Schools are the biggest contributor of pressure on children.
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The rat race for higher scores and better grades is one of the biggest problems which children in India face. Many students feel stuck in this vicious cycle as they are made to pursue studies not according to their interests and cram for those numbers that represent academic performance. This game has grown so much that it devours everything around, overloading young minds and wrecking early lives.
The origins of this obsession can be traced to one belief deeply ingrained in society — success at school determines all aspects of a child’s future career. Parents go by the proverb “Morning shows the day” and are driven by this notion often with exceedingly high expectations for what their children will achieve later in life. These hopes create never-ending demands to score nothing short of full marks every time.
To this pressure, schools are the biggest contributor. They inadvertently foster a culture of cut-throat competition by linking their reputations and rankings to the academic performance of their students. It is like playing a game in which somebody has to lose for someone else to win, setting one student against another in a toxic situation. Such an environment breeds fear of failure, self-doubt, and anxiety.
These consequences are serious and widespread: mental health problems such as depression, burnout syndrome or anxiety disorder are now very common among young people especially teenage students. Often, the students can’t cope with emotions because they are constantly stressed and afraid that they will not meet expectations, and they fall into an emotional whirlpool which only makes it harder for them to show what they can do.
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