Guest Column | What they don’t teach in classrooms
Ask a fresh graduate how to file taxes, face a job interview, cope with anxiety, or manage finances and chances are you will get a nervous smile or a blank stare. Our classrooms have taught them algebra, anatomy, and even the atomic number of sulphur, but rarely the skills to live life practically.
India’s education system is one of the largest in the world. Every year, millions of students step out of schools and colleges with degrees, mark sheets, and accolades. Yet, many find themselves unprepared for life beyond the classroom.
Ask a fresh graduate how to file taxes, face a job interview, cope with anxiety, or manage finances and chances are you will get a nervous smile or a blank stare. Our classrooms have taught them algebra, anatomy, and even the atomic number of sulphur, but rarely the skills to live life practically.
Across India, from small towns to metro cities, the academic journey of a student is a ‘race’ — from primary school exams to board marks, entrance tests to competitive coaching, degree percentages to placement packages. In this run for scores and certificates, we forget that education is not just about earning a living, but about learning how to live!
Lifeless education: Our system still rewards rote learning, test-taking and the toppers. But it rarely equips students with life skills to deal with stress, moral dilemmas, or the everyday frustrations of life. Schools’ emphasis remains on being ‘topper material’ — as if real life comes with a report card. Mental health is barely acknowledged. According to the India Today-MDRA survey (2022), 75% of Indian students between the ages of 14-24 years reported experiencing high stress levels due to academic pressure. How can we expect our students to grow into resilient, emotionally mature adults if they are never taught how to pause, breathe, or process failure?
Lost virtues: In the era of fast-scrolling digital gratification, patience is an endangered virtue. Students rarely learn how to wait — for results, success, or even another’s viewpoint. Discipline, often misunderstood, is narrowly confined to dress codes and classroom silence. True discipline — managing time, respecting others, setting personal boundaries and cultivating personal consistency — is left to chance and parenting. Even more concerning is the erosion of moral values and ethical thinking. In a world facing crimes and corruption, schools must be the training grounds for a strong character. Yet, moral science, once a staple, has either vanished from the syllabus or been reduced to a weekly ritual with no critical engagement. Teachers, burdened by syllabus completion and exam preparation, often have no time to inculcate these values.
Code of conduct: Respecting women, protecting public property, not using mobile phones while driving, being courteous to domestic workers, and refraining from online abuse — these are not just good manners, they form the moral compass of a civilised society. Yet, none of these topics get serious attention in most Indian curricula. A classroom may teach constitutional rights, but who will teach constitutional behaviour?
Financial illiteracy: One of the most glaring omissions in the curriculum is financial literacy. Students graduate without learning how to make a budget, understand taxes or insurance, or open a savings account. They’ve memorised compound interest formulas but don’t know what a SIP (systematic investment plan) or a PPF (public provident fund) is. Financial knowledge remains an optional add-on, instead of a foundational life skill.
Careers and creativity: Most students in India are pushed into conventional streams — engineering, medical, commerce or arts. Career counselling, if it exists, is often unstructured or commercialised. A student with a passion for painting, photography or a talent for storytelling may never receive the guidance or confidence to explore those paths seriously. In a country that produces over 1.5 million engineers every year, shouldn’t we also be cultivating inventors, creators, and change-makers?
Digital literacy: Covid-19 pushed education online, but digital literacy remains patchy. Students can attend online classes and download PDFs but often don’t know how to verify information, protect their data, or behave ethically online. Cybersecurity, media literacy, and digital hygiene must become core parts of education, not afterthoughts.
Social responsibility: We encourage students to win competitions, ace exams, and secure jobs but rarely encourage them to ask, ‘What can I do for my community or people around me?’ India is grappling with water scarcity, garbage mismanagement, air pollution, and crumbling civic behaviour. The seeds of social responsiveness must be sown in classrooms. Sadly, in most schools, social science is just another theory paper, not a call to action.
Road behaviour: A walk down any street is enough to tell that we have not learnt how to share space respectfully. Jumping red lights, unnecessary honking, rash driving, jaywalking, not stopping for pedestrians — these are all symptoms of a lack of civic sense and road ethics. According to the National Crime Records Bureau (2023), more than 1.5 lakh people die in road accidents in India every year. Why is not road safety and civic conduct a compulsory part of school education? In countries such as Germany or Sweden, road behaviour is taught from childhood.
Lessons from abroad: In countries such as Finland or Singapore, schools focus not just on grades but on values, community service, problem-solving, and empathy. In Japan, even five-year-olds learn to clean their classrooms — a simple act that instils responsibility and dignity of labour. In India, many still see education as a stepping stone to ‘a good job’ rather than a tool for building character or a meaningful life.
What we should do: The National Education Policy (NEP), 2020, acknowledges many of these gaps and calls for holistic education but implementation remains slow and patchy. As parents, educators, and policymakers, we must ask: Are we creating ethical citizens or just degree holders? Are we teaching our children how to live with others, or just how to outscore them?
A truly educated college student should know how to file a complaint, open a bank account, read a contract, resolve a conflict, or process grief. They should be prepared to think critically, question constructively, collaborate meaningfully, adapt gracefully, and most importantly — care deeply.
To genuinely prepare the next generation for life, Indian education must move beyond marks and medals. Life skills like stress management, patience, and emotional intelligence must be taught as systematically as mathematics or science. Moral and ethical education must shift from ritualistic preaching to real-life problem-solving. Civic responsibilities, such as driving etiquette and public behaviour, must be introduced early not as penalties, but as lifelong habits. Students should be encouraged to engage with the underprivileged, visit old age homes, and clean public spaces not for grades, but for personal growth. Teachers, too, must be trained as role models in conduct and values, for these lessons are best imparted when lived.
In a rapidly evolving world, the curriculum of yesterday cannot prepare us for the challenges of tomorrow. It’s not just about what we teach our children but also about what we fail to teach them. The future depends on both.
The writer is faculty of business studies at Punjabi University, Patiala, and can be reached at dhiraj.pbiuniv@gmail.com. Views expressed are personal.