Some years ago, while serving as a departmental students' advisor, I was visited by a group of disappointed students with a complaint that a teacher had "failed" them. I first corrected their wording, explaining that teachers award marks while students fail examinations through inadequate preparation or performance. The discussion took a different turn, however, when they revealed that 40 out of 55 students had failed. A failure rate of nearly 73% raised a more fundamental question. Among the unsuccessful students were several whom I had taught before and knew were not academically weak. Although I knew the instructor as well, I withheld judgement. I reflected on a simple scientific principle: when the vast majority of results in an experiment go wrong, a responsible investigator examines not only the subjects but also the method, the process and the system itself. Education, perhaps, deserves the same intellectual honesty.

If, in a laboratory, 40 out of 55 experimental samples fail to produce the expected result, a........

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