"With every passing day, the world seems to be getting more crazy! Jobs are no longer satisfying nor easy to find. Education and housing costs are sky rocketing and people are having difficulty to find life partners or stay married. If you are already married then balancing work and family life AND to stay happy and healthy seems to be an impossible task! If all these were not enough, new technologies like Artificial Intelligence and Robotics are giving sleepless nights to workers across the world and across all Industries and forcing them to ask the question: How can I compete with a robot that can do everything I can do and even better than me at a fraction of the cost?
Its time to ask ourselves, what does the future for our children look like? What should they aspire to be? Will the current education system help them succeed in the world? What are our options? Read our Home Schooling Blog to know more.
I truly enjoyed my primary school life with inspiring teachers, lots of play, arts and crafts, co-curricular activities and school tours. When I reached High school in 1993, my misery with education started. Everything was to be taken seriously and we were asked to put our brains into learning subjects rather than the real world. I was not very happy with the topics being taught and I found it hard to understand how those topics could help me learn to realize my dream which was to fly and become a pilot someday! I was made School Captain in my 7th and in 10th standards as I was very outspoken, topped in my class etc etc.
My Pre-University life will be remembered for all bad reasons. I was terribly ragged by unruly seniors on day ONE in a moving bus even before I reached the college! Then another round of ragging in the campus even though I tried to hide myself in the library and finally one last round of ragging in the bus on the journey back to home. What a shock to someone who thought college was a temple of education!
I tried to immerse myself into books and went to the college library. I was very happy to see some good books on Computers and when I happily requested to study them, I was told they are reserved only for SC/ST students. Oh, so this problem will exist as long as I am in this college? I didn't know what to say.. May be I dialled the wrong number and ended here? Then I realised that my city Kolar Gold Fields has been a Constituency reserved for Scheduled castes ever since it was established. I felt like an untouchable in the temple of knowledge.
It was not just people and rules in the college, but also the subjects that troubled me, first I was forced to select Electronics as my stream (due to availability) where as I was already good at computers and wanted to pursue that as my career. Why cant students choose what they want to study?
Second, the teachers in this stream were really sub-standard and hence we had to study the subjects ourselves. The concept of a college for me was a place of higher learning where Gurus impart valuable life education to aspiring students who want to change the world - thats what I have been imagining since childhood.. but here, most students came to have fun and focus on establishing their love lives. I hardly visited college and tried to study on my own. I was even fined and made to sit in detention for 2 weeks for not attending the classes else I could not take up the exams.
Finally I landed in a merit seat in the only Engineering college in my city. Again, I was in "Electrical and Electronics" stream due to my ranking instead of Computers which was my choice. I wondered why I had to compete with students across the state to get admission into a college that was right in front of my home? I begged them to change my stream to Computers, they said sure, that will be a paid seat and will cost Rs.2L per year. I could not afford that, I was torn apart.
Everyone tried to convince me to simply study the course I was allotted and pass the exams - its was not necessary to really understand the subjects or to become an expert in that field. When it is time for Job hunting the employers really do not care which engineering course you have completed as long as you have the completion certificate with a decent score. It is their burden to train you again so that you can become useful for them! This kind of reality made me super angry and shocked at the same time! How can the system be so illogical?
It then dawned upon me that I was just getting a certificate and no knowledge to become a real engineer. An Engineer who can do things on his own and knows his field and is ready to join the big companies to assist them! No that was not the intention of the course. It was a system to paste "I am just another Engineer, dont ask me tough questions" label on our foreheads and provide a fancy certificate in our hands, it was not a place to get Engineering skills, leadership and a vision to transform the society for good! Nope! May be great engineers are made only in IITs or MITs, I am not sure about it so I can't comment on it, as I fall under the "rest of us" category.
Everyone in my class diligently studied the subjects in the semesters and almost always purged their brain of that knowledge so that they can make space for the next semester, just like a snake sheds its old skin to avoid dead weight (sadly, knowledge seems to be their dead weight in this case). These students passed with flying colors as I struggled to get even a decent score. I even failed in few subjects to my shock. I felt dejected and as a complete failure, my dream of becoming a computer Engineer was coming a disastrous end.
Then, being desperate and confused I was completely stagnated in my life with no future. Thankfully, I have a habit of speaking to my heart and after lot of conversations, it became clear that I need to believe in higher purpose of our life and long term success than being too worried about the materialistic man-made rules, systems and short term success or failures.
The education system I was part of seemed illogical, chaotic, commercial and the students and parents in it seemed confused, manipulated and dumbly following rules without understanding the bigger picture or the long term effect on them. I was never like that, I always questioned everything and only did what felt ethical, logical and constructive. I did not want to be part of the system which seemed flawed.
One day, I simply dropped out my college and never returned to formal college education.
Then I built my life in my own terms - this will be a separate blog post.
Now at 45 and happily retired from my IT career, I can say I do not regret my decision, I would do the same again if I had a chance, only much earlier in my life!
In my IT career I self taught myself all the skills, gave the best in every job and role, earned my way up in every organisation, moved from job to consulting, offering my consulting services for over 18 years, worked directly under top CEOs of million dollar companies across the world, travelled over 10 countries, earned money in silicon valley standards - all these in a work from home setup, while spending time with my family and home schooling our child. Now settled in a remote village surrounded my nature, I have everything I need and also got my pilot license!
How is all this relevant to the Home Schooling Journey of our child?
Well, if you have not suffered enough due to the ill effects of our current education system then you may not be ever fully motivated to consider home schooling and other alternate education options. My journey as described above was very crucial in deciding to go for Home schooling for our child so that she does not have to make the same mistakes as we did.
Infact the origin of the word "School" in greek means a place for leisure and discussion. What has our current education become?
Despite knowing current education system is not relevant and helpful for our child, we took 5 long years to decide on whether we should home school our daughter or not. It was not an easy decision for us as we were risking a lot and we did not have anyone to mentor us. But we decided to go ahead in the best interest of our child keeping the ongoing world situation in mind. There is a lot more to share, more posts will be coming soon.
This is our journey and we are happy to share it with the world hoping it can help anyone considering home schooling.
- Sadha Founders
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Want to talk to someone who has home-schooled their child to really understand this process and risks? Do you need some life advise on this direction that may affect your family, work and social life? Don't worry, we are here to help!! We have been there and gone through a lot of madness before we reached some balance. The risks are totally worth it!
Email us at info@sadha.org and we will be happy to share our own experience of how we home schooled our daughter since the last 12 years. Remember, you as parents alone can understand and decide what is really good for your child, not the current education system, not the society and not even your relatives! All can share their opinions, but the decision is yours. All the best!
Email: info@sadha.org
