The Bombay High Court on Monday suggested all educational institutions to consider making Mathematics an optional subject for Class 10 students. A division bench of Justice VM Kanade and Justice AK Menon said, “You will open doors to a large number of students who are unable to cope up with Mathematics and eventually dropped out.” The direction was given during the hearing of a petition filed by Dr Harish Shetty seeking to highlight the problem of learning disabilities among students and adequate steps not being taken by education boards and schools for early detection.

Explore other options

There is a definite case to enable children with learning disabilities to complete their educational life cycle, and if it is conclusively proven that Mathematics is the hurdle then options must be explored. One option of course is to do away with mathematics all together. However, designing a new curriculum for these students keeping the need of basic mathematics in

mind may also be thought of. The boards, particularly the Central Board of Secondary Education has already taken a series of measures to help the students under this category by including the option of providing a scribe and a grant of additional time to complete the exam paper.

—Ashok Pandey, Principal, Ahlcon International School, Delhi

Scary subject

It will be a good decision for students like us who are not interested in studying Mathematics. The subject scares me. My percentage went down because of Maths in Classes 8 and 9. If Maths was an optional subject I would not have opted for it in my boards now. I have worked really hard to match my Maths marks with other subjects. I think educational boards should consider the court’s recommendation and think about students who are weak at learning the subject.

—Ritika Sharma, Class 10 student, Delhi

Make teaching more interesting

Majority students that fail at Class 10 in most schools are due to their failure in English and Maths. While the subject is extremely important for students, there is an inherent fear in their minds which leads to failure. If Mathematics teaching becomes more interesting, it can help address the issue to some extent.

—Nayana Shinde, Mathematics teacher at a civic school in Mumbai

Not a great idea to do away with Maths

The decision might unnecessarily encourage students to do away with Maths and choose a soft option, and encourage institutions to push a large number of students to opt out of Maths to improve their results. Considering that deficiency certificates are not difficult to obtain, a very strict regulatory, scrutinising mechanism will have to be put in place to reduce anomalous creeping in the system.

—Sushant Kumar, Mathematics teacher at a private school, Delhi

Not with high difficulty

Mathematics should not be made optional. It is true that a large number of students face difficulty in coping with the subject at the school level. The earlier system of offering general Mathematics to students did not work as students who wanted to take up courses like engineering in future could not do so. If we can create a uni-level syllabus for the subject- wherein students will learn the important concepts but the difficulty level would not be too high, it can be an alternative to the existing issue.

—Sudam Kumbhar, Principal, Shailendra Education Society’s High school, Mumbai

Crucial subject

As an educationist, I feel Maths is crucial in all spheres of life, and a person has to be proficient in the subject to succeed in life. With the GST ready to be implemented soon, we can’t think of having a day without numbers being involved in our life. Would we have been able to send Mangalyaan at such a low cost if our scientists were not proficient with Mathematics and made algorithms?

—Sumit Vohra, parent and an education expert, Delhi

— compiled by Ankita Bhatkhande, Fareeha Iftikhar