Guru - the person who enlightens our mind and soul

The mother is considered to be the first guru of a child. She teaches him the first lesson of life which is mainly focused on to cope with it. But it is the teacher or guru who imparts knowledge and wisdom to the child and charges his spirits. In India we have many occasions in which we feel obliged and pay our gratitude. Guru Purnima is one such occasion in which we thanks and feel proud of our teachers and pay them respect. Because its him who taught us to lead our life and how to get maximum out of it. In ancient times the meaning of education was mostly spiritual and it was considered to be the path which can lead you to reach god which was the ultimate goal of life. But the situation has changed completely in this modern era, so called 'kalyuga'. Now teaching is just another profession and students are considered customers whose need has to be taken care of. Schools are more concerned in making profits and education has become a commodity which can be purchased with the money. The ultimate goal is to make ourselves more professionally successful after completing the education. The so called valued relation has deteriorated and the special bonding between teacher and students is no longer observed. We should not get disheartened by present situation. Even today the teachers are the only person responsible for our knowledge. We must shed all our egos and surrender ourselves before him if we want to get true knowledge. The regards and respect should not diminish for our teachers and the real tribute for them will be only if we use our knowledge to serve the community.
Students' Oxygen movement view
25/07/2010

Imparting education can’t be taken for granted

Teaching is not just another work or profession only to earn your livelihood. It’s a devotion and the schools are the temple of knowledge and the teachers are its devotees. It's a selfless service for the community to make our youngster educated in result making our society a better place to live in. A society which adores not just other human beings but also values living and non-living things in surrounding which is important for our survival. If we continue playing with child’s future for the sake of giving them education which is improper and low in quality by appointing those people who either don’t have flair or fire to educate them it will have lots of ill effect in the coming generation. Unfortunately our Government seems to be doing so. They are appointing people for this work just on the basis of their marks or Degrees which are found to be either manipulated or a fake one in majority of the cases. How come these people who are doing immoral acts for getting jobs give moral values to kids is itself a big question. Can we afford to do so because these teachers ultimately has the role to shape our country future by giving our child good education. We will be living in the fool’s paradise if we expect these teachers will do justice to their teaching profession. Its our sincere request not to malign this social service by giving reins to those are not meant for this. Teacher have high regards in our society so lets not de glorify this profession. Can we afford to appoints doctors who are not properly trained and send them to the remotest areas and expect that the health of villagers will improve, the fate of the people can well be imagined. So this act has to be given thought before implementing.

Students' Oxygen movement view

27/06/2010

Schools and Teachers are meant for Studies only

It's a very old habit of engaging Govt. school teachers into various activities like Census, voting (election), health programmes etc. This shows the little concern of the govt. towards education which should be otherwise given utmost priority. But unfortunately this doesn’t happen in India. That’s why its not surprising that we are in so pathetic conditions when it comes to education. The academic calender is already short in schools and we are running short of teachers also. If we’ll engage them into others activities than how the syllabus will be completed? The students will not have other option apart from taking private tuition. This will be extra financial burden on their parents. Even the school premises are used either as a rest house for police and para-millitary forces. It is also used for various election related activities. More even it also serves as a place for marriage ceremony and reception hall. All these thing shows how much serious we are towards education. Because it's the children who are the main sufferers. But who will be held accountable for these things? Teachers who are not interested are also forced into these activities on failing their wages are cut or even withheld. This is the reward we are giving to the teachers who helps in the shaping of country’s future. These things will have to be stopped as soon as possible. And all the good people has the responsibility to raise their voice against it.

