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| EDUCATION TRIBUNE |
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Widening ‘class’ inequity
Bullying in cyberworld differs from that in school
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Widening ‘class’ inequity EDUCATION in recent times has merely been restricted to the completion of syllabi and awarding of degrees. With the mushrooming of private elitist schools, colleges and universities all over the country, education is a commodity that can be purchased with money. With a heightened consciousness about the brands, people are ready to dispense with any amount of money in order to ensure that their wards get into the most prestigious institutions, irrespective of the quality of education offered by them. The number of self-financed courses within the public-funded universities, too, has multiplied, where every seat is sold for a huge amount. These have tremendous implications for society, which also happens to include the poor who cannot afford to send their wards to these institutions. One very significant consequence is the altogether different structure of ‘classroom culture’, where one finds children only from the rich, upper class, affluent, educated and elitist families, of an absolutely homogeneous composition. This may be contrasted with the traditional government schools where a ‘class’ of students would consist of children from all strata of society, different caste, income, occupational and religious groups, making a very mixed kind of lived experience. I recall my own experience at a government school where I completed my matriculation. Throughout my schooling, I had been interacting with classmates who came from diverse status groups, viz., bureaucrats, principals, teachers, domestic maids, rickshaw-pullers, sweepers, and so on. Most of my friends in school and college belonged to very poor families, who would every day be confronted with a new problem, of financial or some other nature. This made me extremely sensitive towards others. I have realised that no single situation can possibly be equally comfortable for all of us sharing similar spaces. Today, when my students plan to organise tours or cultural functions in the university, they start with lofty ideas of celebrations, with a huge financial input. But being a public institution, I am happy that we have all kinds of students, very rich and very poor; and I appreciate when my students immediately read my mind and promise to organise the events according to the lowest common denominator, so that everybody can participate equally. I wonder about a ‘class’ which is comprised of all rich, affluent and probably spoilt children of high-profile parents, with absolutely no possibilities of encounters with young students coming from marginalised and poor sections. How can such students develop sensitivity towards not-so-fortunate ones, for whom life is far from a perpetual celebration? A classroom to me is the most productive educative experience, where the young children get sensitised to the fact that there are other faces of life, too; that there are other children who do not have wardrobes as big as theirs; that there are children who come to the ‘class’ without a penny in their pockets; that there are children who have no stories to share about their homes, parents, trips abroad and so on. A ‘class’ has to have the flavour of representativeness if by education we mean serious business. Ironically, it is these elitist ‘class’ students who later assume the roles of government officials, bureaucrats, policy makers and teachers, often supposed to be carrying out the state-run programmes for the welfare of the poor, marginalised and deprived. Is education only the completion of syllabi? What about the lived-in experiences which are more deep seated, penetrating and enduring than the lessons which can be mugged up and vomited out in examinations? In a society like ours, where a huge majority of population comprises of lower-middle and middle-class people, how can the educational spaces be overpopulated by the stinking rich class, occupying a small miniscule portion of our population? In the process, children of middle-class parents too get completely swept by the charms of the rich spoilt brats (both genders), trivialising the lessons of education. This situation to a large extent would explain why our students in schools, colleges and universities are so disrespectful towards teachers (with many incidents of violence against their own teachers); insensitive towards their institutions, with a very destructive attitude towards the public property within educational institutions; below mark and very incompetent in terms of knowledge of their own subject and general awareness. In fact, the classroom is the microcosm of the larger society that we wish to project; and the new ‘class’, elitist in character, blinds our young children towards the huge population that surrounds them. While we boast of human rights, distributive justice, gender equality and good governance, can we afford to evolve such a ‘classroom’ in our schools, colleges and universities? The sooner we set our house in order, the better! The writer is Chairperson,
Departments of Sociology and Women’s Studies, Panjab University, Chandigarh |
