STANDARDS OF TEACHING
I.-The Need for High Standards 1 Introduction. 2. Low Standard of Degrees. 3. Low Academic Standard of University Entrants. 4. Annual Wastage at the Intermediate Examination. 5. Causes of Low Standards in Schools and Intermediate Colleges. 6. Weakness in our Educational Machinery.
II.-The School and the University 7. Different Functions of a School and a University. 8. Functions of a School. 9. Functions of a University. 10. Standard of Admission to the University Courses and the Age of Entry. 11. Attitude of University Students. 12. Recommendation of the Calcutta University Commission.
III.-Secondary Education 13. Reform of Secondary Education. 14. Intermediate College.
IV.-Occupational Institutes 15. Occupational Institutes. 16. Urgent Need of Technicians.
V.-Refresher Courses 17. Refresher Courses for High School and Intermediate College Teachers. 18. Refresher Courses to be Organised by the Universities. 19. Co-operation between Schools and Universities. 20. Stimulus for Refresher Courses. 21. Time and Place for Refresher Courses.
VI.-Teaching and Examinations at the Universities 22. Low Standards. 33. Large Percentage of Third Divisioners. 24. B. Sc. Results. 25. Percentage of Marks for a Pass. 26. Average Low Standard of Experimental Work.
VII-Courses of Lou, Standards. Low Percentage of Passes and
Suggested Measures of Reform 27. Overcrowding in Colleges. 28. Resulting Evils. 29. Reduction of Numbers Recommended. 30. Limitation of Numbers in U.P. Universities and Colleges.
VIII.-Working Days and Vacations31. Insufficient Number of Working Days. 32. Minimum of 180 Days Exclusive of Examination Days. 33. Maximum Utilization of Working Days.
IX.-Methods of Instruction : Lectures 34. The Lecture Method. 35. The Need for Written Exercises. 36. Elementary Teaching. 37. Text-Books. 38. Compulsory Attendance. 39. Private Candidates. 40. Evening Colleges.
X.-Tutorials and Seminars. 41. What is Tutorial Instruction ? 42. What Does a Tutorial Involve ? 43. Object of Tutorials. 44. Teaching Staff for Tutorials. 45. Tutorials for all Undergraduates. 46. Tutorial is not Coaching for Examinations.
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47. Maximum Hours of Work for Teachers. 48. Practical Problems. 49. Seminars.
XI-Libraries 50. Importance of Libraries.51. Present Unsatisfactory Position. 52. Annual Grants for Libraries. 53. Open Access System. 54. Hours of Work. 55. Organisation of a Library. 56. Staff. 57. Students to be Made Book-Conscious. 58. Grants to Teachers for Books.
XII-Laboratories 59. Buildings. 60. Fittings. 60. Equipment. 62. Laboratory Workshops and Technicians.
XIII.-63. Recommendations
I.-The need for High Standards 1. Introduction-It is the primary duty of a university to main- tain the highest standards of its teaching and examinations. A university is a place of higher education where the personality and capacities of the students are developed to the utmost by teachers who should themselves be at work at the frontiers of knowledge in their respective fields. The success of a university is to be judged as much by the type of graduate it turns out as by the amount and quality of research contributed by its teachers and research students. It must be clearly recognized that there is no conflict involved between the twofold function of a university to educate its members and to advance the frontiers of knowledge-the two functions are, in fact, complementary. Unless high standards of teaching and examinations are maintained, research will suffer, since research can continue uninterruptedly only if there is a regular supply of graduates well prepared by general education for specialized research work. On the other hand, if research is neglected by teachers, their teaching will lack vitality and will rapidly become stale. A degree must always be what a university makes it by the kind of teaching it imparts and the type of intellectual and social life it provides for its members. If our universities are to be the makers of future leaders of thought and action in the country, as they should be, our degrees must connote a high standard of scholarly achievement in our graduates.
2. Low Standard of Degrees-Many of our witnesses have expressed the opinion that the average standards of our university teaching and examinations are low and one principal of a degree college maintained that an average graduate of an Indian university was not very much superior to a matriculate of a British university. This may be an exaggeration, but it is true that many of our universities do not compare favourably with the best of British and American universities in respect of their teaching and examination standards. Unless we ensure the highest standards of teaching in our universities,
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our degrees will not command recognition and respect either in our own country or abroad, and a large number of students will have to go abroad for their higher education. Our universities should maintain the academic character of the work on a level recognised as adequate by the universities of other countries. Universities are our national institutions, and to keep up our national prestige, our degrees must be such as to command international recognition. As long ago as 1921 the Lytton Committee emphasized the need for improving the standards of teaching in Indian universities and for making the highest types of training in all subjects available within the country. Although conditions in several universities have shown a marked improvement over those that obtained in 1921 and reasonable facilities in postgraduate and research work in several subjects standard of our degrees still remains on the low side. are now available at several universities and institutes, the average standard of our degrees still remains on the low side.
