| Username |
Post |
| GP |
Posted
on 19-Sep-03 02:36 PM
CK Lal writes "Built by the British to groom Nepals best and brightest, the school has now become the cradle of the Nepali diaspora: every year, more BKS graduates go abroad than stay in Nepal".
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| lonely |
Posted
on 19-Sep-03 02:48 PM
GP ji
Is that for good or bad? Just going out/abroad does not mean it is bad?
What is important is how much have they given back to the society and the country?
I think you can see this in different perspectives haina ra hajur???
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| bipin |
Posted
on 19-Sep-03 03:11 PM
GP:
The argument does not hold any water. In the past, a low level skilled manpower, the Gurkha recruitment, was being realized. Now, the educated manpower is pursuing the same market attraction. The globalization does just that. Indians did the same thing for many decades. Now, the technology and resources have begun to come back to the Indian economy. Kathmandu University's graduates will also be seeking new opportunities in the US. It is nothing special about BKS. A good crop always gets attracted where the market power is.
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| rabinB |
Posted
on 03-Oct-03 06:44 AM
"In fact, most of the people who are familiar with the school would say that it's the other way round"
So much so that you turn around and kill your own 'Samanta' father and family members, eh ?
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| boston_dude |
Posted
on 03-Oct-03 07:03 AM
where was the article published? can someone post a link or a copy of the article?
B_D.
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| kernel |
Posted
on 03-Oct-03 07:39 AM
This is CK Lal's article printed in last issue of Nepali Times
Time to get the story straight
The present reality is bleak, but the Nepalis belief that things will get better seems to endure.
They are widening the road to Budhanilkantha, and contractors are trying to frantically finish the work before Dasai. A roadroller takes up half the road, the other half is taken up by vehicles waiting to be checked by a lone security man.
Kathmandus SUV-set driving to suburban mansions and commuters crammed inside vintage vans jostle to get ahead at the bottleneck. It takes 30 minutes to cover a distance of 12km. At the end of it, Budhanilkantha School stands in its austere majesty. Built by the British to groom Nepals best and brightest, the school has now become the cradle of the Nepali diaspora: every year, more BKS graduates go abroad than stay in Nepal.
In the shadows of Shivapuri, private promoters have built Siddhartha Colony, a haven for the citys upwardly mobile. It has some of the most expensive dwelling units in Kathmandu, and is a cacophony of architectural styles that cry for attention: a Rana-Roman palace here, a mock-baroque villa there and a faux-White House tucked in between. This is where Kathmandus movers and shakers increasingly move and shake.
Here live the people who read Time magazine and watch Star News to find out what is happening in their own country. However, nothing in Budanilkantha gives the impression that it could all go up in flames . People are building new houses as if there were no tomorrow, and building a house is the biggest endorsement of faith in the future. The present reality in the Valley may be bleak, but the Nepalis belief that things will get better still seems to endure. Imagine if there were a long-term truce.
The management and the staff of the elegant Park Village Hotel here arent as worried as Gautam Rana, who is featured in last weeks issue of Time, worrying about his personal safety. Times are bad, there are very few tourists around, but the Parks lobby is bustling with Nepalis attending this seminar or that workshop. When asked how is business, a staffer is frank: Not all that good, but we are hoping it will get better soon. If she harbours any fears of her world falling apart, she isnt showing it. She is paying closer attention to getting the ashtrays emptied before the next lot of seminar participants arrive.
It would be foolish to pretend that its business as usual in Nepal, but how did Alex Perry of Time get the impression that Kathmandu is in danger of rejoining the rest of the country in the Dark Ages ? Perrys story isnt his personal failure. It is generic to all ambulance-chasing journalists who hunt in packs and have to either trash a place or praise it to high heavensnothing in between. There are no greys in the black-and-white world of parachuting media mercenaries. You jet into town, not seeking a story but confirmation of a preconceived script, meet the people who are waiting to meet you, mangle the copy of the local stringer, liberally sprinkle hyperbole, and then file a feature that refracts reality.