Students' Oxygen movement view

20/06/2010

Dream School 2010

Dream school- not just a distant dream but a dream which we all want to become a reality; a school that beckons all to a world of knowledge and wisdom; A school that will not be for the rich or the poor, the high or the low but for children, where they will grow equally and will be educated equally. We have always dreamt of this school and now we are here to express it through a Creative Vision- Dream School.The day was 7th of May, 2010 the venue was BhartiyaNritya Kala Mandir and the occasion was Dream School 2010.Students from different schools of Patna including Govt. and Public Schools like Notre Dame Academy, Loyola High School, DAV, Gyan Niketan, K B Sahay, and Miller High School participated in the third edition of Dream School. The enthusiasm was clearly visible among the students as they started thronging the venue almost an hour before the workshop started. The preparation for the main event had started way back in march with the coordinators Akanksha Pandey, Prachi Pandey and Parma Singh visiting schools in the first phase and meeting the head of various Institutions. The students prepared a project on their “Dream School” along with an audio-visual CD with the speech of the team members. The Projects had such uniqueness, such different ways for the achievement of our common goal that it proved a difficult job for the panelists to choose the better among the best. The Panel included Mr. Binod Singh, the Convener of Students' Oxygen movement, Miss Aprajita Singh, a socially active and responsible member of the movement and Akanksha Pandey, one of the coordinators for this year's Dream School Workshop.The event started with Akanksha coming onstage and welcoming the students, teachers and everyone present to the workshop with a brief overview of different activities undertaken by students' oxygen movement and an introduction on the concept of Dream School. The stage was then taken over by Parma and Prachi who carried on through the proceedings beautifully. Parma talked about the importance of education, the importance of our dream of an ideal school and the need to realize our dream school.Prachi threw light on the importance of teachers as they are the foundation stone of our dream school and invited them to invoke God's blessings by lighting the lamp and inaugurating the workshop.Shashwat and Bhavya, the youngest members of oxygen presented the teachers with floral bouquets to the teachers as a token of our love, gratitude and reverence. The programme was inaugurated by the teachers by lighting the lamp invoking God's blessings on all of us. The first round was priority listing where all the students present were asked to list 10 distinct features of their Dream School according to their priority within 5 minutes.On the basis of projects, the CD's and the priority list 25 teams were selected who came on to the stage in groups of 5 and gave a brief introduction of their Dream School. They also faced questions from the panelists. After this grueling session the audience had a gala time with two students from DAV BSEB, Rahul Bhardwaj and Prateek performing on stage. The audience cheered for inspirational songs like “Insaaf ki Dagar pe” which have long been forgotten but are more relevant today and still stress on the need of the hour. Songs like Aashayen related the children to the present condition and the hopes of the society from them.

After the priority list round, the top 10 were announced with the audience cheering loudly. But it was a tough time for the panelists as around fifteen teams were deserving enough to be in the top 10.The top ten teams faced questions from the audience and the other teams. And the teams which put forward the best ideas with utmost conviction advanced towards the top three spots. The questions that the top three teams faced were from teachers of different schools. And on the basis of their answers they were ranked 1st,2nd, and 3rd. Meanwhile, the audience also got to enjoy a magic show by a young magician Rakesh Roshan of Sir G. D. Patliputra High School. Although the whole programme stretched for more than four hours, the audience and cheer groups never seemed low on energy with each good answer getting a big round of applause.The programme ended with teachers and students being felicitated and teachers expressing their gratitude as well as asking for a similar workshop for them too. Mrs. Bhawna Shekhar, Hindi Teacher from Notre Dame Academy also narrated a poem written by her especially for the occasion. The Vote For Kids March to be held in October was announced by Parma along with the vote of thanks and the handling of responsibilities to the newly chosen 20 Dream Leaders to take this movement forward.

Students' Oxygen movement view

7/5/2010

Let us make education the biggest issue

We are living in a society without foundation today. A foundation which will enable the structures built today stand strong tomorrow. And when the foundation itself is weak can we expect the structures to stand tall? Can we expect a future without a present? The answer is no. Innumerable people talk of the fate of doomed students who are not getting proper guidance, the much needed changes to empower the students to be able to decide what they need but these are mere hollow talks which have not taken anyone anywhere. We need a mass movement, a revolution if we really want to do something for the students. And it is for this purpose that we have started the Creative Vision Dream School Campaign. Education and true education only can be that foundation which will give children the strength and the ability to achieve what they dream of. The Dream School campaign is going to give that much required opportunity to the students, to voice their concerns and their opinions about the ills of this foundation which is failing to give them the support for a brighter future. Through this unique initiative, we have tried and are trying again and again to create awareness among the masses that schools without proper teachers, a large number of schools that are absent from the system and a huge chunk young population which does not even have access to the basic primary education, is not something that the future of this nation deserves. The rich history and the even richer cultural and literary heritage stands falsified if they fail or they are not utilised to provide concrete present to the society in the form of intellectually rich human capital. It is only through education and by utilising it that we can do more constructive work in more fields to serve more people. True education which enriches one not only academically but also morally and spiritually will eventually guide all of us on the right path where it will no more be a question of me and I but us. This feeling of oneness mingled with the spirit and passion to provide a sound educational base to our children can never fail to give a foundation to our children which we all so desperately need.

Students' Oxygen movement view

18/04/2010