Nurturing Excellence?

If anyone apart from the student community reads this article, they might certainly feel that this guy is a crackpot and doesn’t know how the system functions.

But the fact is its one of those days when life tries to teach you a lesson in one of the cruellest ways possible. 2 days from now, the felicitation ceremony of the rankers of my college is to be held. Their parents have been called. The felicitation ceremony will take place in the H.L. Auditorium. And one thing I’ve seen in my college; only the most serious events that involve much grandeur take place in the auditorium; others are almost like a non-entity. The paradox of the whole story is that I am going to be the host for the felicitation evening. The reason being, the other good hosts are also rankers and they can’t take flowers from the guest of the event and call out their fellow rankers simultaneously.

I mean just think how it would feel like to announce the name of your buddies in front of a 150 odd crowd, praising their performance just when you know that you are just 5 ranks behind!

See, the feeling of contempt has arisen not out of spite, since I did not get a rank, but out of sheer impartiality. Just think, on one hand you say that the Gujarat University has no standards as compared to our college, that the evaluation system is bogus, that the college gives tougher questions in the prelims and terminal exams. And on top of it, you have the best of infrastructure, the best of the faculty, the best ‘pedagogical’ tools, and the highest cut-off during admissions. Don’t you think the ranks that the college is getting now should be by default than by chance? Technically, the ranks that our college does not get are not because others had done well, it’s the flaw, the errors that the University system creates. So, to set a target of 10 out of 10 at the University level, according to me holds no sense.

I know the reader will still feel that I’m pouring out my entire wrath onto the felicitation thing, but it’s not the case. Believe me. There are students in my college, who stand just a level below the toppers, who, think in innovation; different ideas so as to fully exploit the dynamic environment that we find at B.K.M.I.B.A. – H.L.B.B.A.

On one hand we say that we train the students to become the managers of tomorrow. We teach them not only bookish knowledge but the soft skills as well. But the vision to equip the students with those soft skills is so narrow that the value addition is simply restricted to Group Discussions, Personal Interviews, Reading business magazines and the rest. What about the subtle but imperative skills like Innovation, Vision, Creativity and Leadership??? Out of the total toppers half of them are not able to converse in proper English. Why? Because they only study hard, bang their heads everyday, have their faces turned 90 degrees towards their desk for more than half a day and don’t care a shit about raising their heads and looking at the various opportunities that are in front of them.

Someone should recognise that there are a few students who do not like closed environments, who do not like to be bound by traditional norms, who don’t prefer archaic methods of evolution and evaluation. They want to be free, want an open canvas where they can paint their own future and not giving only finishing touches to a painting. Innovation is what drives them. Leadership is what makes people follow them. Creativity is what is violently erupting in them. And Vision is what makes them reach their goal. But here, innovation is given little importance, leadership is something one cannot exercise since others are least interested in what one is doing, and the vision at sometime or the others starts looking hazy since there is little support, more of criticism. People are so focused towards academics and other related activities like debates and management quizzes and presentations that the ‘congratulations’ and handshakes are skewed more towards the latter.

Sure, you have those ‘Continuous and Meritorious’ Awards at the Annual Day, but then that’s nothing compared to the pomp and show that the rankers get. People who get ranks will get ranks; if they don’t someone else will. But for people who have a vision, they carry an idea, and that vision, that idea is their own and nobody else’s. They are those who need more pep, more support to make their vision a reality.

All I can deduce from such tortuous behaviour is that we feel it’s the system that virtually guarantees a future; innovation and creativity matter little in such cases.

I just want to end by asking one question. The college has Nurtured Excellence for a span of 7 years. Has each excellence been welcomed and rewarded equally?