maniac Posted August 24, 2019 Share Posted August 24, 2019 Just spoke to one of my relatives this morning who recently moved to the states with her family. she is a year younger than me. She was a state ranker in 10th standard . I believe she stood either 2nd or 3rd with 98% or some ridiculous and blasphemous percent like that. I believe these days even 98% doesn’t mean anything but that’s a different debate. Anyways I remember back in the day when me and my parents visited her house just around the time she topped her 10th standard exam ,her parents showed my parents paper clippings of her name and picture in the newspaper which led to a couple of days of silence and awkwardness with my parents for me How did her career turn out since then, well, I believe she completed Masters in Biotech. Worked in a top Indian Pharma company for a few years , got married and is now a homemaker taking care of her kids . There is absolutely nothing wrong with any of those as long as it keeps her happy but however it got me thinking Is this what one expects how such a person’s career trajectory will turn out? This is someone who stood out amongst lakhs of people especially in a state like Telangana (then Andhra) where education especially during 10th and 12th makes most parents treat you like a hostage/prisoner and your life is made to come to a total stand still? Every year you see Indian kids achieving ridiculous feats in exams like getting 99.9% ( not sure if anyone has hit a perfect 100 yet) or near perfect scores in 10th,12th and various other competitive entrance exams. You see every year these kids getting their 15 minutes of fame for their ridiculous accomplishments. They get media interviews, their picture in the newspaper for a couple of days but then what happens? I have never heard of any of these kids going on to achieve something big later on. I might be wrong on this but don’t think you ever hear what happens later on in life with most of these kids ever again. There are 2 theories. Either the govt kidnaps them and keeps them underground to run the world by making them part of some kind of a secret society or they work for one of the big Indian IT consulting firms just like most middle class graduates with decent grades. I would bet 99% (no pun intended) it is the latter. Look I am not a fan of those memes of how Jobs and Zuckerberg quit college etc or how uneducated people run the world etc etc. Thats just a way for people to look at their academic failures and feel better about themselves. However the more pertinent question is- Is this a flaw in our educational system which makes these percentiles mean nothing or Should these people groomed to fulfill their potential the right way by intervention of the state or center? beetle 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
cricketrulez Posted August 24, 2019 Share Posted August 24, 2019 What is the point of your post? Same crap in the states. SAT top scorers don't always do well in College. College toppers are terrible at their jobs or grad school. Grad school toppers are terrible at academic research or research jobs and on an on and on. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
maniac Posted August 24, 2019 Author Share Posted August 24, 2019 2 minutes ago, cricketrulez said: What is the point of your post? Same crap in the states. SAT top scorers don't always do well in College. College toppers are terrible at their jobs or grad school. Grad school toppers are terrible at academic research or research jobs and on an on and on. In the states I can bet someone who scores a 98-99 percentile in SAT or GRE will not end up with a dead end meaningless job. Anyways education in India is ridiculously competitive. Someone topping these exams regardless of how flawed the education system is still a tremendous accomplishment. It is no joke. I mean a child cricket prodigy may not make it to the international or a music prodigy may not become a movie music director or something but atleast 9 out of 10 times they won’t end up in meaningless dead end jobs. beetle 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
rkt.india Posted August 24, 2019 Share Posted August 24, 2019 7 minutes ago, maniac said: In the states I can bet someone who scores a 98-99 percentile in SAT or GRE will not end up with a dead end meaningless job. Anyways education in India is ridiculously competitive. Someone topping these exams regardless of how flawed the education system is still a tremendous accomplishment. It is no joke. I mean a child cricket prodigy may not make it to the international or a music prodigy may not become a movie music director or something but atleast 9 out of 10 times they won’t end up in meaningless dead end jobs. I don't think they top the exams because they want some meaningful job which you are talking about. In India, things don't work like that. First priority is to get a job that pays well meaningless or not. They either do engineering, some do MBA after engineering just to get high paid jobs. That is the ultimate goal and that's the definition of success in Iindian society. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
