This kind of education

Much of the public debate has recently been focused on education in our country, with people wondering what went wrong.

Questions such as the rising phenomenon of illiteracy in elementary schools, poor quality at all education levels in general and campus violence have been cause for deep national concern.

Only after cheating in the Tawjihi (secondary school certificate) exams has reached scandalous proportions did the Ministry of Education manage to successfully restore order in the examination halls and prevent leakage and organised widespread sale of examination questions.

Analysts and education experts come up with very convincing diagnosis of the crisis and introduce valid remedial advice too. One such suggestion is to abolish the Tawjihi altogether and rid the society of what is becoming a huge burden on the authorities, the families and their children.

We must admit that the ridiculous ways in which we celebrate positive results (firing live ammunition in the air and reckless driving around) often leading to loss of life, as well as the social pressure that may drive those who could not make it commit suicide, therefore more loss of life, defy the very basic values any education is set to promote.

According to our laws, only one single factor, the Tawjihi results, determine not only acceptance to university but also the field of specialisation. That is one reason why Tawjihi has been gaining so much significance, developing at the same time so many serious negative consequences.

The idea of the education experts I just referred to is to leave it for the universities to assess the ability of the applicants for admission to higher studies and decide their field of specialisation according to talent, irrespective of their high school marks.

This way much of the Tawjihi pressure would deflate.

Does that work?

It perfectly does. Most good universities worldwide do that, so why should we not?

Here is a real simple example.

A family relation of mine has just been accepted to an American university. She will soon be graduating from a private high school in the New York area. The young girl was advised to start applying to universities of her choice few months ago, long before graduation from school was due.

She may still receive acceptances from some of the other universities she submitted applications to. That means her high school diploma results at the end of this school year would not be a factor in determining the outcome of her applications; many other important factors count, however.

The application forms of most American universities are designed to reveal significant aspects of the applicant’s personality. Apparently the primary concern at this stage is not only the level of achievement of the high school graduate, measured by a percentage figure, but the evaluation of how the personality of the student developed since the early school years and how much the accrued benefit over the years has prepared the candidate for further studies.

Most universities pay less attention to any previous results if that did not lead to establishing the required grounds for the subsequent stages of learning, such as, among other things, reliability, maturity, seriousness, responsibility, commitment, defined purpose and intellectual capacity for heavy assignments.

Like good medical institutions, good universities insist on conducting their own evaluation tests to assess the situation, rather than just look at the test results granted by others.

Surprisingly, the acceptance my relative received from the university was accompanied by a grant.

In his acceptance letter, the dean of admission wrote: “I am also pleased to let you know that because of your superior scholarship and academic achievement you have been selected to receive the Dean’s merit scholarship [which covers a large part of the tuition]. We are extremely excited” he added “to recognise your past achievements. We know that the university will be enriched by your presence and your contribution, and we look forward to having you as a member of our campus.”

The element of great surprise here is that the scholarship was granted without being requested, and it was not linked to the student’s financial hardship. It was purely offered to an unknown applicant on the basis of academic achievement and indeed promise, from a university where education comes before profit, as indeed is the case with most good universities.

In Jordan, we also need to view education as a value on its own, as an essential prerequisite for progress and as the appropriate vehicle for constructing a healthy society, not as business.

What, however, is worse and most depressing is that many among us view education and the diploma, the Tawjihi or the university degree, as status symbols meant to serve the social image rather than create qualified citizens.

Remedy, therefore, requires radical revision of the entire system, not quick fixes and short-term repairs. The process starts right from the beginning. 

From my experience with schools which my kids attended years ago, I learned a lot. I learned that at school, children are taught to love education and enjoy school time. Their gifts for certain skills are monitored and nurtured. 

Children do marvelously well when they are enabled to do exactly what they are gifted at; never bored or suffer from loss of interest.

I know that my kids hardly needed to be prodded to do their homework or forced out of their bed at dawn to get ready, or to routinely attend to their school duties, quite heavy at times, even at a very early age.

As a matter of fact, they always wanted to do more to excel as they got accustomed to confronting challenge.

At a good school, strict discipline, professional or otherwise, is based on nurturing the kids’ voluntary eagerness to display appropriate conduct and enter positive competition to be at the top, rather than on punishment and fear.

The environment a good school creates for the students is always attractive, despite the very strict discipline and the very hard work.

I was often fascinated with the end of term school reports that analysed in minute detail every aspect of the student’s personality and performance, with clear remedial recommendations when weaknesses were detected.

A high school graduate brought up this way, confident of his/her school accomplishment, in good command of his/her subject matter, taught the correct ethics and values of the society, as well as the perfect manners, respected and highly recognised in his/her environment, is the kind of citizen any good education should produce. It is the kind of citizen that constructs sound societies.

It may be a long way to go, but it will only get longer if the start is further delayed.