Improving education part 3
Today every Asian country has plans to improve their education systems. India has a plan to build more schools (50,000 colleges and 1,000 universities) to educate its large population. China has a plan to modernize most schools with computers and advanced technologies. The Philippines has a plan to increase the number of healthcare colleges to meet demand of nurses and healthcare workers worldwide. Thailand, Malaysia, and Indonesia all have plans to expand their universities with modern buildings, and better facilities etc.
It seems that every country wants to invest in physical things such as big buildings, more equipments, and modern facilities BUT big buildings and modern laboratories will NOT make their education better. To improve education, it must start with the TEACHERS and their working conditions. What I observed in some countries was the poor working conditions that many teachers must work (except in Japan, Singapore, and S. Korea). I think it is better to invest in improving these working conditions than to build more facilities or equipment that only look good from the outside.
Last year, when I taught in Asia, a government officer explained his plan: “We want to model our education after the U.S.; we want to improve our universities so they can be world class like Harvard or Stanford. We want to build a modern technology park like “Silicon Valley” for our country.” I told him: “Harvard and Stanford are NOT known for their modern buildings but the quality of their education and their professors. If you visit them, you will see that they have many old buildings, some were built in the 19th century. Silicon Valley did not start as a technology park with modern equipments and tall buildings. The fact is it started in the old garages of Mr. Hewlett and later at the garage of Steve Jobs' parents. Silicon Valley is NOT known because of its facilities but the skills of engineers working there. Basically, you are modeling the wrong thing with your massive building plan.”
The key factor to improve education begins with the teachers. They need better trainings, smaller class size, better access to new teaching materials, and most of all better salaries so they can focus on their jobs. Compare with teachers in the U.S, Asian teachers are making much less, many are struggling with the rising cost of living. In addition to low salaries, Asian teachers have to deal with large class sizes, few resources, and long working hours. That explains why many good teachers left the education field for other careers and it impacts the quality of education, as well as adding burden to the system that already has shortage of qualified teachers.
Because of larger class, students do not have opportunities to ask questions or discuss materials with teachers. They are not encouraged to express their own opinions but have to keep quiet and passively listen to the teacher. Large class size increases the amount of works for teachers; take away the needed time for them to improve their teaching materials or learn new things to keep up with technology changes. In large class, teachers have to spend more efforts to manage and control students' activities rather than focus on teaching. Basically, this working conditions and the archaic “exam focused” method have reduced students' learning into a “limited knowledge” just barely enough for them to pass exam, get degree but NOT enough to develop the needed skills for them to work in the industry.
Today students need more knowledge about the globalized world in addition to the technical knowledge related to their field of study. Today teachers need more knowledge on effective teaching methods, materials, and better class size so they can do what they do best: Teaching. With large classes, poor working conditions and archaic teaching method, education cannot be improved. As the economy changes and being impacted by global events, education improvement is becoming critical for society to meet the challenge of the changing world. There is an old saying: “Bad doctors would kill few patients but bad teachers would destroy the whole generation.” For education improvement, top priority must be put on the teachers' trainings and their working environment, not on more building or equipments.
Sources
- Blogs of Prof. John Vu, Carnegie Mellon University
