What is coaching?
Experts train and guide learners to achieve the Goal.
But, it seems training and guidance are misoriented at Kota’s IIT-JEE coaching centres, as stats say around 95 students have killed themselves since 2015.
On average, every year 19 students die by committing suicide. All the students who end up in Kota IIT-JEE centres are very young, most below 20 years only.
The burden of expectations begins from home. Parents send their children to IIT-JEE coaching institutes in Kota with a lot of financial burden. The children go to Kota from different places in India. These 12th-passed students are first time away from their parents and have to stay in Paying Guest houses or Hostels along with others. The environment is pretty new to the children.
Kota class room
The coaching classes are from Monday to Saturday-7 to 8 hours a day. In a week at least 3 internal tests are conducted, and one major test is on the last Sunday of the month.
Even Sunday has remedial classes. It is not easy to listen to classes for so long and assimilate that information. Students every day are under pressure to memorize things taught in classes. The pressure to perform well is enormous. The coaching centres send results to parents and we all know how Parent-Child interaction happens when marks are bad.
With no dear loved ones beside them, children generally go into depression. They resort to bad habits to destress themselves temporarily, but the damage has already been done with constant pressure and high expectations.
A students room in Kota coaching classes
The high fees of coaching don’t mandate a stress-free life for a child. Even if they miss class for even 1 day due to illness, it will be tough to cover missed classes, as they are rushed up at a rapid pace.
The schedule of coaching with only 1 day off makes it tough for students to cope. They have no time left to take care of or de-stress themselves. Always they live in pressure cooker conditions.
With no one to listen to their grievances, students go into their shells and never open up, even with their parents. All they hear from every faculty and their parents, asking for results, not well-being. They get so depressed that they resort to killing themselves. After the COVID-19 pandemic with economic loss, and time loss that happened to parents and coaching institutes, the children are facing the brunt with more and more pressure and expectations to perform both from parents and coaching institutes.
Reputation matters both for coaching centres and parents. But, life doesn’t matter to them. The urgent need for all the students is- weekly 2 days off, a caring environment, a counsellor/psychiatrist and parental backing which gives them a cushion to perform, not a knot to die by hanging.
Parents must be told at coaching centres that not all IIT-JEE students end up getting great jobs, many are jobless too. Government must mandate this SOP for coaching centres when talking with parents. Only give them a sense of confidence by sharing the child’s progress and providing guidance. Coaching centres, when earning 5000 crores every year, must be held accountable for child safety and well-being.
A spring fan is no solution to prevent suicides. A well-planned training and guidance for students is the answer to preventing suicides.
Leave a Reply