3. Low Academic Standard of ,'University Entrants-University teachers almost unanimously complain of the low academic standard of the average university entrant, and several of them have declared that a large majority of students come to the university so ill-prepared as to make it difficult for them to take advantage of university education, and that intermediate work is really school work, which should have been completed at the, high school stage. That the complaint is largely justified is shown by the large percentage of failures at the intermediate examination of the different universities and boards as seen in the following table
Average percentage
of "failures" dur-
Serial University or Board* ing the last 5 year
No. (1944-48) at the
intermediate exam-
ination
%
1. Banaras 37.6
2. Bombay 44.0
3 Gauhati 60.0
(1948 only)
4. Madras 59.4
5. Patna 43.5
+6. U.P. Intermediate Board 48.0
7. Utkal
*These 7 Universities and Boards have been picked out at random.
+The U. P. Intermediate Board has the highest percentage of passes in this list, but it may be noted that during the last 5 years (1944-48) the Board allowed 35% to 41% of it, candidates to appear privately for the Intermediate examination and passed 7% to 20% of the candidates with the help of grace marks. While in 1927 private candidates formed only 16% of the total number, in 1947 they had grown to 41%.
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That the annual wastage due to failures should range from 37.5 per cent to 60 per cent is staggering, if we bear in mind the fact that the intermediate examination in preceded by a similar process of screening two years earlier at the high school stage. But even with this high percentage of failures, the average standard of teaching and examinations is not high enough since we know that the minimum marks required for a pass are only 33 per cent and that a large majority of candidates pass in the third division. There is little doubt that this enormous wastage is due, firstly, to the large number of unsuitable entrants coming to the intermediate classes, secondly, to the poor average quality of teaching provided in the intermediate classes, and thirdly, to the laziness of, or insufficient work put in by, the students themselves.
4. Annual Wastage at the Intermediate Examination-That the annual wastage at the intermediate examination is so inordinately large and must be avoided has not been adequately realized either by the teachers or by parents or even by the Government which directly or indirectly finances intermediate and university education to a large extent. A deplorable wastage of public funds goes on year after year but what is worse, there is an unconcerned complacency about this serious loss of public funds on the one hand, and waste of time, energy and funds of students and their parents, besides terrible frustration of their hopes and aspirations on the other. Secondary schools and intermediate colleges form the foundation of university work. Any reorganization of our universities without a corresponding improvement in school and intermediate college teaching will not produce the hoped-for results. Our high school and intermediate standards are undoubtedly low, and in order to improve them we should not only exact a higher standard in these examinations but also considerably improve our teaching. We cannot raise examination standards unless we improve the quality of teaching first.
5. Causes of Low Standards in Schools and Intermediate Colleges-Our schools and intermediate colleges are congested and understaffed, and teachers are so ill-paid that generally only those graduates who fail to enter any other profession take to teaching as a last resort. Very few school teachers have a call for or take pride in their profession. Secondary education can only improve if a large number of first-rate graduates become school masters. While university standards cannot improve unless the quality of teaching in schools and intermediate colleges improves, it is for the universities to provide a continuous supply of highly trained and efficient teachers for these institutions. Reform should, therefore, begin at both ends.
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It is pertinent to recall that secondary schools in the neighbouring country of Ceylon maintain a much higher standard than we do in our country.
If we attain high standards in our high schools and intermediate Colleges, there should be less need for a large number of students to enter the universities at all. As a community we look down upon the school teacher and pay him as little as we can. A foreigner would be struck by the fact that we recruit so few of our college and university teachers from the ranks of school masters; in England and America many school teachers rise to be university teachers; in India the average standard of scholarship among school teachers is so low that they seldom qualify to become university teachers. If we are to raise the average standard of attainment of our school teachers, there is no reason why there should not be a larger percentage of teachers from our schools selected for teaching in our colleges and universities. The real need is to be able to offer salaries and prospects which will attract persons of first class ability for our schools.