All of this wouldnt have mattered if this particular multinational newsmag werent distributed free in every hotel and airline in the region. We hear some sightseeing tourists even cancelled their Nepal trip after they got to Bangkok airport! But how do you explain the Australia-based Asia-Pacific Human Rights Forum cancelling its annual meeting which was to be held 22-24 September in Kathmandu? They probably read Time. Spooked by Perry and warned off by knee-jerk embassy travel advisories, we can understand tourists cancelling, but human rights activists fearing for their safety? Dont they listen to their contacts in the United Nations in Kathmandu? In this sad and costly seven-year war, it is ordinary Nepalis who have suffered and died. They are the ones who face threats, extortion and fears of safety every day. Not foreigners. Not tourists. And especially not international human rights activists meeting in an international hotel. When will the Nepal Desks at overseas ministries so quick to put out travel advisories to protect their behinds understand this? When will South Asia correspondents in Delhi stop behaving like birds on a wire? There is a moral in this for our own paranoid elite: next time be careful what you tell parachutists. They care not for the truth and will twist your words to suit their script.
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| Disco |
Posted
on 03-Oct-03 07:53 AM
"Built by the British to groom Nepals best and brightest, the school has now become the cradle of the Nepali diaspora: every year, more BKS graduates go abroad than stay in Nepal."
BKS is in no way an exporting machine, most of the graduates would have fallen into abrodite catagory with or withought BKS, there have been brighter ones who've opted to stay back or could not just because, and there are less brighter ones in the States and where not who've got AMERICA stamped on there temple, more pronounced than BKS anyways.
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| boston_dude |
Posted
on 03-Oct-03 12:39 PM
Thank you kernel.
The comment made on BNKS seems to be just an off hand remark, so I would not take this, by itself, to be an attack on BNKS. Also, could the author be factually correct? Do more than half the graduates go abroad anyway? I, myself am a BNKS graduate, and like many of my classmates, have moved out of the country.
B_D.
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| ashu |
Posted
on 04-Oct-03 12:20 AM
As a beginning and even a questioning student of economics, I once started a debate
on the Internet (in The Nepal Digest, to be precise) asking whether the public money that the Nepali state poured every year into BKS school could be better spent in a different way (maybe by spreading the money around, maybe by privatizing BKS and
so on and so forth).
I had hoped to start a relatively academic debate and discussion based around
economic issues.
But little did I know that my relatively ACADEMIC question would generate emotionally charged responses and even invite vituperative attacks against me and against the question itself from a number of people who are -- for respectable reasons -- are loyal
to their alma mater.
So much so that I still feel -- even today, years later -- that some of those BKS grads who responded to my questions then have not really gotten over their grudge against me for asking that question so openly and so directly in a public forum.
That incident taught me -- quite starkly -- that more than reason and logic, emotions, raw crude infectious emotions, play an incredibly strong role in shaping judgements about people, places and events.
As they say, one lives and learns, and that's the way life goes.
oohi
ashu
ktm,nepal
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| M.P. |
Posted
on 04-Oct-03 10:48 AM
>>>That incident taught me -- quite starkly -- that more than reason and logic, emotions, raw crude infectious emotions, play an incredibly strong role in shaping judgements about people, places and events.
---> Whether logic or emotions should play the role in making judgements requires judgement itself. I, for one, believe that whether we should pick logic over emotions or vice versa is time and situation specific.
Logic: End justifies the means. We are trying to create a just society, so killing people while that just status is achieved makes sense.
Emotion: Every person killed is somebody's father, son, husband or mother,daughter, wife. Put your self in their position and see the things.
Here, I would pick emotions while making a decision.
--------------
Sorry to hear that those people who adamentely defended their alma mater than still hold grudge against you.
--------------
Being an Ex-BNKS myself, I openly invite another discussion, a healthy one, about government investment in BNKS.
My take: goverment investment in BNKS is worthwhile and should continue, but with regular assessments of its performance.
I am still wondering why CK Lal chose to include BNKS in the article. It has no relation, whatsoever, with the theme of the article. And I do not think this was meant to be a wake up call. So perhaps we can leave this thread alone and start a healthy debate on investment in BNKS.
Bhawadiye,
"heck, its been a year of Gyanendra's rule! What am I doing here? I should send a congratulation message to his junaaf" *
Misunderstood Poet, Oct 4
* This style was borrowed--without permission--from Ashutosh Tiwari.
