom?
The result? Many of us walked out of school academically with a pass certificate but completely untrained and unprepared for adulthood. We didn’t even know about menstruation and when the first bleeding occurred we were scared to death that something terrible had happened. My grandmother found that out when it happened to me and her reaction was, “Oh no, now you could get pregnant if you are not careful.” But she taught me to use a piece of cloth as a napkin. Those days there were no sanitary napkins. So that’s how we entered adult life. No wonder we were unsure if we had fallen in love or were infatuated with someone before we slept with that person who was equally unprepared for the future and the result of having sex.
We have come a long way since then but are young people today prepared to bear the consequences of having sex before marriage? If not, then protected sex must be the norm. But unprotected sex happens because we don’t discuss sex in the classroom, in Sunday Schools or Moral Science Classes. Sex is still a hush hush subject yet the consequences of having sex, especially unprotected sex between adolescents has such serious and long term consequences for the girl. For the boy it is the momentary pleasure he enjoys. In most cases he does not care for what happens after that. If the girl gets pregnant he will not take responsibility because he is himself young and unprepared. The girl with no one to turn to and counsellors are still difficult to come by especially in villages, becomes an emotional wreck and a mother much before her time.
Only today after years of harsh experiences of living life does one realise that we were never taught the things that mattered the most – protected sex. I know the holy joes and church goers will baulk at this but the truth is that sex is no longer preserved until couples walk the aisle. Very few wait up to that time. The truth? Adolescents are experimenting with sex and there’s no lecture or preaching that can stop them. So yes we survived school and did not drop out but we were emotionally, financially, and socially uneducated for adult life. We discovered too late that the skills needed to live well were never part of the syllabus.
The other day there was a panel discussion at St Anthony’s College on the theme “Democracy in Practice: The Four Pillars and the Role of Youth.” The participants at the Regional Youth Summit came from different states of the North East and one could see that they were curious to understand politics, the role of the legislature, executive and the judiciary. MLA Brightstar Marbaniang spoke at length on what politics means and why young people should be involved in questioning the system of governance and holding power accountable. Lakador Syiem, a police officer, told the students to be active in voicing out their concerns even if it means coming out to the streets to protest but within the parameters of the law. I was asked to speak on the role of the media and told the students that if we have a partisan, pro-government media today in this country it is because citizens are not holding the media accountable and critically questioning its role.
The youth are no longer the leaders of the future. They are stakeholders of the present and must assume leadership roles. The question is – Are we teaching our youth what leadership means? Are we allowing them to take up responsibilities and guiding them when they stray from the path? Look at Meghalaya today. We only have pressure groups that do not believe in a democratic process of debate and dissent. They adopt the motto – It’s our way or the highway. And these pressure groups will not allow space for other dissenting voices. So where is democracy in action here?
I could speak about many other aspects that we were illiterate in such as money management (financial literacy). We did not learn budgeting, savings, interest rates, taxes, insurance, or debt. In a world where the economy is discussed by the hour, this ignorance comes at a cost. Young adults fall prey to predatory loans, reckless spending, or financial dependency because no one taught us how money actually works. Financial education is not only for millionaires; it is about us ordinary mortals and how we can prevent avoidable hardships.
But above all, what we missed learning is emotional intelligence. We didn’t know how to manage anger, cope with rejection, navigate heartbreak, or resolve conflict. When we talk about peace-building it is just a word. We don’t know how to go about it because no one demonstrated the steps to peace building and the peace vocabulary. Schools should have included practical lessons on conflict management, resolution and peace communication skills. In a society increasingly marked by polarisation—religious, political, and ethnic—the ability to disagree without dehumanising others is a civic necessity. Students should practise structured debates, collaborative problem-solving, and active listening. These are the muscles of democracy.
What we have not taught our adolescents is also critical thinking or the ability to break down a subject or a statement and analyse it rationally before accepting it as truth. And then Media Literacy is a neglected area so we lap up what the media broadcasts unthinkingly and consume all the propaganda without understanding that we have been brainwashed. Students must learn how to verify sources, detect bias, and question narratives. A democracy depends on informed citizens, not passive consumers of viral content.
Hence the purpose of schooling must evolve. If we truly want the next generation to thrive—not merely survive—life skills can no longer remain extracurricular. They must become the core part of the curriculum.
