The coaching centre enigma

Mahmudur Rahman writes for DOT : 
From the days of demand driven friendly private coaching to bolster inadequacies of learning the business of coaching centres has come a long way. It provides employment to otherwise unemployed youngsters and makes good, to an extent the lack of quality teaching in schools and educational institutions. These hallowed corridors are hamstrung by limits on fees and pay for teachers resulting in quality teachers not being found. Wherever quality is available the eternal greed for more has resulted in an unholy nexus by which students are directed towards coaching centres for lack of intervention by authorities concerned.
The numbers of coaching centres, mostly concentrated in the cities are essentially unregulated thereby with little control over syllabi.
Of more urgent concern is the straightjacket nature of such coaching that neither encourages nor caters to the outreading that is so essential a part of general education. Schools are guilty of not teaching natural sciences taking students out into nature itself and the age old argument about the utility of grammar is fast beginning to lose out to the demands of certificates in place of education. The move from subjective to the objective is causing our education to become distanced from life leading to ominous gaps in education. Higher education is becoming too accessible and predictable thanks to these coaching centres to the extent of admission tests becoming more of a ritual than tests as they become prone to corruption and question leakage. Shutting down the centres at the time of exams is a clear indicator that there’s something very wrong going on but temporary measures don’t solve the major problem. Indeed, Bangladesh is one of the few countries in the world where Secondary and primary education is so dependent on coaching rather than studying. Schools are usually understaffed, that too with teachers essentially lacking in qualifications and government funding geared towards infrastructure rather than enhancing teaching skills.
The coaching centres pick on the brighter students to run classes with the focus on passing exams and seeking the short cut towards better results with education itself never really coming under test. The added burden of coaching is preventing children from childhood pleasures and learning some of life’s essential lessons. The apathy of parents to follow the learning curve of their wards adds to the dilemma with more and more children headed towards depression and sadly the penchant for using drugs. Part of this comes from the pressure they face in tackling the demands of life, part from the alienation from familial life.
The absence of measures to control and regulate coaching is causing further havoc to our systems with output insufficient to face the challenges of the new world. These centres could well be the conduit whereby future teachers progress to the highest institutions. Prior to that the Department of English at Dhaka University could not find a single student out of2500 students only 102 that qualified in the written exam for entry. They all failed the viva and as a result 23 seats remained vacant.There lies the pity. The writer is an author, columnist, communications specialist.