A few days ago, I was talking of my a colleague's son. He had an exam in front of him and he was preparing for the exam. So I asked him that do you really understand the subject or are you just studying to get good marks in the exam? He smiled a little and said that uncle, now the marks are everything. I am try to studying by understanding but I don't understand everything.
Hearing his words, I started thinking about my own student life. During our time there were studies, exams, and competitions, but gradually I realized that many times i did not study to learn but to get more marks than others. Because there was pressure from the family and we had to do it thinking about everyone around us. The whole discussion seemed to revolve around who came first in the class, whose GPA was high, who got admitted to a good college.
Competition is not a bad thing but a certain level of competition because it helps people do better. When I see someone doing well, I also feel the desire to try. I would call this healthy competition which leads people to improve. But the problem starts when this competition becomes unhealthy. When students start studying just for grades the real joy of learning is lost. Many people focus more on memorizing than understanding the subject because getting grades in exams becomes the only goal.
I myself have gone through a time when it felt like making a mistake meant falling behind. If I failed an exam, I thought everything was over, but I didn't realize that it is actually very normal to make mistakes in the path of learning. When I look back today, I realize that real education was not just in books. I have learned a lot from experience, talking to people, and making mistakes while working.
I have also noticed that excessive competition creates mental stress on many students. Many people get tired of always trying to be ahead of everyone. Some even lose confidence in themselves. I think education should never be a battlefield where everyone just tries to beat others. Even today, when I see a student who is only worried about grades, it seems that no one has told him that knowledge is more important than grades.