Public vs Private Schools

Private vs Public schools 

It is said that a school is a second home for a child. It is where children spend most of their time. Here they learn, interact, teach and also experience some of the most important lessons of their lives. The learnings can be both academic as well as practical learning. These learnings eventually shape their professional as well as private lives which will contribute to society. School is one of the most important institutions in building the nation too. The students at schools are taught information which can be assimilated in their daily lives and in society. For its importance, many people from different backgrounds have their own perspective on whether ‘education should be privatized or not.’

I have had an opportunity to experience both public as well as private schools. Private schools and public schools are the major education systems in Nepal. In public schools, the monetary resources and other materialistic resources are usually provided by the government. Hence, the fee charged at public school is less compared to private school because they are funded by the government.
On the other hand, private schools have the complete upper hand over the free structure. Private schools usually rely on their student’s fees and external donations. This has led the private school to be more expensive and inaccessible for the economically challenged family. Therefore, critics of private school argue that private school has been used as a platform to conduct business and gain profit rather than provide quality service. However, parents are still more inclined towards choosing private schools for their children, I believe that even my own parents would choose private school over public school. Though the fee might be on the high end at private schools, their quality service is what attracts their customers.
The facilities could be better at public schools as they sustain regular funds by the government, however, due to their failure of utilizing the available resources as well as limited knowledge of using such resources plays a great role in failing to provide standard education.

Class size in the above-mentioned systems is also another important aspect to look into. I have seen that in public school, the class size is larger compared to private schools.  The teacher-student ratio in the classroom can have an adverse effect on the teaching method as well.
The teacher might be exhausted due to a large number of students or are unable to give the required attention to the individual students. This will consequently influence the overall learning of the students. Private schools can utilize the funds that are available at their disposal from their high-budget fees in hiring experienced as well as trained teachers. Likewise in public schools, according to Grossberg in her article 5 major differences between public and private school, she states ‘public school teachers always need to be certified, private school teachers often don’t need formal certification.’
Nevertheless, even such certified and experienced teachers sometimes show reluctance in focusing on the comprehensive learning of the students. Limited monitoring and evaluation systems in such schools have induced such attitudes among teachers.

Even for their worthy service, private schools are better than public schools to a certain extent, however, there are rooms for improvement. For instance, private school has been praised for their quality service however, the students in private schools are also prone to rote learning.
For me because of the competitive environment which I was in at school. I had to achieve a very high percentage, hence, I would rote learn the context whether I understood the context or not. Also, higher grade attainment in private school may be prevalent, but they limit themselves when it comes to creativity.

It should not be an issue as to where a student should be sent to learn - Public or Private as long as the quality remains. As widely known, ‘Today’s children are tomorrow’s future.’ We should ensure we are giving the correct guidelines to these children who will once build our nation.

Defying the traditional method of learning!

At Canopy Nepal, we focus on promoting interactive learning to make our students independent learners and foster their well-rounded development. We run various programs to ignite the love of reading, writing, listening and speaking among our participants.

Often, we see children are encouraged to adapt in traditional rote learning techniques where children are likely to memorize the context instead of understanding it. The students study for the grades and not for the long term learning, which is a serious problem. We see this happening in public schools but the private schools are not as good as we tend to think. This trend has affected students from private schools as well. Following the trend, we can safely assume, that the mentality of the society is still in the primitive era. We still judge a student by their obtained marks and not the knowledge and the skills they have.

Every student is different from another, that is why we need to approach every student differently. For this, we need to introduce interactive learning to make the students independent learners. Interactive learning is where students are encouraged to self-study by engaging the students in the lesson through interactive activities. In class, we only use pen and paper as a means to learn but interactive learning can involve computers, videos, speakers and projectors which could tap into the different sensory receptors of the student.

Even though we are aware of the negatives of rote learning, why is it still practiced?  There are many reasons why this is happening. One of the reasons is the limited resources and lack of awareness among teachers to be able to add interactive activities in the standard pedagogy for the students. However, interactive lessons do not necessarily have to be more costly. It usually requires a bit of effort and willingness to conduct a different, but a more engaging learning experience.

How can we practice interactive learning techniques? Learning shouldn’t just be limited to one form but must be fused with, aural, verbal, physical, logical, social and solitary learning styles.

We should all try to incorporate interactions between an adult and a child in order to enhance the quality of the learning material for the children. They should be excited to learn something rather than the feeling of being burdened when they come to class every day. Interactive learning could be any activity which involves participation from every child within the classroom. For instance, we could conduct interactive activities beyond the four walls of the classroom where children can learn while having fun. Some of these interactive activities are poem interpretations, video screening, ‘mero daar’(my fear), ‘Why I love my teacher’, board race and many more. All of these interactive activities aid the student in enhancing different skills.

Understanding the importance of learning, we should use it not only for an academic environment but for all learning experience so that together we can prepare today’s students for life.

Written by: Sabanam Thapa

Edited by: Hriya Kafle

A Step towards Sustainability

Our lives which has been made so much easier by the accursed virtue is gradually progressing towards an imprecation. The resources on earth that made modern world possible is finite. It should have been long approached that it is our responsibility and the major need to practice sustainability in our everyday lives. We have come so far into the perdition that it is now an irrational concept to revert all the damage that has already been done.

The development activities that offer people several kinds of opportunities leading to community’s growth has done harsh environmental repercussions. The importance of environmental awareness has induced greener practice initiatives among businesses including construction companies. It is of primal importance that building construction projects surround and embrace the concept of sustainability which concerns with not only protecting the environment, but also with using economical and environment friendly materials, and encouraging efficient use of resources.

The new school reconstruction project by ‘Kids of Kathmandu’ uses sustainable and economical building materials due to the progression towards the understanding that it isn’t enough to just ensure that the resources are being used in an efficient way, but is now more crucial to understand the measures we use for our reconstruction activity in terms of the impact on the community, and the environment.

“With 60 percent local sand-mixed soil, 20 percent clay, 15 percent construction aggregates and five percent cement, Rammed Earth Solutions constructs sustainable houses without using any machines.” (Gautam, 2017) Since the main ingredient is soil, it is cheap and is locally available which means reduced cost of transporting construction materials to the site. The earth-built walls need not to be painted or plastered due to its unique final texture, and are non-toxic and non-pollutant. To add up to its value, rammed earth buildings regulate the indoor relative humidity which, in turn, produces comfortable indoor conditions.

The decision to work using Rammed Earth Solutions has introduced to sustainable earthquake resistant building technologies and materials which allows its focus towards factors such as indoor environment quality and sustainable building materials. With the already established system inclusive of a set of complementary facilities in each of its rebuilt schools, Kids of Kathmandu sets towards green building as a future for its school reconstruction project where the school pivots on renewable energy, while it has already been sustaining with water conservation measures and environmental sanitation initiatives.

Reference:
1. Gautam, Nikeeta. 2017. October 10. 12:23:56. Eco-friendly Building with Rammed Earth. New Business Age. Blog.

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Sujita Mahat is currently working with 'Kids of Kathmandu' as a Project Manager.