Draft National Education Policy (NEP) - An invigorating day-long dialogue practitioners (Part 2)

Draft National Education Policy (NEP) - An invigorating day-long dialogue practitioners (Part 1)

Post Lunch Sessions

Mr. Nandakumar took the stage (again) to talk in length on School Education. He gave the facts and governing bodies as listed by the policy and concluded his speech with a few observations of his:

1. The governing bodies that will be set up will be mutually exclusive in their functions and roles and hence there will be no conflict of interest. 
2. The split of school education is 5+3+3+4. The last 4 years correspond to 9-12 standard with 4 years, 8 semesters, and 24 subjects with flexibility for students to choose subjects of their choice in addition to the mandatory subjects.

His suggestions, which he said he had already written to the concerned people were:

• Lack of single government-approved rating agency, like the OFSTED in the UK, to rank schools based on some valid criteria such as child safety, inclusivity, active learning, etc.
• No mention of PPP - Private Public Partnerships.
• Private schools to be declared as “industries”.
• Go beyond School Management Committees (SMC) and bring in Boards (Board of Trustees/directors with roles and responsibilities.)
• Bring Coupon system for fee payment where the coupon can be given to the school during admission, which can be converted to money by submitting to the treasury by the school. If the parent wishes to secure private school admission for the child, then the coupon can be topped up with personal money for the difference in fee!

Next, we had Mr. Divanshu Kumar, Founder & CEO Involve - focus area being peer teaching with Student Leaders and Student Learners as stakeholders. The draft NEP talks about National Tutors Program (NTP), which is in line with the focus area of Involve. He gave a concise picture of their solution for improving learning outcomes in school children, the assessment modality and how they have witnessed a marked increase in the learning outcome with the group that was part of their program. He also spoke how the model is a viable solution for the NTP suggested by the draft. The result of his program saw student leaders (role of peer teachers) develop 21st-century skills like collaborating, cooperating, creativity, communication, flexibility in addition to literacy.

Dr. Uma Muthuram, Managing Trustee, Suyam Charitable Trust, spoke about Equity and Inclusion in Draft NEP. She raised a few operational concerns regarding the lofty changes that the policy was speaking about. She registered her reservations on the effective execution of the policy to its spirit, based on her current and earlier experience with bureaucracy and regulatory authorities.

Ms. Pooja Jayaram, Education Consultant and Teach for India Alumnus, spoke at length on Curriculum and Pedagogy based on her experience as a fellow of Teach for India initiative. Her concern was that the rural-urban divide may become more pronounced if the implementation of the processes documented in NEP, doesn’t take into consideration the practical implications with respect to the teaching abilities of the volunteers who are expected to support the schools!

Another panel discussion ensued with the stage adorned by Mr. Vikas Arya, Director - DAV Group of Schools, Ms. Vidhyavathi, Head Mistress - TVS Higher Secondary School Madurai, Ms. Gowri Shivshankar, Principal - Chettinad Harishree Vidyashram, Ms. Aruna Rathnam, Executive Director - Madhuram Narayanan Centre for Exceptional Children on Draft NEP and the Teacher. The common point raised was on the aspect of the implementation. From the practice standpoint, they felt that there will be challenges in implementing the change, based on the current and previous practices that they have had the chance to experience over their tenure. Also, Ms. Aruna Rathnam felt disappointed that the draft NEP does not talk anything about exceptional children and their education.

Last but not the least, on stage, was Mr. Vishwanathan Radhakrishnan, Corporate Volunteer to share his views on Remedial Instructional Aides Program (RIAP). Like the NTP, RIAP is also an initiative that involves community engagement to support school teachers in addressing the gap in achieving Foundational literacy and numeracy.

