As the District Magistrate of a district, known for its concentration of coaching centers for both engineering and medical entrance exams, you’ve recently been confronted with a distressing situation. A number of students, around 5, have taken their own lives due to the intense academic and social pressures they face. These students, primarily aged between 15 and 18 from various parts of the country, arrive in your district with aspirations of securing places at renowned institutions such as the IITs and AIIMS. However, the coaching centers, driven by profit, aim to produce top performers from their own institutions to attract more students. This leads to a significant amount of pressure on the students to excel, with differential treatment, including the segregation of students into different batches based on their performance. These students often live as boarders, far from their families, struggling to cope with the overwhelming competition and the mental strain it brings. The recent increase in suicides among these students has caught national media attention, prompting you to be requested by the Chief Minister to conduct a report on the situation and propose solutions. The Chief Minister has also requested that you avoid drawing further public attention to the issue, ensuring that the coaching centers can continue their operations and contribute to the state’s revenue. Upon investigation, it has been discovered that a significant number of the leading coaching centers are owned by political figures from the ruling party. These centers have been accused of misleading advertisements to attract more students and exert excessive pressure on them to perform. Additionally, there’s a growing black market for performance-enhancing drugs among the students.
Given these circumstances:
(a) Identify the key stakeholders involved and discuss the ethical dilemmas associated with the situation.
(b) Outline your strategy for addressing the issue.
(c) Explore the root causes of the rising suicide rates among students and suggest long-term solutions to mitigate this problem. (Answer in 250 words)
Answer: The given case represents a situation where teenage students are put under immense social and family pressure to perform academically well. The coaching institutes are showing apathy and are motivated only by commercial gains. It also highlights the lackluster approach on the part of the government and district administration to regulate the industry. (a) Stakeholders involved in the case and the ethical issues involved:
(b) Given the situation, I as the DM can undertake the following course of action:
(c) Reasons for increased suicides among students:
Steps that can be taken in the long term to prevent suicides:
The Indian education system needs an overhaul where the shift from rote learning to comprehensive learning through the development of critical and analytical thinking should be made.