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| M.P. |
Posted
on 04-Oct-03 10:49 AM
>>>That incident taught me -- quite starkly -- that more than reason and logic, emotions, raw crude infectious emotions, play an incredibly strong role in shaping judgements about people, places and events.
---> Whether logic or emotions should play the role in making judgements requires judgement itself. I, for one, believe that whether we should pick logic over emotions or vice versa is time and situation specific.
Logic: End justifies the means. We are trying to create a just society, so killing people while that just status is achieved makes sense.
Emotion: Every person killed is somebody's father, son, husband or mother,daughter, wife. Put your self in their position and see the things.
Here, I would pick emotions while making a decision.
--------------
Sorry to hear that those people who adamentely defended their alma mater than still hold grudge against you.
--------------
Being an Ex-BNKS myself, I openly invite another discussion, a healthy one, about government investment in BNKS.
My take: goverment investment in BNKS is worthwhile and should continue, but with regular assessments of its performance.
I am still wondering why CK Lal chose to include BNKS in the article. It has no relation, whatsoever, with the theme of the article. And I do not think this was meant to be a wake up call. So perhaps we can leave this thread alone and start a healthy debate on investment in BNKS.
Bhawadiye,
"heck, its been a year of Gyanendra's rule! What am I doing here? I should send a congratulation message to his junaaf" *
Misunderstood Poet, Oct 4
* This style was borrowed--without permission--from Ashutosh Tiwari.
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| VincentBodega |
Posted
on 04-Oct-03 12:09 PM
let me be the one to start the thread then.
Check the new posting.
I dont know much about this, didnt even know Gov. financed BKNS. see you all in the next thread :)
-- BV
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| ashu |
Posted
on 05-Oct-03 04:20 AM
MP,
It's perfectly all right to copy my "ish-tyle" even without permission. :-)
I don't mind.
That said, my admittedly LIMITED experiences tell me that in Nepal and among Nepali societies, raw, crude, unprocessed and reptilian and destructively contagious emotions matter a great deal more than calm and cool reasoning and uses of logic.
Speaking for myself and myself alone, and borrowing the "ish-style" of great courtroom lawyers, I've learnt to use and manage emotions in a positive way to get my points across than try to persuade my fellow Nepalis by using pure reason and intellect,
which -- though wins points in the US -- almost always seem to fail in Nepal.
[Logic and reason have their usages, yes; but ONLY if the other side is willing to put its emotions aside and deal with the facts and conclusions that those facts lead to. Else, logic and reason don't matter much. Ours, let's face it, is NOT a fact-based, data-analysing culture, and that is one reason why our politicians and netas get away by saying whatever he hell they want to say at any moment without ever being held
accountable to their words.]
My further experience is that even educated people in Nepal can't resist showing their viciously ugly side -- which, truth be told, is never really all that far below the polished surface anyway, needs just a litle bit of stimuli to bob up -- when the fit starts hitting the shan.
But hey, that's life.
***********
As for talking about how Kathmandu's schools can be made even better, my REAL-LIFE verifiably true experience is that, you can say things against St. Xavier's (as I have), and the Principal invites you in to have a frank conversation, and he listens to your suggestions, and other alumni and teachers don't attack you with words, and instead they too join in to expand the scope of the discussion.
You can also be critical of Rato Bangala (as I have), and the teachers there listen to what you have to say even when they may partly agree with you.
But, you know what, you touch BKS -- even for academic, conceptual, abstract
reasons -- and you are toast.
People are so emotionally invested in that school (and that's great up to a point, after which 'a diminishing rate of return' starts to kick in ) that it's just impossible to have a non-partisan yet critical discussion. Your arguments become suspect, your motives are dismissed . . .you yourself get trashed, and pretty soo, a full-scale verbal war breaks out.
Who needs that?
Metaphorically speaking, I think I'll have a better luck being critical of, say, the Maoris of New Zealand and still be alive to tell the tale than be critical of BKS and deal with the emotionally exhausting consequences that will, given the way some of these guys hold grudges over imagined and perceived slights, continue to reverberate far into the future.
And so, my take is that: As in the case of reforming orthodox, kattar Hinduism, BKS needs to better itself through the relentessly self-critical efforts of its own people and not through an outsider -- but a well-wisher nontheless -- like me.