6. Weakness in our Educational Machinery-One of the greatest needs of present day India is more education, widely spread through out the community. Fortunately, both the Government and the people are keenly alive to this pressing need, but they are not equally alive to the concomitant need of a strong emphasis on excellence in the quality of education so that there is no avoidable waste of public funds as it occurs now. Our provincial governments are naturally keen on "basic education" and are financing schemes for its wide extension, but unfortunately they do not seem to be equally keen on secondary education which is the real weak spot in our entire educational machinery. They have not fully realized that the army of competent teachers needed for the rapid expansion of basic education must be provided by our secondary schools and intermediate colleges. Further, any university reform will remain largely ineffective unless the level of secondary education is raised so as to furnish the necessary foundation for a sound university system.
II.-The School and the University. 7. Different Functions of a School and a University-In order to improve the organization of teaching and tests in our high schools and intermediate colleges on the one hand, and in our universities on the other, it is necessary at the outset that we should be clear as to the different functions of a school and a university. The function of a school is not merely to prepare students for the university but also to provide a suitable education for the large number of pupils who have no intention of proceeding to a university. From the
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figures available to us, we find that of the students that pass the high school examination, 50-55 per cent actually go up for the intermediate, while the remaining 45-50 per cent do not. The education of these two sets of students must be combined together in most multipurpose schools to mutual advantage. while there will be other uni-purpose schools where students will be trained for work in agriculture, industry and commerce.
8. Functions of a School-It is commonly stated that the func- tion of a school is to provide a' good general education to its, pupils', but it is necessary to know what exactly are the elements of this good general education which will not only prepare a pupil for university work, but at the same time prepare him for practical work to earn his living if he does not proceed to a university. A school should, of course, provide for adequate classroom intellectual discipline, but should at the same time place equal emphasis on the physical training and corporate activities of its pupils. It should, in fact, provide for the physical well-being of the pupils first, as no pupil can make satisfactory progress in school or later in the university or in a profession unless he is physically fit. Then, a pupil must take part in the corporate activities of the school and thu learn to subordinate himself under rule to the common will, and if he has the talent, to exercise leadership in the small community of his class. Along with these activities the school must develop and test the intellectual discipline and aptitude of its pupils. A school fails of its purpose if it neglects any of these three sides, of its pupils. Unfortunately it is only the third aspect that is attended to at present in most of our schools and that is why many boys leave the school physically ill-developed, socially ill-adjusted and unwilling to work in a team, even though they may secure good marks in their examination. The school must integrate the individual child into community life, impart to him useful information and develop in him necessary habits of intellectual effort.
9. Functions of a University-The university, on the other hand, should be a great meeting ground for young men and women, where they receive higher instruction from their teachers as well as prepare for life through contact with their contemporaries and their seniors. In the university an under-graduate must expect to be treated as a grown-up person; the formal discipline of the school must be loosened to give place to comparative freedom for the under-graduate to order his own life. In order that a student should profit from university education and its manifold opportunities, the university should ensure that all entrants are sufficiently mature for the kind
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of instruction it provides, and that they have had a broad general education and have reached (at least in 4 subjects) a standard of attainment adequate as a basis for the further study of these or other subjects at the university level.
10. Standard of Admission to the University Courses and the Age of Entry-Students arrive at the stage of maturity for university work at about the age of 18, though there are exceptional individuals who reach it earlier than 18. Before this age of maturity is reached, a boy or girl must stay under the formal discipline of a school and should be taught by the methods of the school and not by the methods of the university. That is why the British, the European and the American students are seldom admitted to a university before they are 18 or 19. In U.K. and U.S.A., and most European countries like Germany, France and Switzerland, at least 12 years of schooling are necessary before a student enters the university. In India most of the work now done in our present intermediate classes is really school work and should properly be regarded as pre-university work, as in U. K. and U.S.A. The real university work is done only for two years of the B.A. and the B.Sc. classes and that is why the standard of achievement of our average graduate is low. We, therefore, recommend that the standard of admission to the universities should be the present intermediate examination, to be taken by a student after completing full 12 years of study at a school and at an intermediate college, normally at the age of eighteen. This change will mean that students proceeding to a university for degree course will have the essentials of a good general education and will be more adequately prepared for university work ; they will be mature enough to look after themselves, will not be bewildered by the comparative freedom of university life and will, with intelligent self-interest, take better advantage of educational opportunities in the universities. Since most universities in India are situated in large towns, it is desirable to keep away young and immature students from crowding into these towns where conditions of life provide innumerable temptations and few restraining influences.
