Let talent flourish

The unusual case of an Indian student who dropped out of formal schooling in this country but got admission into America’s renowned Massachusetts Institute of Technology is a lesson for us on how our education system has become so rigid and rule-bound. Even our famed IITs, due to their strict regulations about minimum marks and school-leaving certificates, refused to let Malvika Raj Joshi study science, despite her undoubted talent. Our scholastic systems are so exam marks-oriented and favour learning by rote that there’s little scope for extraordinary talent to shine except in competitions that are outside the school curriculum as in coding, computer programming and Maths Olympiads. Our higher education institutions are too pedantic to allow anything but exam marks and tests to determine a child’s talent or innate strengths. The Chennai Mathematical Institute, founded to honour prodigy Srinivasan Ramanujan’s memory, was the exception that could see the light and offer her training.

Malvika, of course, had an advantage in that she had supporting parents and her mother dedicated herself to defining her “unschooling” curriculum. She was bright enough to win medals in informatics contests, giving her the chance to catch the eye of MIT. As a society we are too busy handling the huge numbers involved in basic education to be able to look for bright kids outside the system. Those who come through despite the system like Malvika help us celebrate the fact that talent abounds in our country. We must find a way to discover and encourage such talent.