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:
- The mindset change (to not look down upon) that was needed towards vocational studies as they are no less than the “professional studies”.
- 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.
Originally published at https://bhaarthi.blogspot.com.