A very Happy Dassain to you all.
oohi
ashu
ktm,nepal
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| Yankees |
Posted
on 05-Oct-03 05:57 AM
I would not see any problem with this article, and he is writing what he is seeing in the school history. And its every individual student's rights to choose to be moral and immoral. If you come back there and get stuck with the goverment office, there is no way that he can support his family with goverment salary, so its universal truth that he will be one of those leaders. I see BKN students very moral and doing very big favor to its country. He/she is going aborad, getting their education and making money and sending back to there famalies and helping not only family members but to the whole country.
On the other hand, Indian inst...of technology, which is very much equivelent to the MIT of west, exports its 95 % of its graduates, now the graduates of that institute is board member and President of such corporation as Citi bank and all thoses. Now look at the influence of those big power personalities, by 2010 americas 1 million jobs will be moved to India, if it werent of them, I dont see India being in such situation.
Well done Budanilkhanta School. In my eyes you are doing the right thing.
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| tare maam |
Posted
on 06-Oct-03 04:46 PM
The negative connotation that have been implied by some in this site is certainly not the intention of CK Lal. If anything, he is merely identifying the School with one of its greatest achievements; nurturing its students to compete and succeed globally. This is the kind of recognition or image that people outside of Budhanilkantha have about the School.
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| Rosie |
Posted
on 06-Oct-03 09:56 PM
I think BNKS is certainly one of Nepal's best schools. This is obvious in the achievements that BNKS graduates have made in Nepal and in the United States, as well as in other parts of the world. However, one thing that I don't like about BNKS is the fact that it is basically a microcosm of the male dominted nepali society. There is obvious favoritism among the teachers for boys and a discreet discrimination against girls. This bias against girls and for boys might have sprung from the fact that BNKS used to be an all boys school before or just because it is yet another representation of the patriarchal Nepali society.
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| ujol sherchan |
Posted
on 08-Oct-03 05:16 AM
I taught at Rato Bangla for a little while. 100% of the students in the first batch to do A-level all went abroad. I do not see anything wrong with this though.
However, I suspect that many colleges are developing into 'feeder schools'...the more students they can place abroad the more in demand they will be and the more they can charge. This also plays well with parents [who can afford it] but are anxiously shopping for colleges for their wet-behind-the-ears sons and daughters. Whether this mushrooming of 'feeder schools' - which is prevalent in America - is good or bad for Nepal is up for debate, given the state of education in Nepal, marred by dismal SLC results, neglect of primary education and party politics in temples of learning.
Nepal's feeder schools may not be anywhere near America's Whitney High School, in Cerritos, Calif, but they are certainly getting there.
Excerpts:
Humes reveals a stressed and often desperate world -- one where even the parents feel they will die if their kid isn't accepted by MIT or UCLA: Anyplace else doesn't even count. And that pressure starts early. Each Whitney class -- 7th to 12th grade -- accepts about 150 students, and people will do whatever it takes for their children to be invited to enroll in the elite school. One father told Bob Beall, the program's founding principal, "I'm very wealthy. I"ll be happy to make a large donation once my son is admitted. What amount would you like?" Another disappointed parent, a mother, took a different tack: " 'I'd do anything to get my daughter into Whitney,' she said, closing Beall's office door, leaning close to him, and staring meaningfully into his eyes. 'Anything.' "
For more, pls visit:
http://www.washingtonpost.com/ac2/wp-dyn?pagename=article&node=&contentId=A28398-2003Sep4¬Found=true
Could this be the future in a certain quarter of education sector?
Oo mama, can it be the end
to be stuck inside of mobile with the memphis blues again.
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| kernel |
Posted
on 08-Oct-03 06:12 AM
Getting back to the article by CK Lal: I think it's hardly about BNKS school. I'm not even sure why he chose to throw that sentence about the school there. It's really out of context.
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| lonely |
Posted
on 08-Oct-03 11:38 AM
Rosie you wrote "However, one thing that I don't like about BNKS is the fact that it is basically a microcosm of the male dominted nepali society. There is obvious favoritism among the teachers for boys and a discreet discrimination against girls. This bias against girls and for boys might have sprung from the fact that BNKS used to be an all boys school before or just because it is yet another representation of the patriarchal Nepali society. "
I don't agree with you that girls are not favored by teachers in the school. But its the other way round. Most teachers are always favor girls unlike boys as you said.
