In this age of technology, even a child can attain information at the tap of a single button. This shows that one no longer needs a structured institutional level of education to mould their skills and talents. In India, we place too much emphasis on what is often a ‘degree,’ which is no more than a piece of paper instead of the knowledge or skills one should acquire to earn it.
Have a basic look through the job advertisements column, most of them will layout the qualifications required; prominently of graduation. Their filters further fall in with the name of your college and your command over English. The primary thing an HR rep would ask for is a degree irrespective of how adequately trained a person can be. There are some places where you get hired for white-collar jobs without having a degree based on your skills and talents, but to say the least those places are very minuscule. The tech industry across the world survives on the mantra of ‘where new skill sets develop and old ones fade away in no time.’ Is it time that we look beyond the degree?
Are we going in for the demand of a degree or for those having a degree in a new skill set? A person who is willing to learn new skill sets and can evolve at lightning speed should be given the chance than flooding your office with graduates. This is because even though they possess a graduation degree, they do not possess the necessary skills required in the 21st-century job industry to get employed.
Having said this, if you don’t have a degree from a well-known college, you won’t go beyond the initial HR filtering, while applying for a job. Even if you manage to get there, you would hardly make any progress in your career irrespective of how hard working you might be. Does that mean that education is absolutely futile? The answer is ambiguous. One cannot rule out the necessity of having a degree, but that should never be the sole criteria for judging someone in their career. The preference should be given to a person having graduated with a specialized skill set over someone who is simply having a degree.
Perhaps it’s more to do with the fact there is no appreciation for creativity in India. It would be appropriate to say that Indian society is insensitive towards creative works and art. This lack of appreciation and recognition can severely demotivate an artist, and gradually they may stop creating artwork. Alternatively, the same piece of artwork gets appreciation from an audience in European countries where they recognise their work and give a sense of achievement. This kind of attitude will gradually compel them to lead the life of a regular office-goer, with no creative instincts.
As children, we are always made to believe that money is all that matters. We are told that in order to get a degree and a job, we must keep aside every creative hobby we had. It’s all about grades and marks after vomiting the same thing that’s already written in our school books. If a child is a creative artist but is average in academics, they would be motivated to stop their art and focus on their studies.