We must also look at the age of entry into the university from the point of view of 'the public' or rather the parent, as also from that of the boy or the girl. It is so difficult for many parents to decide what their sons and daughters between the ages of 14 and 18 will do and yet these are the most critical years of their lives. In most cases their circumstances are fluid; parents do not know whether the aptitudes of boys or girls will fit them for a university training ; the boys or girls do not clearly know what possibilities are open to them and the result is that, for want of any proper guidance, all those
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who can afford and even many of those that can ill-afford, whether they have the aptitude or not, flock to the university or a college far away from their homes. The universities and colleges, many of them anxious to augment their fee-income, admit as many students as they can to their intermediate and degree classes, irrespective of whether they are likely to pass or not at the end of the two years. There is little doubt that these colleges and universities commit an act of curelty towards those of their students who have no aptitude for university training.
11. Attitude of University Students-The average student in our universities brings with him the school attitude towards his studies. He expects to be treated Eke a schoolboy even in the university. He doer, not realize that it is his duty to study and not the teachers' duty to make him study. He does not make full use of the opportunities the university offers him and, therefore does not get proper advantage from the university. Unless he himself works and does a good deal of written work for his teachers to correct, he can- not get benefit out of his teachers. This attitude on the part of the students leads to another noticeable defect, i.e., the very slow rate of progress of work in the classes. In British and American univer- sities the rate of progress of work in a class is ever so much faster than in an Indian university with the inevitable result that they are able to cover a much larger ground in the same period of time and the contents of their syllabuses are fuller and richer.
12. Recommendation of the Calcutta University CommissionThirty years ago, the Calcutta University Commission recommended the institution of 'intermediate colleges' and also held that the intermediate examination should be the qualifying test for entry into a university. These recommendations were adopted only by the Government of the United Provinces and the teaching universities of U.P., Lucknow and Allahabad, and the affiliating university of Agra, admit students only after they have passed the intermediate examination. This step has been very beneficial to these uni- versities; freed from the burden of intermediate classes, they have been able to develop good post-graduate departments like those of the University of Calcutta, and have thus been doing more of real uni- versity work than many of the other universities. We certainly do not aim at uniformity in all the universities, as we do not consider that education all over the country should conform only to one pattern, but in the matter of admission to the university there should be a general recognition that intermediate examination should be the admission test for all the universities in the country.
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III.-Secondary Education 13. Reform of Secondary Education-While we are definitely of opinion that no student should be admitted to a university until he has passed the intermediate examination, we are equally convinced that the mere raising of the standard of admission to the, level of the present intermediate examination would not by itself improve the work of the universities. We must at the same time make better provision for the training of students at the high school and intermediate college level. In the present conditions of inefficient and uninspiring schools the four years of the life of a student, between the ages of 14 and 18, when his memory is most active and when his ability to do sustained intellectual work with the minimum of boredom is at its highest, are largely wasted. The abler students do not get a fair deal and are kept back by the less intelligentthe best are being smothered by the many. In fact, our secondary education needs radical reform.
14. Intermediate Colleges-The Calcutta University Commission (1 919) recommended the institution of Intermediate Colleges as "the very pivot of their whole scheme of reform". The essence of the proposal in its best form was that the two top classes of the present high school course were to be removed from the high schools and combined with the two years of the intermediate course in an entirely new type of institution called the Intermediate College. The intermediate College is to correspond to the Realschule or Gymnasium of Germany in which sound and liberal training is imparted to the students and in which opportunities of higher secondary education are adapted to the needs of industry, commerce and agriculture as well as medicine and engineering in all its branches. The aim of these colleges would be to meet a variety of needs of our young men by giving a vocational bias to their courses while retaining at the same time their value in a system of sound general education as a preparation for university courses. The essential qualities of a good education to be given at an intermediate college are admirably described in the following paragraph:-
"Education should be given under conditions favourable to the health of the pupils. Their bodies should be developed and trained by systematic and Vigorous exercise. Their eyes should be trained to see, their ears to hear, with quick and sure discrimination. Their sense of beauty should be awakened, and they should be taught to express it by music and by movement, and through line and colour. Their hands should be trained to skilful use. Their will should be kindled by an ideal and hardened by a discipline