Education

After all the economic and social problems we had in 2008, I believe that:

• 2009 will be tough as a lot of big countries are in recession and Mauritius will inevitably suffer. The tourism industry and Air Mauritius for instance will have to adapt… or perish. Remember that major banks and factories in the USA, Europe and Japan are closing every day…
• 2009 will bring a major shift in the way we relate to money and indulge in consumerism. Many of us, including a lot of young people, forget that working is first and foremost about saving money to have a good standard of living when retirement age comes. Working is not about using a major portion of one’s salary to buy the latest electronic gadget however tempting that may be… In 2009, people will have to be more prudent with their money and invest wisely. Remember to get all your needs first before considering some of your wants.
• 2009 will be the year of Barack Obama and I hope this will have an influence on politics in our country. Politics in Mauritius is outdated. Old politicians have lost their ideals and have no vision. Many of the young ones (but not all) are just younger versions of the old ones… It is time for someone to come with a long term plan with feasible solutions to real problems we face in this country such as our inadequate education system, corruption, no equal opportunities, poverty, promotion not based on meritocracy, communalism, violence and, something I have realised lately, a lack of Mauritius entrepreneurs in high-tech and value-added industries compared to other countries.

 

People in Mauritius, as unfortunate victims of our education system, generally tend to think on a small scale. People here generally are not very confident in their own abilities and qualities. People here often are reluctant to innovate because of ki lot la pou dire. People still have this mentalité colonialiste here where we’ll do everything to prevent a fellow Mauritian doing things while, at the same time, revering any Tom and Jack however stupid he may be provided (i) he comes from abroad and (ii) he is white.

This has to change.

We have to start to think big. It’s time to understand that we are intelligent and can change things. It’s time for each of us to have an opinion and not be afraid to voice it… however strange it may be. Could you have imagined something stranger than someone with the middle name of Hussein becoming President of the USA? No? Me neither. But this is what is happening this month. So don’t hesitate to have strange ideas. History shows that people with strange ideas change the world. We need people with strange ideas to change Mauritius.

Happy New Year 2009 to you all. And don’t forget: Think Big!

This is a nice normal distribution curve and this is what we expect of the performance of a representative sample of students when having an exam: a few hopeless cases, lots of average students and a few very bright persons.

Here is what we have instead in Mauritius:

This is taken from pg. 24 of the Draft Education & Human Resources Strategy Plan for 2008-2020 published yesterday by the Mauritian Ministry of Education. Here is a revealing quote:

“The above results from the academic deficit starting from the primary sector. An analysis of the distribution of pupils’ pass rates at the CPE level over the past six years indicates that the distribution of scores is “U-shaped” instead of the expected normal bell-shaped distribution associated with the distribution of intelligence in the population. Indeed, the distribution of pupil achievement scores is very unusual. This is depicted in Figure 4 […]. Mauritius produces a significant number of primary school graduates with “A” scores and a significant number with “F” scores and a low number of pupils with the intermediate scores of “B” to “E”. 

 The “U- shaped” curve indicates that the system has developed into a two track-system and characterises an important inequity in learning pupil achievement.”

The Ministry of Education of the Republic of Mauritius is officially saying that our primary education system level has developed into a two track-system. I would say that the same thing is happening at secondary and tertiary levels.

The Minister is not saying that rich people are on the right and poor people on the left. Instead, he is saying that this U-shape curve is in total contradiction with the normal distribution of intelligence in the population. This means that CPE exam do not test the intelligence of young Mauritians. What does it test? God knows.

Personally, I’m disgusted. We are destroying the future of countless young people every year and wasting a lot of money on lots of scholarships for people who don’t come back to contribute (or have the decency to respect the terms of the bond they signed.)

Time for change I would say. Is this the Obama effect I was hoping for?