Education For the Future

Context: The New Education Policy (NEP) misses out on the reforms, which are essential for nurturing our democracy and benefiting from India’s diversity, and to provide the innovative educational system we need for our future.

Significant Aspects of the NEP:

• Expanding Educational Outcomes:

• Focus on Social Role: the social role of education is much more than that of producing high productivity workers. NEP says – 

• “The purpose of the education system is to develop good human beings capable of rational thought and action, possessing compassion and empathy, courage and resilience, scientific temper and creative imagination, with sound ethical moorings and values.”

• Enhancing Learning Outcomes:

• In Lower School Education:

• NEP proposes a move from the 10+2 school system to a 5-3-3-4 system.
• The highest priority to achieving Foundational Literacy and Numeracy by all students by Grade 3.
• Ensuring high-quality infrastructure, play equipment and well trained Anganwadi workers/teachers.

• In Higher School Education:

• Focus on vocational: Every student will take the hands-on experience of a sampling of critical vocational crafts, such as carpentry, electrical work, metalwork, gardening and pottery making.

• Improve Teacher Training: by shifting it away from standalone training colleges, which are mediocre and often corrupt, to universities.

• The medium of Instructions: The medium of instruction until at least Grade 5, but preferably till Grade 8 and beyond, will be the based-on vernaculars.

• Reducing Political Interference: The NEP proposes to setup school complexes, which would connect schools over a geographical area and be governed by a committee of parents, teachers and other stakeholders.

• This could be the beginning of a drive to reduce political interference in school management.

• Flexibility in Higher Education:

• Multidisciplinary Universities and colleges
• Improving the link with research by establishing the National Research Foundation, to actively seed research in universities and colleges
• “Light but tight” regulation by one umbrella body 0 Higher Education Commission of India (HECI).

• Increased Expenditure: Proposed to achieve the long-standing goal of 6% of the Gross Domestic Product (GDP).

Challenges to the NEP

• Language Controversy: While the NEP prefers local language, the Supreme Court has ruled that parents have the right to choose the medium of instruction irrespective of the mother tongue of the child. 

• A recent estimate suggests that the proportion of children studying in English almost doubled from 12% to 23% between 2007-08 and 2017-18.
• Political Control: Since most teachers and Principals are appointed by the governments (Centre and States), they have little authority to enforce discipline or standards.
• Falls short on quality enhancement: NEP has nothing credible about how quality improvement can be secured, particularly in existing universities lumbered with poor quality staff.
• Mirage of expenditure: Drive to prioritise spending on defence and internal security and the political pressures to expand anti-poverty programmes, public spending on education will continue to fall short.
• Infrastructure Requirement: While the percentage of the population falling in school and college-going brackets will decline from 39% in 2011 to 30% in 2031, the Gross Enrolment Ratio (GER) will increase.
• For E.g. The 25 million additional university goers need to be accommodated when the GER in higher education doubles to 50%.