It’s that time of the year when smiles go off student’s faces, lively conversations vanish and tension takes a toll on youngsters - It is time for board exams.

Achieving accolades and honours make parents and family members proud.

However, we as educated individuals, need to analyse, whether we are writing exams just to become toppers or to celebrate and finally graduate after fourteen years of learning so much at school?

Our world has become increasingly competitive in all dimensions, any student who doesn’t score 90 per cent is labelled as a weak student.

Our education system has become such that people care more about marks than the actual subject, students don’t understand the subject, instead resort to rote learning. What they read is only retained until the exam is over. To remember something forever, our brain needs to thoroughly understand it.

Are students studying in school just to become toppers or to become pro-active global citizens? They should be taught how to think creatively, not to become robots who are programmed using textbooks written in the 1970s.

Children should be urged on, to not give up, instead of being ridiculed for failing. Thomas Alva Edison faltered a thousand times before discovering the science behind the light bulb.

I am not saying that we shouldn’t aim for a 90 per cent on our marksheet. All I mean is that we should stop doing that if the purpose is only societal competition. We should do it because we want to fully utilise the provision of education and make ourselves useful in society.

Competition should be something that helps bring out the best in students and peers, not something that stresses students to such an extent, that they lose hope and commit suicide.

Lets learn how to enjoy our successes and learn from defeats.

-The reader is a student based in Dubai