Hi Guys,
It has been a
long time, since I wrote my last post. It was my term end and I was busy with
projects and exams. It is refreshing to have a week break and I have thought of
writing a series of posts. Lets see how it goes.
The first one I
want to write is about the recent story of a Social Media Entrepreneur being
turned away by a famous Engineering college in Chennai for not being in formal
attire. The college invited him for a guest lecture and when he went there in casual
attire, the college refused to let him address the gathering. The reason given
was that the students were raised up in a disciplined way and allowing a guest
lecturer to be in casual attire could spoil them. They gave him formal attire
and asked him to change. He refused and came away.
Students being
asked to dress in formals is a usual story in the so called best colleges, but
asking a guest to be in formals is quite pathetic. Interestingly, this guest
handles a course in my college on Social Media Marketing and is said to be one
of the best professors. Last year, the assignment he gave to students was to
perform a Harlem Shake in classroom and spread it on Youtube.
Having done my
Engineering in a college where we had lot of restrictions on what to wear and
what not to wear and currently doing my MBA in a college where there is
literally no restrictions on what to wear (of course there are few, but no sane
person would go beyond the limit) I think I have some points to make.
Personally, my discipline levels have not gone down or up because of the attire
I wear. I no longer have to worry about the attire I wear to my classes. It
feels comfortable and level of discussions certainly goes up. I would say that
these colleges should have a certain dress code, but it shouldn’t make students
hate to go to college every day.
The concern of
the college authorities that the students could be spoilt by the guest wearing
casual attire is a very stupid thing. With the growth of technology, students
have access to information from all across the world. They can certainly see
what is happening around. The CEOs who have been very formal in their attire
have made the biggest of crimes. Students would have certainly seen Steve Jobs
delivering Keynote address in his famous T-shirt – Jean Combo. They would know
that the most innovative of firms do not focus on attire.
By making
students focus on these small issues, they fail to kindle the minds of students
to do big things. The students’ life revolves around focusing on what would be
the consequences of what he does and it would not allow the student to have any
freedom on innovation or research. I have witnessed many of these incidents. A
student who is interested in doing something innovative would go to a leading
professor in his department. The professor would not heed to the student’s
concept, but would rather focus on what he did against rules recently and how
it affects the reputation of the institution. That would be the end of the
student’s research.
No wonder these
colleges produce scores of students with university ranks, but not with scores
of students with good innovative projects. The lead university provides 50
ranks to the best performing students in academics. But, isn’t Engineering a
research oriented field. Shouldn’t the awards be focused towards Research and
Innovation. I myself belong in this top 50 category. But, to be true I never
did a meaningful research. I never had the chance to do one. All I did was
study and crack the exams. This is how our system works.
It is high time
for them to focus on research rather than on discipline. I do not say that discipline
is not required, but discipline should not be the only thing that is required.
Happy Reading!
