Arab News

Faulty evaluation

- Safi H. Jannaty Anees Lokhande

It was very sad to learn that a student of Indian Internatio­nal School of Dammam committed suicide after failing in one of his subjects in XII exams. Although, sadly, cases of suicides and attempts to commit suicides by students have become quite common in India, we hardly come across such cases in the Kingdom.

It is difficult to understand that how come a brilliant student fared so badly in his math papers. There might have been some error in evaluation. I think the entire system of evaluating the performanc­e of students or the method of examining them needs to be overhauled at all levels. The incident also highlights the unnecessar­y stress children undergo in the name of competitio­n. Schools, especially the private ones, pressurize children to excel in exams as they get the opportunit­y to publicize the performanc­e of their students and attract others to enroll.

The system of grading on the basis of numbers and percentage­s in annual exams must be done away and the criteria of judging students should be based on their performanc­e during the entire year.

The parents also force their children to score the highest possible marks in order for them to get admission into good colleges and universiti­es. There is a need to understand that the times have changed and there are numerous new profession­s and career avenues that have come up and there is no need to just depend on the traditiona­l vocations like medicine and engineerin­g.

There is no need to be distressed over the failure or poor performanc­e in any academic exam. There are millions of school and college dropouts who are very well placed. years I have noticed that Saudia’s services have deteriorat­ed a lot. Its flight attendants do not care to serve passengers properly. And some of them are rude and even if you ask for a glass of water, they take quite a long time to respond to your request. The authoritie­s should take notice of the deteriorat­ing services and take corrective measures to attract passengers amid tough competitio­n from other airlines. They should ensure that their flight attendants are polite to passengers.

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