Key Take-Aways:

• The Draft NEP is a welcome step to uplift our national educational system combining the traditional Indian and modern international pedagogy and emerge as leaders in the educational front.
• The clear differentiation of regulatory, governing and implementing bodies removes any conflict of interest and would ensure better quality education.
• The Census exams proposed at standard 3, 5, and 8 are not to be confused with board exams. They are a way to assess the student’s ability to understand the minimum requirements for that stage and if there is a mismatch noticed, then the needed corrective action with additional teaching/learning support could be provided.
• The three-language system is expected at basic proficiency. Learning more than one language in a diverse nation like ours increases the prospects of better career planning and makes relocation (due to globalization) seem like a breeze. 
• Imbibing 21st Century skills and increasing the employability of graduating students.
• Concept of school blocks, which necessarily do not mean the closing of small schools, but combining of facilities of bigger schools with that of the small school that cannot scale up to become big enough so that the student learning is enhanced and hindrances due to scalability can be avoided.
• Bringing World-Class universities (similar to Elite Universities of the USA) by urging the Type 1 colleges to increase standards to meet the necessary requirement. Similarly, Type 2 and 3 colleges to continuously strive to up their standards to better themselves in delivering quality education to the graduates enrolled in their institutions.
• The focus to shift from rote learning to experiential and practical learning for all ages. 
• Equip our children with the confidence to face exams instead of fear and shift the focus from marks to learning outcomes and subject knowledge understanding.

As a concluding remark, the organisers TNYTF, Bluewhistle, and the experts & panelists alike urged the participants themselves and the general public to read through the draft (even if the time duration to give suggestions has expired by now). As this policy has the capacity to run its course for at least 2 decades (if not 3), it can undergo revisions if needed. If anyone wishes to submit their recommendations, suggestions, changes, concerns or comments on draft NEP, it is now very easy to do so. Just register yourself on Mygov.in and then look up Draft NEP 2019 and then give your feedback (this page also has links to the summary of the policy in different languages) on the respective section as you would like to.

I know it was a long read (hence the 2 part article), but I think it was very important to share the information based on facts, to remove the misinformation that is spreading panic and confusion among a various section of the population. Also, this is going to impact each and every individual or family irrespective of your stake on the system. So please download the Draft NEP (English) and read it, or at least skim through it like a non-fictional read! The summary of the draft is also available in other languages. Here is a link to the Tamil and Hindi version for the summary.

Draft National Education Policy (NEP) - An invigorating day-long dialogue practitioners (Part 1)

On 27-July-2019 (Sat), I attended a dialogue on the much-discussed and debated, Draft National Education Policy (NEP) 2019 at D.G. Vaishnav College, organised and hosted by Tamil Nadu Young Thinkers Forum (TNYTF), in association with D.G. Vaishnav College.

I had already started reading the draft before this meeting. Skimming through this sheer volume of 484-pages document was a bit daunting. I spent more time on Early Childhood Care and Education (ECCE) & Foundational Literacy and Numeracy sections. I personally felt, both these topics were well-documented (excellent English) and well researched on every possible aspect.

The speakers of the event were veterans in the education sector, who had been in the practice for at least more than 2 decades. There were prominent Educationalists, University/College/School Principals, Deans, CEOs of career planning/reskilling firms, EdTech Consultants, Social Entrepreneurs/workers, and volunteers, with years of varied experiences and exposure

The agenda of the program was for these speakers to pick each section of the NEP and giving a gist of what it says, their understanding, appreciation and criticism on the same and finally providing suggestions on what can be included or changed to make it better. What more could I have asked for to find an easy but very efficient route, to better understand the whole document in a single day?

The day started with Mr. Sundara Velavan from TNYTF welcoming the participants who filled the auditorium, followed by Tamil Thaai vazhthu, brought back memories of my school choir days. Following that, Mr. Nandakumar Venkatraman, Director-Datta Education Consultants, to set the context for the day’s proceedings. I was taken by surprise when I heard a name familiar from my school days - My Principal Sir, from secondary school. As a student, I admired him for his articulate and factual delivery of the speech on any topic.

He gave a brief history about the NEP starting with the Kothari Commission (1964-66), the NEP of 1986, and a few more. He touched upon the major revisions that it underwent, spoke about how this current draft NEP 2019 was the effort of two experts with TSR Subramanian Committee doing the initial work and after him, the current Draft NEP was brought together by the team which was chaired by K. Kasturirangan, Former Chairman, ISRO (among many other positions to his credit). His request to the audience was to listen to the day’s proceedings, get factual information about the draft, and then share it to challenge the misinformation that is making rounds in the various media (social networks, WhatsApps etc.).

