|
Edupreneurship
By Professor
Gnanaharan
May 2006
The ongoing controversy and conflict on the thorny issue of Reservation
brings to the fore the age-old friction between economics and politics. Every
right-thinking and well-meaning individual would unanimously be of the view
that any purposive development effort should be as inclusive as it could. In
other words, every section of the society should take part in the development
process to make themselves eligible for sharing the bounty.
There is obviously a near unanimity among development planners that less
privileged or marginalized sections of the society should be given special
attention. Concurrence with the objective does not however mean commonality
of approach. The dominant view held by the majority pins their hope on
Reservation Policy. A small but an increasingly influential section of the
society strongly believes in what is now come to be referred as
"affirmative action". Reservation per se can not guarantee a
lasting solution.
Students belonging to the forward castes particularly in the North have taken
to the streets worrying about their opportunities for entry dimming. An ideal
solution should try to address the special concerns of the Backward Class
students without affecting the normal prospects of the Forward Caste
students.
In this respect, it is worth quoting Tim Harford's best selling book
"The Undercover Economist". Tim raises a pertinent question which
is very relevant here. "Can we enlist markets to help with fairness? Is
it true that we have to choose between the efficiency of perfect markets and
the fairness of benevolent government intervention?". Tim leans to the
Nobel Prize winning economist, Kenneth Arrow in defense of this argument.
Arrow proved that not only are all perfect markets efficient, all efficient
outcomes can be achieved using a competitive market, by adjusting the
starting point.
Adjusting the starting point here could be taken to mean developing the
competency, building the commitment and preparing the less advantaged
students to perform as well as the others. Reservation on the other hand is
more like removing the entry barriers or having different 'bars' for
different sections of the students. This would enable those students to reach
the bar who would otherwise fail to cross the bar. But removal of entry
barriers do not ensure successful performance. If entry itself is considered
as an indicator of success, then obviously something important is being
sacrificed. Reservation is easy to introduce but would hardly serve the
purpose.
So what is needed is committed individuals who are passionate about
developing people. Stated otherwise, the old system of Gurukul has to be
reinvented in line with today's changes to meet the requirements. An ecletic
system which combines the virtues of Gurukul with that of the market
mechanism would address this problem comprehensively. A new breed of
edupreneurs should commit themselves to this cause.
Outcome orientation of the system can be brought out by measuring how well
the students fare in the examination and how prepared they are for the job
market. Fees for the economically poor, backward caste students should be
borne by the Government itself. In addition to that, some kind of an
incentive system can be built into the whole thing for recognising and
rewarding those edupreneurs who produce superior results on the above scores.
Broadly speaking, the above kind of mentoring can take place at two different
ways or places. Either educational institutes can go forward and do the
finishing or the employing companies can backward integrate into preparing
the students "market-ready". In both the cases, the edupreneurs
play a decisive role. All these are happening already in some measure or
other and in some form or other, but in a very small way. These sporadic
moves on the part of few institutes or companies should become all
encompassing movement.
India's demographic advantage at the global level provides a perfect launch
pad for such a futuristic initiative of developing tomorrow's Knowledge
Workers -not just for India but for the entire world. Window of opportunity
for India would remain open at least for the next 15-20 years giving enough
space and time for taking advantage of this global opportunity.
|