Essays on Imp of Sports & Games, Adv & Disadv of Distance Learning & Drug Addiction
To view other Essays Click Here.
Importance of Sports and Games
There is hardly a student who is not interested in games and sports. They say,
“All work and no play makes Jack a dull boy.”
Sports afford amusement and recreation. They give equal joy to players and spectators. Our daily work is a great strain on our energies. A game of football or tennis takes us away from the drudgery or dullness of work. After the game is over we return to our work with a renewed energy.
In addition to this, games and sports teach us the presence of mind, fellow-feeling and discipline. The lesson of the spirit of sportsmanship is brought home to us. It is to win without pride and to lose without bitterness.
Players learn self-control. They are not swayed by sudden fits of anger or passion. Games teach them cool-minded-ness and courage. If we have constantly to compete with others in the open field, we shall develop and cheerful view of life.
Games and sports provide a healthy outlet for our surplus energy. They promote international understanding. They open before us a new world of competition and struggle when they are over. We feel closer to our comrades in other parts of the world.
But sports have also a number of defects. If we indulge in them in excess, they damage our physical and mental system. Too much physical exertion tires our nerves.
There are professional players who do not play a game for the sake of the game. They care more for records, prizes and gains than for the pleasure derived from them. Sometimes games give rise to party spirit leading to quarrels and broken heads. Hard games sometimes cause serious injuries to players-spraining of a limb or fracturing of a bone.
In spite of their defects, games and sports are essential to our healthy growth. They invigorate our bodies, refresh our minds and help us grow into healthy and upright citizens. Games and sports, in short, play an important part in giving us complete education.
Advantages and Disadvantages of Distance Learning
The concept of distance learning or education or open universities has caught the imagination of the educationists throughout the world. This system is expected to provide education to the masses, particularly in developing countries at their door steps.
Distance education has come to stay as an alternative to the formal system of education. The latter has certain limitations Young people who could not afford to enter a college or a university had no alternative to fulfil their desire to get a higher education. The dropouts from colleges and universities had no future. The working people, in spite of their desire to improve their qualification, could not do so.
To begin with, the philosophy of distance education was not that of openness. It was merely an extension of the formal system with all its rigidities except compulsory attendance. The system was mainly designed to absorb the surplus candidates in the colleges.
Further, it attracted the dropouts of the formal system since the same courses were offered in formal and distance education systems. Certain factors led to a change in objectives and expectations These were: population growth, prohibitive cost education, etc. Consequently, the idea of open education took place.
The inception of the Allama Iqbal Open University (AIOU) in 1974 is a mile-stone in providing education to the masses. These universities offer an opportunity to students to join at any age and study at their own pace and place.
AIOU has set up centers for the convenience of its candidates countrywide. Lessons by experts are available on the AIOU TV. The experiment has proved a tremendous success and has been much acclaimed by the elocutionists.
Pakistan has ambitious plans of developing a network of open universities with AIOU at the top. The open universities system is trying to impart quality education by planning lessons carefully, preparing audio-visual lessons, opening study-centers etc.
They are going to be more flexible in their course content. Bold experiments are being tried by making use of labs of regular college on holidays and Sundays. More and more courses are being offered and students are enrolling themselves enthusiastically to improve their skills and qualifications.
Drug Addiction
Drug addiction is a major social evil of modern times. It has spread its tentacles among the young and the old, and the rich and the poor. It is a problem of the whole society and has eaten into its vitals.
In the beginning a person takes a drug out of curiosity or for pleasure. But once he gets used to drugs, he becomes an addict. He finds it difficult to give up the habit. The condition of a drug addict, when he does not get his usual dose, needs to be seen.
There are many reasons for the worldwide spread of drug addiction. Easy availability of drugs like brown sugar, hashish, and he-roin etc., have made many a young man and woman fall prey to them.
Migration of rural youth to the cities in search of livelihood, breaking up of the joint-family system, pressures of modern living, its tensions and tribulations and uncaring parents, tend to increase the tendency to take to drugs. The absence of moral values in modern youth and materialistic approach to life has also encouraged the use of drugs.
Drugs are not only bad in themselves, but they also give rise to certain anti-social activities. As drugs are very costly, their addicts indulge in petty robberies and house breaks and extortions.
Most of them fall in the hands of drug-peddlers, murderers, and terrorist groups. Young girls get sexually abused and often land in brothels. Tamil terrorists in Srilanka are known to indulge in drug-trafficking throughout the world.
In Pakistan drug addiction is increasing. Recently, reports of the free sale of heroine and brown sugar in the university campuses and schools have prominently been published in our national newspapers.
Professional colleges and other institutions are known to be the hotbeds of drug addicts The conditions are really very saddening. The increase in the number of drug users is very alarming.
The world community is not blind to this menace. Government and voluntary organizations throughout the world are taking steps to check it and rehabilitate the addicts. International Drug Enforcement Agency has been formed to tackle this problem.
The press and the electronic media have been carrying on an unrelenting propaganda against the use of drugs. But more stringent measures need to be taken. Some countries like our neighbors which encourage drug-trafficking are responsible for its production, should be prevented from doing so.
International opinion can force them to put an end to the production of drugs in their countries. Counselling centers need to be opened in big cities to give advice to the youth. Anti drug addiction centers can save the youth from this evil of the present time.