He introduced Dr. S. Vaidhyasubramaniam, Vice Chancellor and TCS Chair Professor of Management, Sastra University, and welcomed him on stage to speak on Higher Education (Reforms in Institutional Governance and Regulation).

Dr. Vaidhyasubramaniam, who was consulted by both TSR Subramanian and K Kasturirangan, while the draft was being formulated, started with a brief on the 4 different models of governance, introduced the various governing and regulatory bodies (RSA, NEHRA, NRF, NAAC, NCTE, AICTE, etc.) that were responsible in future for the functioning of the Higher Educational Institutions (HEIs). He also spoke on the usage of the nomenclature - College, University, Deemed University and such. He was sure that this policy will be passed in the parliament session and was hopeful that the enactments (Central and State) that followed and the regulations designed would help in keeping the spirit of the policy intact. He also stated that the various regulatory and evaluating bodies will not have any conflict of interest as clear lines of responsibilities and roles will have to be defined for each of them. His take was that the policy was an outcome-based policy was good for the better future of education. It will also urge educational institutions to up their ante and rise up to world-class institutions quality standards.

Mr. Tamilselvan Mahalingam, Founder & CEO Future Captains, spoke on the section covering Professional Education. His stance, like his predecessor, was that the policy was great and he impressed upon the fact that the policy talks about skilling (through PMKVY) and 21st-century skills needed for career planning and development. He talked about the scholarship program that is being recommended for professional education and registered his concern for the proper regulation of its disbursement. He also felt that there was not enough said about the legal education & entrepreneurial curriculum as he felt these were very relevant and more focus. He insisted on career planning and exploration being part of the higher and professional education.

The panel discussion that followed him was on Vocational Education, Skills and Jobs. The stage was occupied by three vibrant (probably even diverse I could say from their thought perspective) people – Mr. Rajaram Muthukrishnan, Founder - Swatantra Foundation, Ms. Swati Komandur, CEO - Sixerclass, and Mr. Rajendran Dandapani, Vice Chancellor, Zoho University. The panel discussion started with a light note with the panelists confessing that like the audience they also have not gone through the entire 484 pages of the draft but did read up on relevant sections that spoke on skilling using a word search. This being the high note of the discussion, it was quite vibrant and touched upon various aspects of skilling as discussed in the policy and currently existing in the industry. Main highlights included:

1. The mindset change (to not look down upon) that was needed towards vocational studies as they are no less than the “professional studies”.
2. The need for internship exposure to enhance the knowledge on the practice of the profession rather than textbook-based learning.

In fact, Mr. Rajendran went on record stating that if this policy was implemented a few years ago, then he would not have taken the decision to home school his child! The panel discussion ended with a wishlist of the policy to include about Maker mindset, talk about 'collaborate & co-operate' rather than compete, focus on the mindset change towards Industrial Training Institute (ITI) education.

Next on stage was Mr. Saikrishnan, Managing Trustee - Nidharsanam Charitable Trust. A school dropout himself, he spoke on what he expected from school education and why he was a dropout. He insisted that he has not read the policy and his main aim to come to this dialogue was with the hope to understand the policy better (just like most of the participants) from the experts and practitioners. From what he had heard on the news and from people around him, he said he welcomes the census exams (3, 5, & 8) as he thinks that this would give a gauge on the capabilities and understanding levels of the child and if needed, a necessary intervention to course correct the learning path of that child (to avoid/reduce dropouts). He also urged the need to inculcate problem-solving outlook and a liking towards education.

We broke for lunch but the dialogues continued even at the lunch table. I was humbled to share the table with 5 other eminent personalities. With so much of food going in for my intellect, my actual hunger pangs were almost negligible. I ate because I did not want to feel hungry during the second half of the marathon.

Post Lunch Sessions continued in Part 2.