MechEng Posted August 24, 2019 Share Posted August 24, 2019 Percentile scores are perfectly fine. Just because someone scores 100 percentile in boards does not mean he/she will make it large later in life. Life itself is very unpredictable and anytime a major obstacle can stagnate you, these obstacles are not bad at all but are stepping stones to gain more maturity even if success is absent completely. I think Graeme Swann and Mike Hussey made their test debuts when they were nearly 30 and made it big in international cricket. So you never know what life will give you. We must celebrate if someone does very well in boards or entrance exams, just celebrate that moment without judging if they will be great in their professions or not. Stradlater and beetle 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
velu Posted August 24, 2019 Share Posted August 24, 2019 No offence to any feminists here especially @beetle Don't go by percentile when evaluating our students.. Indian women are damn good in memorising ( mugging up ) and our educational system is based on how strong ones memory is .. Reason why girls take 70/75% of the mbbs seats where only mugging up is needed . In my engineering class girls occupy 7/8 position in the top 10 rank. But most of them struggled to code even basic even or odd number program in the first year in C . When guys were solving bfs , DFS , trees , they were happily coding prime number or not problems. Stan AF and maniac 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
beetle Posted August 24, 2019 Share Posted August 24, 2019 Eff off velu! Stop tagging me everywhere. Get your effing cheap thrill some other way. velu 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
beetle Posted August 24, 2019 Share Posted August 24, 2019 (edited) I had read an article long time back that most toppers ( not all ) rarely continue to shine through life . Unlike school....life needs far more lifeskills to succeed than marks. Most toppers score so well because they are solely focused on studies ,often neglected other life skills. They find it difficult to succeed in real life situations. They also tend to get disillusioned later on when they cannot match their educational success in school life. Society / family also puts undue pressure on the toppers to do better than others in employment which puts too much stress on them. Sometimes toppers are real geniuses who are unfortunate to not find the place where they could shine.They just wither away. Sometimes they choose to work in fields that lets them do what they want to do without a spotlight .These fields may not be conventionally what we call successful fields . Sometimes these toppers are toppers because of the extreme effort they put in with multiple tuitions and not because they are naturally topper material .They are like the 100 metre runners who give it all for the exams but can't carry it on for longer and fail in life which is more like a marathon. Edited August 24, 2019 by beetle Number and maniac 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
velu Posted August 24, 2019 Share Posted August 24, 2019 44 minutes ago, beetle said: Eff off velu! Stop tagging me everywhere. Get your effing cheap thrill some other way. I tagged you after 2 or 3 weeks After you troll voted 3/4 of my posts , I stoped quoting you as well Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mishra Posted August 24, 2019 Share Posted August 24, 2019 I think, its lack of opportunity. Toppers are standouts and states have a duty to take care. It will take time but they are best and there is no iffs and buts about it. Life is not fair. Let’s accept it. Its system which fails them Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
R!TTER Posted August 24, 2019 Share Posted August 24, 2019 Just now, rkt.india said: I don't think they top the exams because they want some meaningful job which you are talking about. In India, things don't work like that. First priority is to get a job that pays well meaningless or not. They either do engineering, some do MBA after engineering just to get high paid jobs. That is the ultimate goal and that's the definition of success in Iindian society. Yeah well student loans is the next ticking time bomb in the US, the problem in India is that academics is mostly geared towards theory with little to no practical skills involved up til 12th standard. As for College they're even worse, apart from a handful the rest are not even worth mentioning! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
LordPrabhzy Posted August 24, 2019 Share Posted August 24, 2019 State toppers are usually made with the 'rote marna' principle. Im not sure how much things have changed now but when I was in india in 7th/8th standard time, everything was focused on studies with very little all round life skills, or sports or music. So yes these students can get 99% and get their 15 min of fame but once they manage to rote their way out of engineering college they realise they are not equipped to excel in their jobs due to them having a one dimensional approach to their life so far. Ironically i had decent marks in my Alevels ( 12th 13th) and got into an okayish undergrad course with decent marks and now work in a MNC... the very same job someone in India would need to be a state topper and go to a good undergrad college and then do an MBA... Thats the difference between India and the west.. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
cricketrulez Posted August 24, 2019 Share Posted August 24, 2019 Stick this to you 'puter, cubicle, office etc etc WHAT GOT YOU HERE WON"T GET YOU THERE! https://www.amazon.com/What-Got-Here-Wont-There-ebook/dp/B000Q9J128 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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