On the 29th of July, the Modi Cabinet approved a new National Education Policy (NEP) intending to ameliorate our current education system and refashion it to usher in the modern 21st century. This new policy comes a whopping 34 years after the last one and is truly worth the wait, bringing with it a multitude of changes, which if implemented diligently, will greatly benefit the education sector and society alike.
The NEP includes changes at every level of education. The fundamental difference at the school level is that it revokes the existing 10+2 structure and welcomes a 5+3+3+4 system, with more checkpoints, ensuring an environment for holistic, all-round development with a focus on vocational education. The plan proposes ten bag-less school days in a year where students will have the opportunity to intern under workers from a plethora of professions. This experience could prove to be hugely instrumental as students would be exposed to diverse areas of the workforce, giving them the scope to discover where their true passion lies.
The Current System
In the system that exists today, students are faced with a board exam at the end of 10th grade, which is significant in shaping their lives and hence imposes a great deal of pressure on them. A survey conducted in a rural area using the Quick Inventory of Depressive Symptomatology (QIDS) assessment among 407 students revealed that 42% of these students suffered moderate depression, while up to 16% suffered severe depression and stress a month before their board exams. [1]
The New Structure
The improved scheme removes the special importance given to the high-pressure 10th-grade board exams and uses continuous and comprehensive evaluation to produce a 360-degree absolute performance report. This report will provide, along with the marks obtained in examinations, insight into other essential life skills and co-curricular activities of the student. This primarily aims at diluting our society’s obsession with grades.
The NEP highlights that board exams are to be conducted biannually, and these exams will not be aimed at testing the students' rote-learning skills or their ability to reproduce what they have studied in class, but focus on testing their core competency and critical thinking skills.
The schooling years from 9th to 12th are proposed to be split into eight semesters and gives students the flexibility to choose from a wide range of subjects, with two levels of proficiency depending on the fascination with the topic, spread across all three streams - Science, Arts, and Commerce, with no clear distinction.
One Common Entrance Exam
2020's NEP also addresses various existing problems at the university level. The 1986 National Education Policy, modified in 1992 by the P.V. Narasimha Rao Government, brought into picture a Three Exam Scheme: JEE and AIEEE at the National Level- to grant entry into India’s premium institutions (the IITs and the NITs)- and the State Level Engineering Entrance Examinations (SLEEE) that granted entry to each state's most sought-after colleges. [2] Although initially these proved to be a successful and streamlined process to get into engineering institutions, with time, several private varsities began enrolling students through separate tests. Currently, the number of engineering entrance exams stands at a weighty 50. [3]
The NEP plans to establish a National Testing Agency (NTA), which will handle the orchestration of a biannual common entrance exam, comparable to the SAT in the USA, greatly freeing the students of the burden of multiple entrance exams. Students will be able to use the test scores obtained to seek entry into the university of their choice.
Higher Education
Upon admission, mid-term dropouts of the bachelor's program will receive credit for the courses completed, giving them an option to complete their degree after a break. This change is long overdue because young adults at this age go through an abundance of new experiences and sometimes face mental health issues that need to be addressed before they can focus their attention on academics again.
Over the span of 15 years, government affiliation with universities are to come to an end and colleges will be administered with graded autonomy to give out degrees. Top-rated private universities in India will be encouraged to go global and set up campuses in other countries while top-rated universities all over the world will be welcomed to deliver quality education in India. The proposal also brings forth the idea to cap the academic fee amassed by private institutions and standardize the fee-structure to make undergraduate education more affordable.
Challenges
As is the case with any proposed reform, the government will be faced with a multitude of challenges in the effective implementation and smooth transitioning of the policy. Retraining teachers and professors fixated on the current methodology, integrating digital learning while maintaining the quality of education, and creating fair guidelines to grade universities all function as roadblocks. Appropriate changes and updates will have to be made in tandem with step-by-step implementation, after deliberation and reaction from the education sector. Nevertheless, the new National Education Policy powerfully deals with multiple crises existing in our current education system.
To pursue arts while studying physics, to learn to code as early as the 6th grade, to take a year off in your bachelor's course to work for an NGO, the new and revamped NEP provides substantial flexibility and breathing room to the students of India. [4] The possibilities are boundless. Students will now be able to chart the path and plot the trajectories of their life, unfettered by the restraints of the education system.
Article by-
Tejesh Paidi,
Head of Social Media & Design,
For the Record,
PES MUN Society
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