When girls first came in 1991 and ever since then, girls are always getting more preferences and some boys even modified the Animal farm quote to this:
"Boys and girls are equal but girls are more equal"
always lonely,
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| john doe |
Posted
on 08-Oct-03 11:48 AM
just out of curiosity, exactly what kinda nepotism r we talking about here?
Grades? Student government? Extracurricular?
Care to elaborate?
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| Rosie |
Posted
on 08-Oct-03 06:28 PM
Lonely,
I don't think that there is anything such as "girls are more equal" in BNKS. Obviously, they are more protective towards girls, just because the Nepali society deems it necessary to protect girls and be more conservative with them. The kind of favoritism that I am talking about is where girls are psychologically manipulated into thinking that the boys are superior to them. If you don't believe it, tell me why there are no "head girls" in BNKS? Every other school in Nepal has a head girl or a head boy. But, BNKS only has a head boy because they do not trust or have enough confidence in a girl being in a leadership role. And whay about presidents for clubs? How many clubs have female presidents?
John Doe,
Discrimination is not only about grades and extra curricular activities, its can also be about making the girls feel like they will never equal their male counterparts in intelligence, smartness, or achievement. When all your teachers give you the kind of vibes that make you feel like you will never be as good as the boys, that is psychological manipulation, whereby you start believing and becoming the person that others think you are. This, as you know, is often called a self-fulfilling prophecy.
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| nepali_angel |
Posted
on 08-Oct-03 06:42 PM
Rosie, I would have agreed with you had it been the case that boys and gals made up equal population in the schoo, i.e. a 50-50 ratio between the two . The last time I checked(this I base solely on my bro's analysis, and not from my own experience, mind you) boys far outnumbered gals; so obviously in a seapool of boys, gals being picked for the top job is highly unlikely, as they're a minority. I don't know if things have changed or not yet since my brother's days which was about 9-10 years ago. America doesn't have a minority President as of yet, just because minorities are what they are--minorities. They might have a big voice, like they do in Budhanilkantha, but to be the top dog, you gotta be the majority. That's all. It has nothing to do with "discrimination" that you're spouting about. Nada. Zilch.
I am thinking that your so-called "psychological manipulation" is just a creation of your psyche. Has anybody even documented all these sorts of discrimination women go through when they're at Budhanilkantha? If not, what are you basing it on? Just your subjective observation? Two minds never think alike, mind you.
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| Rosie |
Posted
on 08-Oct-03 06:55 PM
Nepali_angel,
I agree with you in that the girls are the minority in BNKS. But I don't agree with you in the way you are comparing the presidency with someone being chosen in a leadership role in a school. A president is chosen by popular vote, a head boy or a school girl is chosen by the faculty and administration delegating among themselves and deciding which individual is best suited to be in the role. Being a minority or a majority has no effect on this because nobody is voting or counting the number of votes.
And about the psychological discrimination, it is based on first hand experience, not on the past experiences of a sibling.
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| nepali_angel |
Posted
on 08-Oct-03 07:00 PM
A presidency isn't chosen by popular vote, but rather by electoral vote, the reason why Al Gore was not the president. That's one error many people make. Rosie, even if faculty chooses the head or whatever you call it there, we cannot assume that they don't have some sort of democratic system to do so. It's not like the principal is Mussolini and everybody has to heed to his demogogic opinions if you know what I mean. You might want to expound on "psychological manipulations" please. The thing is you can't prove it. If you can, please do so. I am all ears.
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| Rosie |
Posted
on 08-Oct-03 07:23 PM
Thanks for correcting me. The presidency in the US is not chosen by popular vote but the numbers has a huge effect on the results. The majority/minority representation has a big sway on who gets into office.
And yes, its not like the principal is dictating over the school and appointing ppl in certain positions. There is probably some democractic way of choosing ppl but it is democractic only for the administration and faculty. They are the ppl solely responsible for choosing ppl in such leadership roles. The students do not have much voice in that.
About elaborating on the psychological manipulation, I think I already elaborated on that in my earlier postings. If you have lived in Nepal for a substantial number of years, you would know exactly what I am talking about....being teased and passed comments on everything you do or wear or say...being treated like an object...being groped at...need I say more?
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