Kathmandu: Eleventh-grader Anuj Dangol recently switched to the management faculty after finding that the ‘science stream’ was not what he had imagined it to be.

Dangol, who enrolled at the science stream under peer pressure in mid-August, is not alone. Two other science students of the same college (the principal has ‘barred’ Dangol from naming the college) have joined the management faculty in the middle of this academic session despite pressure from their parents.

Psychologist Kedar Bahadur Rayamajhi agrees that students are under pressure from parents to enroll at the science faculty, hoping that their wards will become doctors or engineers, professions that fetch huge sums.

These days, many other professions do not command the respect they deserve because of money-minded parents, who force their children to study science, notes Rayamajhi.

And, the parents do not understand the importance of counselling. They visit palmists and fortune-tellers to know what their children will become.

“Personality disorders are common among college-going students because they do not get to study subjects of their interest,” according to Rayamajhi. Some colleges have initiated counselling, but the move seems to be a promotion campaign rather than a genuine bid to help the students.

Coordinator of the science faculty at the Baneshwor-based Nobel College, Deepak Adhikari, stresses the need to counsel students and parents together before enrollment, admitting, though, that his college has not initiated professional counselling.

“Through poor performance in unit tests and lack of interest in class, students let us know that they have chosen certain subjects under parental pressure,” notes Adhikari. Two students have already switched over the faculties at Nobel and the number is likely to increase. Last year, eight students of the college had switched faculties.

Some boys choose the faculty and college following the girls they are after, says a principal.

“We educate our children for foreign job markets. When they become capable, they go abroad. This is the paradox of Nepali society,” Rayamajhi says. “It’s time we began a drive to give due respect to all professions, letting the children choose streams they like.”

Rayamajhi opines that education planners should orient their children to serve the country rather than producing exportable resources.

Parents, meanwhile, can take a leaf from Dangol, who is enjoying management lessons and aims to become an entertainment manager, introducing new entertainment programmes.

source: The Himalayan Times,20 Nov 2011