The Season Of Exams

The season of Exams.

Here comes February & March, and everything comes to a stand still.

No extravagant family outing, plans, travelling & commitments.
The focus is only on ONE thing.
And that is, the students preparing for their all important finals & parents-teachers keeping a close watch. (As good as exams for them too :-))

Just went to drop my Son for his 1st exam of XII boards today.
Amazing scene of students & parents all around.

Last minute check-lists being carefully and hurriedly covered.

• The hall ticket,
• The writing board,
• The compass box kit,
• To check whether enough numbers of pens & pencils there,
• To check for water bottle,
• last minute advise on how to approach the paper, how not to leave any question unanswered,
• last minute hugs and kisses...

This is simply amazing.

If we closely look at all these emotions turned into actions, we see there is lots and lots at stakes, lots invested on every student with respect to time, money & energy, not only by the parents, but also by teachers, the institution and the education department.

To see their child passing out with flying colours in all important boards exams, is every parent's dream.
Right from the time the child is put into kindergarten, the immediate destination in mind is STD X & XII boards.
And this we believe, sets the tone for an entry & eventual jump into the career oriented graduation stream.

But, I somehow feel, the things have changed or constantly changing, from the perspective of students.
Students appearing for XII boards seem to be much calmer & confident. One of the reasons may be, it being their second outing & experience of appearing for boards, after X boards. Good for them.

At the same time, I have noticed that most of the students at this stage of their academic pursue are not ready or prepared to commit on any particular onward course of studies.

I remember our school & college days in 1990's, when these used to be our all important stepping stone to launch ourselves for higher studies and which also used to set tone for what we actually wanted to become professionally in the career to follow.
May be, limited choices of academics during those times helped us with better clarity pertaining to the same.

Today, the choices are immense, much beyond usual Science, Commerce & Arts. Each of these primary fields of studies now have umpteenth number of sub-choices, leading to or can say branching out to many unknown and unexplored territories of career & profession.

Every year or an alternate, a new subject, a new stream is launched into the mainframe.
And thus, the approach to look towards academics is changed.

More and more inclination towards liberal arts education is seen, where it offers flexibility to the students with respect to their area of interest & strengths.

But in no way it means that students are not thinking or going for core careers pertaining to medicine, engineering or finance.

Yes there are students with strong grip over technical subjects like Mathematics, Physics, Biology and also much clear about their course of studies to be pursued.
But what I am hinting at is, that the volume of students (would rather mention "unsure" students) is increasing every year, who are ready to throw their weights or experiment on any unusual, little offbeat and apparently challenging stream of academics or profession.
And while choosing so, interestingly, their attention to the "pay pack" is secondary.

In anywayz, not going into much details about the intricacies of various opportunities available in today's times, the fact remains that for us parents, who are with school of conservative thoughts, would like to see our children to be sincere in what they study, sustain focus (feel pity for them in these times of electronic distractions) and have clarity about their future.

And quite obviously, who wouldn't like their child to be consistent enough to walk his path towards secured future which they have seen/dreamt for themselves.

So, between outgoing winter and welcoming of the summer, we have these few dayz, which tests our temperament to the extremes.
Let's keep enjoying these times which give us enough spice & space to talk, argue and debate.
At least it is one thing which invariably unites all the students at one side and all what-so-called chasers at the other. ;-)

Once again, wishing best of the luck to all the students (more of that to the parents) to perform at their best, justifying their abilities.

Small request to all my young friends.
If possible, try to understand at least a little from your parent's perspective, when they are trying to help you to pull yourself out of your compulsive addiction towards electronic gadgets, which you are stuck with even during the times which demands more of your focus and personal attention.

By - Sanjay Jogani
21stFeb'2018
Mumbai. India.
sanjay-jogani.blogspot.com

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