The education supermarket
By Dr Shahid Siddiqui

Recently there has been a lot of rhetoric to improve the quality of education in Pakistan but most of the efforts are hinged around measureable quality indicators as they are easier to demonstrate. The problem with such notion of quality, however, is that it focuses only on the quantitative aspects.

The real essence of quality education, however, emanates from what actually goes on in a classroom in the teaching and learning process where teachers play a significant role in the interaction between students and teaching materials. There has been a growing realisation of the role of teachers in the teaching and learning process in recent times.

Connelly and Clandinin (1988) suggest that among the four commonplaces of curriculum – students, teachers, teaching materials, and school milieu – teachers, because of their central position, can play a significant role in enhancing and enriching the given curriculum. Contemporary research from developing and developed countries supports the pivotal role of teachers in improving the quality of education.

The complexion of education, however, changed drastically during the last three decades impacting the role of teachers in a negative manner. This started with the emergence of education as a plausible business venture which facilitated the corporatisation process of education. According to Dave Hill (2003) “the capitalist class has a business plan for education and a business plan in education.” This observation is also true to the contemporary educational scenario in Pakistan where education is largely geared towards business and education itself has turned into a lucrative business.

We are currently living the narrative of neo-liberalism. The desire for financial gains is the essence of this narrative. As financial gains justify the means, there is not much talk of values in this narrative. Maximisation of profit itself becomes a value, and the slogan of quality is used to sell the product of education. The notion of quality, in this paradigm, however, is confined to the measureable aspects of efficiency and productivity. Education thus is transformed in terms of its objectives and dynamics and the role and freedom of teachers are negotiated.

In the ‘supermarket’ of education teachers are reduced to mere salespersons whose job is to deal with clients (students) in a friendly and polite manner and deliver them goods (pre-planned lessons) to their satisfaction. As in a free market economy the labour is always exploited, teachers in schools are made to work for long hours and, in return, are given low salaries.

Young teachers in renowned school chains of Pakistan are given much less salary compared to the work and pressure they are exposed to. One very important aspect of neo-liberalism is to keep the jobs of workers (teachers) insecure by hiring them on contract basis or giving them jobs on a part-time basis. These temporary and insecure jobs not only suit the owners in terms of money, since the teachers hired on contract are not entitled to the benefits enjoyed by the regular employees, but the owner can also maintain pressure of the non-renewal of the contract. Similarly if certain teachers join some good private schools as interns they are given no salaries for the work they do there.

In a bureaucratic and stifling environment, where teachers’ freedom is curtailed and their voices choked, favouritism and flattery flourish. Conformity and compliance become attributes desired by the management, while creative initiatives and innovative practices are discouraged and debunked. The culture of conformity and submission tarnishes and distorts teachers’ personalities. School managers usually prefer a factory-like environment where teachers are treated as factory workers and are monitored closely in order to achieve enhanced productivity and efficiency.

These managers, however, tend to forget that there is a major difference between the nature of work done by factory workers and teachers. A factory is supposed to produce identical items at a mass scale in a predictable, mechanical, and robotic manner. A school, on the other hand, is supposed to develop students as thinking citizens who cherish the ideals of emancipation, peace, coexistence, and progress. Such thinking human beings can only be developed by thinking teachers who are creative in their approach and reflective in their practices.

The stifling educational scenario has squeezed the space of freedom of teachers and made critical pedagogy a redundant commodity. In the given circumstances how can teachers inculcate critical thinking skills among their students if they themselves are reduced to submissive, insecure, and voiceless creatures? Educational researchers and policymakers need to address this pivotal question before they ask for a qualitative change in the country’s system of education.

The writer is author of RethinkingEducation in Pakistan; Education,Inequalities. Email: shahidksiddiqui@gmail.com