Coaching Syndrome :

 What was once considered a stigma , that is , attending private coaching classes , is turning into an essential activity for students . A multi hundred crore business has arisen across the country that includes , besides the coaching institution , boarding , lodging , publishing and advertising business. Many coaching centres for the entrance tests to engineering/medical colleges help their students get admissions in the formal school alongside , in which attendance is a mere formality. Thus the school provide them +2 certificates and the coaching centre imparts learning. The growing attraction for coaching classes reflect the dissatisfaction of parents with the educational outcome of schools. Marks in examination have become the sole criterion to judge a person's abilities. While a regular school's goal is to prepare students for examinations and the life beyond , for coaching centres , examinations are the sole goal. For the rising middle class, success at the entrance tests of engineering/medical colleges is a gateway to prosperity and a higher social status. This attraction has grown to the extent that a callous attitude towards the formal school system is being bred. Students even attend coaching classes in their school and follow the lessons being taught in these classes rather than in their schools. The coaching centres are a huge financial burden to the parents. Students in rural areas , small towns and those who cannot afford coaching , are at a disadvantage. The poor kids have no time for outdoor games or extra curricular activities , and a spoon fed generation of 'fragile learning ' is being raised. Teachers in these centres can be of two kinds - untrained teachers , who might know their subjects and the problem solving tricks but have no knowledge of child/adolescent psychology ; and trained teachers , who though formally employed in some schools , teach at these centres at the cost of their duties in school. Both are jeapordising the students future. With the coaching institutes acquiring the status of a parallel schooling system , the formal school system might get subverted. Performance should be portrayed in a portfolio revealing his/her total being. This can include domains such as life skills , academic/non - academic and vocational subjects , personal qualities etc. Schools should conduct target based teaching after identifying the aptitudes of students. Hence the educational reforms prescribed by National Policy of Education 1986 , should be implemented and work. --