Summum Bonum

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Here is a delicious news item, dateline Hyderabad, DC, Sept 9

Carrot - and - Stick

"Teachers will now be held accountable for the performance of school students. At the end of every academic year, if the performance of students in a particular subject or class is below 60%, the subject teacher and the class teacher concerned will be held accountable for the poor result and the government will impose a penalty on such teachers.

In the case of private teachers, the penalty would be up to Rs 10,000, while in case of government teachers, the government will impose cuts in increments and promotions.

...Meanwhile, if the performance of the students in a particular subject or class is above 90%, the subject teachers or class teachers will be recommended by the local authorities for the best teacher award at the district or the state level..."

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Ha, I see enormous scope for a gigantic new scam here.

If only IIT KGP had implemented this nice policy, I would have been the recipient of a dozen Best Teacher Awards...

This reminds me of a morning a couple of years after my joining KGP when I was walking along the ground floor corridor smoking the default fag gaily after a lecture class.

Suddenly Ghoshal-da, Secretary to our HoD, Prof HNB, called me and slipped a Note into my hands asking me to run to the NA Dept immediately...they were all waiting for the Physics Representative under the benign HoD (NA), affectionately called Daddy Mitra of the 'chicken and my wife' fame:

http://gpsastry.blogspot.com/2011/01/words-worth.html

On reading the thing I got to know that there was a Board of Examiners Meeting in Daddy Mitra's Office.

I couldn't make out what it was all about and walked into HNB's Office to get some funda from him.

He then told me that in our system then, at the end of every year, the HoD of each Dept conducts a Review Meeting of the Results of his Dept in which teachers of all concerned departments are called up. The HoD would go through all the Failure Cases and closely quiz the concerned teacher (or his representative) why his genius student was failed in Physics, say, it being understood that since all IITians are the cream of the country, the teacher must be at fault in all Failure Cases, by default.

I told HNB that I never taught NA students. He replied that the concerned teacher is an adamant individual lacking sympathy and so I am being sent instead.

He then said that Daddy Mitra didn't have the authority to add grace marks in Physics, while I would be having, as the hallowed proxy for HNB. And he told me that if Daddy Mitra wants to add up to 2 marks, I should relent after much cajoling; but for anything more than that I should decline firmly saying:

"Physics is a tough subject!!!"

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In our School Anniversary once there was a popular play called Vapas.

A smart student X wants to fail in his final exam, because he is badly in need of money...the private Convent School in which he was studying had the policy of Full Fee Refund for failed students.

The Principal wanted to save money and pass all students.

When X insists that he ought to be failed since he learned NOTHING from the School, the Principal asks X to appear before a Grand Viva Board, in which he would be examined.

And X is surrounded by teachers of all subjects. And intentionally gives wrong and absurd answers to all questions in English, Telugu, Science, Social Studies etc.

Finally it is the turn of the Math Teacher who looks at X benignly and says that all his answers are wrong and so his claim on refund is justified.

And asks X to calculate the refund amount to which he is entitled with a 14% interest.

X is jubilant and goes through the calculation mentally and comes up with the sum.

Upon which the Math Teacher says that X passed in Math gloriously giving the right answer for a formidable question on Compound Interest and he is awarding him 200% marks...toting which with the poor marks in other subjects, X passes gloriously in the Aggregate...

X is left fuming helplessly.

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Lala

Ayaz Memon writes in DC's Sports Page that today, 9/11, happens to be the Birth Centenary Day of the legendary Indian Cricketer, Lala Amarnath.

'...Lala was the first Indian to make a Test century on debut; indeed he was the country's first centurion. When he made 118 in the second innings of the first Test of the 1933-34 series against Douglas Jardine's team at the Bombay Gymkhana, it is reported that the spectators went delirious and many women yanked off their mangalsutras to present it to the 21-year-old hero..."

gps: I was told that something similar happened to the handsome Abbas Ali Beg...on his way back to the pavilion, a cute maiden ran in to him and planted a sensuous kiss.


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