the other day, as i reached M22 for my morning class, i found a group of unknown women, average age 22, standing outside. accompanying them was a junior friend of mine, who told me about them. they were from some organisation called 'teach for india'.
"ah. teach india. but of course...the times of india thingy..there're here to get people to join?" i asked.
"no. its teach For india. its different. and i've been assigned to show them around and get them to give their presentation to as many classes as possible."
as i told her then, there were precisely six people attending class that morning, and the visiting women seemed rather put-off. but, well, what else can u expect at 9 am on a cold lazy morning in a college where attendance is not compulsory?
anyways, they started their presentation. and when they spoke the first few words i nearly fell off my chair. they had a fake american accent!! for Gawd's sake!
they spoke to us about how they arrange as agents and sponsors of the Educated to go and teach underpriviledged children, etc. (quite similar to teach india)
this would, however, have been sufficient for 20-year old almost-graduates. No. they, by now, seemed to be rather affected by the sleepy/stoned response the six of us were giving them..so now they decide to keep on asking us questions like "what do u think is the dichotomy in indian education", which digressed into "ok tell me what differences do u notice between a private school and a government school", which soon became a frantic "do u think everyone in india is educated as much as you??". the desperation to drive in a already-known point was apparent and pissing off.
by now they were treating us like underpriviledged children themselves, talking ever so slowly and asking more and more basic questions. i knew this would be a rather long affair now. (our ma'm was blissfully happy that this way she would get lesser time to teach, and thus taking no efforts to cut this arduous presentation short)
but! all of a sudden, the main presenter said "so thats all we had to say" any quick questions?
i asked her who these kids were. and where will the volunteers teach them?
"low income private schools"
-"never heard of them. didu just say private schools? didnt we just know how they are different from the grassroots govt schools, etc?"
"umm..uhh..yes..they Are indeed LIPS as we call them."
-"ugh."
a north indian girl asked if knowledge of marathi was necessary.
"of course not! you will teach in english..and a little bit of hindi is fine to communicate with their parents."
didnt go down too well with me.
"but isnt marathi the language that almost all the lower class people of this city use?" i asked.
-"um yes.. but we are teaching in english medium..and we are campaigning to convert the marathi medium LIPS to english ones"
and they went on about how even parents want kids to learn english. but did this mean that they should be alienated from their vernacular language or that they should have teachers who dont know it at all?
my further arguments about the importance of teaching basic concepts in their mother tongue (and certainly not badly accented english) drowned amidst their insensitivity and corporated-ness, and my own mind's reclusion against all this.