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Bullying in cyberworld differs from that in school WASHINGTON: The dynamics of online bullying are different from traditional bullying, a University of British Columbia research has found. The finding suggests that anti-bullying programmes need specific interventions to target online aggression. “There are currently many programmes aimed at reducing bullying in schools and I think there is an assumption that these programmes deal with cyberbullying as well,” said Jennifer Shapka, an associate professor in the Faculty of Education at UBC. “What we’re seeing is that kids don’t equate cyberbullying with traditional forms of schoolyard bullying. As such, we shouldn’t assume that existing interventions would be relevant to aggression that is happening online,” she said. The study involved 17,000 Vancouver, B.C. students in Grades 8 to 12 and 733 Vancouver, B.C. youth aged 10-18 were questioned in another follow-up study. Results of the studies show that about 25-30 per cent of youth report that they have experienced or taken part in cyberbullying, compared to 12 per cent of youth who say they’ve experienced or taken part in schoolyard bullying. However, “Youth say that 95 per cent of what happens online was intended as a joke and only 5 per cent was intended to harm,” said Shapka. “It is clear that youth are underestimating the level of harm associated with cyberbullying,” she noted. According to Shapka, the findings suggest that in cyberbullying adolescents play multiple roles — as bullies, victims, and witnesses — and “downplay the impact of it, which means that existing education and prevention programmes are not going to get through to them.” “Students need to be educated that this ‘just joking’ behaviour has serious implications,” she said. Being victimised online can have consequences for a person’s mental health, developmental well-being, and academic achievement, according to Shapka. In extreme cases, there have been reports of suicide. Traditional bullying, or schoolyard bullying, is often associated with three main characteristics: a power differential between bully and victim, a proactive targeting of a victim, and ongoing aggression. Shapka indicated research is beginning to show that cyberbullying does not necessarily involve these three characteristics. Traditional power differentials — size and popularity — do not necessarily apply online. There also seems to be more fluid delineation between the roles youth play; it is not unusual for an individual to act in all capacities — bullies, victims, and witnesses — online. Previous work by Shapka and her colleagues has shown that in contrast to traditional bullying, cyberbullying is rarely associated with planned targeting of a victim. — ANI |
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Campus NoteS Guru Nanak Dev University, Amritsar GURU Nanak Dev University has postponed its annual theory examinations for BA, B.Sc and B.Com scheduled to be held on April 22. The examinations will now be held on April 23, 27 and May 29. Professor R. K. Mahajan, Professor in charge (Examinations), said the changes in the examination schedule were made due to administrative reasons. However, there would be no change in examination centers, he added. The examinations for B.Com Part-III—Punjabi (compulsory) and Punjab history and culture; B.Com (professional) Part-II—Paper III: cost accounting); Bachelor of Performing Arts Part-IV—applied theory, theatre art/music-vocal/kathak/dance/tabla); Bachelor of Fine Arts Part-III—aesthetics, common with applied art and painting; B.Sc (fashion designing) Part-I—Paper-III: traditional textiles); B.Sc. (home science) Part-III—textile science and traditional textile; and Bachelor of Food Science and Technology (honours) Part-I—general English will be held on April 23. While the examinations for BA/B.Sc Part-III—English (elective)-A, Punjabi (elective)-A/Hindi/Urdu-I/Persian-I/Russian-I/French-A, electronics-C and chemistry-III will be held on April 27, the examinations for BA/B.Sc Part-I—mathematics-III, zoology-B—will be held on May 29. Blood group testing camp NSS Unit I of the Law Department organised a blood group testing-cum-donation camp at the student centre of the university recently. Over 500 students got themselves registered for blood testing and as many as 133 students donated blood at the camp which was organised in association with the blood bank wing of Guru Nanak Dev Hospital. Inaugurating the camp, the Vice-Chancellor, Prof. A. S. Brar, emphasised that at least two such camps should be organised every year. The Vice-Chancellor also felicitated blood donors with star donor trophies. As many as 500 students registered themselves for blood testing and nearly 133 students donated blood. Senior scientist award Professor Ashwani Kumar Thukral, Professor of Botanical and Environmental Sciences and Director of Research of Guru Nanak Dev University has been awarded the prestigious Professor Pran Nath Mehra Memorial Senior Scientist Award for his outstanding research contributions in the field of environmental biology. This coveted award is conferred upon senior researchers and eminent scholars of excellent scientific acumen to commemorate the memory of late Prof. Mehra under the establishment of the Prof. Pran Nath Mehra Memorial Trust. Prof. Mehra was an internationally renowned expert in cytology and morphology of bryophytes and vascular plants. This award was constituted by his academic admirers for honouring outstanding scientists in the field of plant and environmental sciences. The award carrying a citation and a memento was presented to him collectively by Prof. V.K. Jain, Vice-Chancellor, Doon University, Uttarakhand, and Dr Rajneesh Arora, Vice-Chancellor, PTU, Jalandhar, at a special session organised during the recently held Punjab Science Congress at the university. Semester system The university has decided to introduce semester system in the undergraduate courses from the academic session 2012-13. The Academic Council at a meeting held recently at the Senate Hall of the university also approved the syllabus according to the semester system. The Vice-Chancellor, Professor A. S. Brar, presided over the meeting, while Dr Inderjit Singh, Registrar, presented agenda. Apart from Dr Rajinderjit Kaur Pawar, Dean, Academic Affairs, Deans of various faculties, heads of various departments and principals of the affiliated colleges were also present. — Contributed by G.S. Paul |
