The Odds of Being a Student/Teacher at the UnIvErSiTy of NoUaKcHotT

His name was Sadio Ly, he was a fourth year student when he passed away the eve of the final exam. The following morning when I received the news, which I was not prepared for. I returned from where I stood back home since my mood has been abruptly disturbed and the eagerness to start a new day has become the end of my day. That small piece of news has been recurrent in my mind for many days till I decided to write this article or rather just join few fragments together in form of sentences. I felt a sob blocking my voice midway somewhere between my heart and my mind……

For, in a situation like this where heart is broken and life is replaced by an anticipated death and where the echoes of memories speak louder than any language, any attempt to write will be just nothing but fragmenting and sentencing the self in few scrambled words which might never be able to convey the feeling of pain and sour tears falling apart carrying slices of the shattered self……

The girl spoke to me in a sad but very touching voice, saying that the student who had his shoulder broken died surprisingly one day before the final exam despite the fact he was denied a chance to recapitulate for his mid-term exam that he missed and the administration was not comprehensive for his case as he told me two weeks before his death, when I was examining him for the oral test in Speaking Skills……

That day, I saw a glimpse of hope and despair mingled together in his voice. He was very gentle and approachable, you get influenced whenever you hear him speaking, I recognized that when he was presenting his expose, in the context of my seminar, on ‘The Effects of Early marriage on Polar Community.’

After the girl confirmed to me the death of the young man whom I remembered vividly, she did not know that my heart has been broken and I could not prevent tears from pouring down from my eyes…..

I think when Sadio Ly was complaining about the incomprehensibility of the administration, he was provoking a big issue which many students were victims of the rigidity or narrow-mindedness of teachers. According to my experience, many teachers seem to be punishing and humiliating students instead of educating them and helping them to be more productive and positive citizens…..

My late student was not and he will never be the last victim as long as such policies are adopted by certain teachers who are not able to distinguish between being an educator or producer of the future generation and retaliating or subordinating anybody whom these teachers may have in the limits of their mercy. Many students told me that other teachers shout in their faces and speak to them in a humiliating language ( rubbish, shut-up, sit-down, who are you? and go-out), let alone that these teachers try to prove their superiority only through giving bad grades to the students…..

I remember one day, I had a discussion with one of these so-called teachers. I asked him WHY you always give lower grades to all students regardless to their differences and ability to understand? His reply was a giggle and then he said proudly “because these are still students and students can never get more than a lower grade as far as they do not read. These are not even students…..”

I was really surprised by such stereotypical attitudes that this teacher has about all the students with overgeneralizing. How can a teacher with such ideas help into raising up a reliable generation? Why such people are not given a chance to study about the psychology of students and be aware of what is labeled ‘pedagogy’ which is a key concept in the relationship between the educator and the educated?

I have been trying hard, in vain, to decipher the intricacies beyond the failure of our teachers and students because I was once a student at the university and I knew and still know how many teachers look at themselves as the only legitimate authority to decide for the future and destiny of hundreds of students who are supposed to be imbued and indoctrinated with self-confidence and self-reliance, but these teachers work on killing and marginalizing any students who would show any predisposition…..

It goes without saying that the UnIvErSiTy of NoUaKcHotT is just a prototype of the educational system prevailing in our country which has always been a failure rather than a place where people are to be given suitable chances to be good citizens and challenge the epistemological obstacles that many people can encounter in the long pitiful journey of life towards self-realization…..

In our educational system, there are no objectives or goals for the long-term scale. This absence of any kind of planning is the reason behind the huge gap between the student and the teacher. The students are coming to UnIvErSiTy of NoUaKcHotT as a seeker of knowledge expecting teachers to share with them experience and show them the right path to take, while ironically many teachers have chosen teaching only to avoid joblessness or at the best for prestige. This lack of communication between teachers and students has also meant to be like the discrepancy between the master and the disciple……

Throughout the long period of study at the UnIvErSiTy of NoUaKcHotT, students will never know the objectives for which they are studying and spending their precious time for, let alone to realize the potential talent. Teachers also do not bother themselves with caring about the future and talents of students because many of them look down at students as outcast and childish adults, wasting their time with attending classes at the UnIvErSiTy of NoUaKcHotT. This conviction of many teachers is justifiable since it reflects their impotence to be aware of the responsibility of being up to the task……

This kind of untrustful relationship between students and teachers is a result of the ignorance of many teachers and the further discriminations within the humiliating strategies which teachers adopt whenever they want to emphasize their claimed superiority than all students. Teachers not only humiliate students but rather try, most of the time, to marginalize, mute, or silence other teachers if they look different or aspire to consider students not only as subordinators but also as future leaders of this country……

Elycheikh Bah Ahmedtolba