The main issue is that many students seem to have a difficult time understanding English, the language of instruction in almost all universities. Greg was at a university in southern AP where this was most pronounced: the professor lectured for 45 minutes in English. Then, recognizing that most of what he said was totally beyond his students, he gave a 15 minute re-cap in Telugu. Students are not receiving the full picture on two fronts - first, because a 15 minute summary does not compare with the details present in a full lecture. Second, Telugu just doesn't have all the appropriate words English does, especially in engineering or science disciplines. (aside: I have read articles about trying to "invent" Telugu words for modern research).
I was recently at a university screening the film, "Home," to increase environmental awareness. Students were reticent to offer their opinions in the discussion session, I assumed because they were embarrassed to speak in front of their friends or because they didn't really have an interest in environmental issues. The Indian guy with me, though, asked them to please speak out, "in any language." Still no one took him up on it, but after class the professor again explained that, even in this English-medium university, students had difficulty expressing themselves in English.
How, then, are all these students managing to graduate? We've also learned that the university grading system is - not surprisingly - completely different from the U.S. In many instances, small colleges are affiliated with a large name university. The main university sets a syllabus and writes an exam. All students across all the colleges take the same exact exam at the same exact time. Thus, all a student needs to do is study to a very objective test, that his or her own professor may or may not grade. Anything beyond the scope of the test is lost - the system takes "teaching to the test" to the extreme.
Our Indian colleagues at work were shocked when we explained that, in the US, two students can have the same major at the same college and not take a single class in common. They hardly believed us when we said that many high level classes don't even have exams - a grade is a combination of class participation in seminar discussions and a paper or project. They were incredulous to learn how much leeway an individual professor has.
Perhaps we need to take a broader view - perhaps we are missing something. Certainly at the highest institutions, what described above is not the case. But I can see a lot of room for reform at the mid-level universities that most students attend.
7 comments:
You're 100% right when it comes to education. Especially since most educated people in India think a bachelor's degree is just a basic education and that unless you have masters you're barely literate. But with this new job I am doing and also seeing the education through the eyes of my sister-in-law, it is lacking. A masters degree in India is like a 4 year degree in the US and Canada. I have seen some of the material my SIL is studying, and wow, she is in her 3rd year and I was doing the stuff she is doing in high school. They have one exam at the end of their year, and all the exams throughout don't even count. They don't have to write well researched essays (that i saw anyway).
My husbands cousin just graduated with an engineering degree and can't get a job because he can't speak English. This is ridiculous since his 4 year degree was in English- so you're right, how did he pass??
I am not the director of admissions for India for a few western universities and I have seen and learned a lot about how it works and how Indians get to go abroad. it's really interesting, but it also helps me to understand why there are a lot of Indians (and other immigrants) unable to find jobs in the west who seem to be highly educated. A doctor in India needs to study 2-3 extra years or more at a western university before they can even start practicing in the west.
It's funny you wrote a blog about it, because I have thinking about this a lot lately, since i am now in the education business. I should write my own entry about this because I could go on and on about this....
Not quite true for engineering. Most disciplines will require the same core courses during your first two years, 3 semesters of engineering calculus,differential equations, statics, dynamics, mechanics of materials, multiple semesters of physics, chemistry, etc. In my four years I had only four electives and those were mandated to be in my discipline. Some schools are now going to a five year program because as the fields evolve so do the requirements. Case in point, in addition to a materials course you may now need a composites design course. You can't just wing it in engineering.
I forgot to comment on exams. In engineering your grades will be 100% based on exams, with the exception of lab or design courses. Upon graduation you take a 2 day Fundamentals of Engineering or Engineer-in-Training exam, the infamous EIT, to prove that you are indeed qualified to begin your career. After working 5 years you are then allowed to take your PE exam, in your discipline. If you pass then you receive you Professional Engineer license. Continuing education is required to renew. That's how it works here in the United States. I didn't have any Indian Profs and the one class I had where I couldn't understand the professor, I transferred out immediately.
I have taught quite a few students in nursing school who supposedly attended a school where the teaching was in English (these were mostly students from Africa) and I did find that their English was just not good enough for the level I was trying to teach. Medicine/nursing has a whole language of its own, anyway. It's so hard to teach a student what "diaphoresis" means, for instance, when they can hardly understand everyday speech.
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