KNOWLEDGE

 

Evana was getting ready to catch her school bus. It was 8am. As she was hurrying it up, I said, it would have been good if she didn't have to go to school. She could stay at home and do whatever she felt like doing.

She's eight. It is the second day of the new academic year. She's in the third standard, ICSE, St.Thomas Residential School, Mukkola, Trivandrum.

Evana replied, " No, I must go to the School."

I needled her, "Why do you go to the School?"

She quietly replied, "For knowledge."

It made me look at my years in the school and the college.

I don't know about others, but I never knew why I had been going to the school and the college. But I perceive many of my contemporaries - not everyone - had similar sentiments.

In fact I had hated to go to the school and the college.

I never knew I was being forced to proceed to the college and the school to acquire knowledge. No one ever told me that either.

It had been a journey sans focus.

Every year I had been promoted to the next level. It went on till I completed my degree.

Yes, the focus of education must be the acquisition of knowledge. 

And nothing else

I have to admit, it took 54 years and an 8 year old girl to teach me the true meaning of education.