TOWARDS the end of the final year class that I was observing, the teacher showed the students an advertisement for an internship programme. It offered new graduates three months of exposure to corporate work. Open to applicants from across the country, the internship was full-time, unpaid and free of cost — there was not even an application fee. The role held prestige that could significantly enhance future prospects.

The students were excited at this meritocratic opportunity — open to all regardless of region, religion or ethnicity. “It’s free,” said a student in the middle row, “but it still costs. I’ll need to pay for food, travel and accommodation. I must earn immediately after graduation. It is not for me”. The classroom fell silent.

The student’s last sentence still haunts me. It transformed how everyone in the class saw the ‘free’ internship. What appeared as equal opportunity now seemed conditioned by prior privilege. No-fee-no-pay became a filtering process, favouring those who can absorb risk and forego income. The student’s intuition is backed by research which shows that unpaid internships reinforce social and economic inequality.

The student’s response was an exercise in critical thinking — but not of the kind commonly taught these days in schools and universities or invoked in international agencies’ reports or government policies. There critical thinking is typically understood as the ability to analyse arguments, assess sources, weigh evidence, detect fallacies and check the validity of conclusions. This is how Unesco’s working paper (2015) on the ‘Futures of learning’ defines........

© Dawn