I had the opportunity of working as a Marks verification Officer for the SSLC Examination (Tamil) at one of the valuation centers in Coimbatore in 1980. The Chief Examiners used to prepare mark lists and our work was to compare the marks with those found in the scripts and to make corrections, if any.
A new virus is spreading. It is seeping deep into our educational system. If it is not contained and destroyed immediately, it will multiply infinitely within a short time and engulf the whole organism of our educational system.
One day one of the chiefs came very late. When I asked him the reason he said, “Sir, for so long I have been arguing with one of my Assistant Examiners. He had awarded marks for an answer which was obviously incorrect. I asked him to score it off. But he refused to, because he says, the students must have referred to “Konar” notes and so we must award him full marks. I told him it was not proper because his answer was wrong. But he continued arguing with me as he thought the student had only reproduced the answer from a given guide that was available to students – Konar Notes – and so he must be given full marks. Whatever may be the reason for his wrong answer, our duty is only to see whether the answer is right – was still my emphatic reply. But he never caught my point. He maintained that he was championing the cause of students. I could not succumb to his arguments and finally I used my prerogative to score off the marks awarded by him for that particular answer.”
Mr. Raman (that was his name) was trembling with anger. He was not ready to compromise anything for truth. He reminded me of the scene in the famous film “Thiruvilaiadal” wherein the great Tamil scholar Nakkeerar dared to say even to Lord Siva , “O Maheshvar!! A mistake is a mistake even if you open your eye on your forehead.”
But days have changed. The attitudes have changed enormously. They have become too soft and tolerant. Teachers are also no exception to this change of attitude. They don’t want to call a spade a spade and thereby succumb to the wrath of the powers that be. To Keats beauty was truth and truth beauty and a thing of beauty was a joy forever. But should we not be the torch bearers of truth? Should we not uphold the truth at least for the sake of the joy it gives?
This lament is nothing but the outburst of agony and anguish over the innumerable mistakes found in the textbooks of today. And when logical errors abound, the fury finds no bounds and Nakkeerar enters our veins. But as the story goes, Nakkeerar was finally blessed and honoured for his virtue. What will be our fate if we call a spade a spade now? Our flood of furies will flow into desert land.
What is the cause for this abnormal change of attitude amongst us? Is it due to the passage of time? May be. But the rate of change is not normal. Nakkeerar is separated from us by two millenniums and Raman by two decades. The change occurred in two millenniums is nothing perceivable because, in the 1980’s that is, during the days of Mr. Raman, the text books contained one or two mistakes here and there. Teachers never failed to show their anguish then and there. But during these two decades the deterioration of attitude has taken astronomical proportions. Before Raman it was the reciprocal of exponential function.
The relation between the number of mistakes in books and the reaction by the teachers can very well be explained by the well known curve of an inverted parabola. In the initial stages, the reaction was in direct proportion to the number of mistakes. But it retarded gradually because of the apathy of the powers that be and after reaching the peak, it is assuming inverse proportions. Now the greater the number of mistakes, the less their reaction to them.
Having made the teachers silent, the textbook producers feel very comfortable. Starting with printing mistakes made by the “letter press” of olden days, we have entered into the new era of “type setting” of computers with improper “editing”. But the greatest agony is to see logical errors in Mathematics textbooks. These errors have shattered all our hopes. The syllogism of the future generation would lead to a very dangerous situation and ultimately to the fall of the edifice of mathematics, because Mathematics is nothing but logic.
The causes for these mistakes are many and it seems to be beyond the control of the teachers and educationists. Their hue and cry have fallen on deaf ears. The powers that be have become immune to their cries. They hardly care to feed the corrections in the future editions. It is said that Euler, the great Swiss mathematician who is generally equated with Ramanujan wrote text books for Russian schools. Perhaps that may be the reason why the Russians were the first to put a satellite into space. But in a democracy like ours the preparation of flawless text books seems to be a chimera. We will have to wait for the day when our dream will come true. But what is the role of teachers? Shouldn’t they uphold the truth at any cost? But everyone feels helpless No one is ready to bell the cat. No one wants to take the risk of swimming against the current. They let themselves to be carried away by the current. They are very considerate to the student community. They take the role of their saviors.
What is still more distressing is the stark reality that when a student gives the correct version of an incorrect version found in the textbook, he is awarded zero marks! The arguments put forward in support of this are very funny. They go like these: “What authority has the student to correct this? How can we teach anything different from what is found in the textbook? If at all we correct it and teach the corrected version, what will be the fate of the student in the public examinations? Is there any guarantee that his correct answer will be accepted? It is very unlikely that a new teacher who values it will award him marks. So the safest method is to teach what is found in the textbook, whatever absurdity it may contain.
There are a number of bitter experiences about this grave situation. Many of the author’s friends, some of them eminent mathematicians, have related that, when their wards taught by them wrote the correct answers in the examination, they were awarded zero marks because those answers were different from the ones found in the textbooks,
It would be appropriate to relate a recent incident which depressed me. It happened in a coaching centre which prepared students for Engineering and Medical Entrance Examinations. They conducted a unit test in which there was a question, “How many ……. Does a flower have? There was some controversy about how to award marks. The senior teacher was very sincerely advising his junior like this: “In the Tamil medium book the answer is given as 23 and in the English medium book it is 28. So, the Tamil medium students must be given marks if they give the answer as 23 and the English medium students 28. This is how instructions are given during valuation in public examinations. So follow this principle strictly Otherwise the students will be affected.” See how considerate he is towards the students! Is this a virtue or a sin? What kind of students will this system produce?
There is still another situation. A problem is solved in the book in a particular way correctly, but a student gives a different but logically correct derivation, sometimes much shorter than the one found in the book. The student might have learnt it from some other source, or might have done it all by himself. Though such situations are rare, students giving alternative answers are quite common. So, in a good educational system, provision must be made to give full credit for alternate answers provided they are complete and logically correct. We have visualized three different situations arising daily in our schools. 1. A student writing an incorrect answer as found in the book and being awarded full marks. 2. A student writing the correct version of the incorrect answer found in the book and being awarded zero marks.(3) A student writing an alternate correct method and being awarded zero marks
Such circumstances were only exceptions in olden days, but today they have become the rule, as often as in daily/monthly tests and quarterly/half-yearly/annual examinations. A new virus is spreading. It is seeping deep into our educational system If it is not contained and destroyed immediately, it will multiply infinitely within a short time and engulf the whole organism of our educational system. All kinds of remedial and preventive measures must be undertaken. The pity is that it has not caught the attention of many educationists so far. This situation must change. Educationists must shed their apathy and come forward to voice their concerns through appropriate forums.
The ultimate solution lies in the preparation of flawless textbooks supplemented by a Teachers’ Guidebook. But that solution is eluding us. So until we achieve this – we must strive hard to achieve it – we have to resort to some interim arrangements.
A copy of the complete corrigenda prepared by experts should be given to every teacher, their acknowledgements must be got promptly. They must be assured that in the final valuation marks will be awarded only for correct answers. Above all, The Ramans (Chief examiners) are the pivots around whom the entire valuation system revolves. Only they prepare instructions to the Assistant Examiners as to how they should value the answer scripts. It is they who supervise the valuation until the marks list is prepared. So the right choice of these Chiefs and the right kind of instructions to them will ensure the right kind of valuation we need.