To thrive in today’s highly competitive professional world, education is crucial to enhance a student's skill and potential. With the world’s largest youth population of 365 million, it becomes foremost for India to provide its youth the finest education facilities available. As the Indian education system has been functioning on a traditional approach for more than three decades, it is high time that a major reform comes in play with regards to the country’s education.
The swift changes in the country with a surge in technology have created room exclusively, for people with industry relevant expertise or skill sets. In order to help India reach the progressive goal of self-reliance, the working age population needs to be equipped with pertinent skills which should be taught as a basic foundation in schools.
The new education policy is also a new ray of hope for the Indian education system. The recently introduced National Education Policy (NEP) 2020 has come to the rescue to serve as a comprehensive foundation that aids the evolution of the Indian education. Advancing our education system towards international standards, NEP 2020 has been presented as India’s third education policy, replacing NEP 1986. This policy aims at reforming school education by focusing on subject-flexibility and terminating compartmentalization between different streams of learning.
As the Indian education system has been functioning on a traditional approach for more than three decades, it is high time that a major reform comes in play with regards to the country’s education.
The foremost impact of NEP 2020 is the availability of school for all children with a reformed approach. For instance, the introduction of pre-primary units at every level of government or private schools, bringing back the school dropouts to education, fund incorporation for underdeveloped areas, homeschooling for people with disabilities and more. The policy focuses more on a holistic development rather than marks.
Under NEP 2020, the existing school structure of 10+2 will be changed to 5+3+3+4, covering children from the age group of 3 to 18 years. The policy aims to lessen the content of the syllabus to only the core essentials. The objective is to concentrate more on the fundamental ideas and concepts for analytical and critical learning requisite for the growth of specific skills. NEP 2020 also focuses on the foundation of numeracy and language in the formative years of learning. Moreover, education will be provided to the child in their mother tongue and gradually he/she will be introduced to other Indian or foreign languages. Digital literacy will be promoted extensively so that the classroom resources can be available to students all over India.
According to the policy, every university should aim to become multidisciplinary by 2040, which will help the country gain an accurate expertise from the graduates of the universities. With this forward approach, the future employees can obtain a broader perspective towards problem solving, than the current workforce, who primarily specializes in a particular field. The former education policy focused mostly on matters of access and equity. The uncompleted agendas of the prior policies are crucially approached within NEP 2020. As the earlier 10+2 curriculum of the education system lacked research and skill, the new education policy aims to generate productive and engaged citizens for an all-inclusive society.
NEP 2020 will also be a driving force for the Ed-Tech companies who are working towards building a thorough technology like - Learning Management System, Online Labs, ERP Softwares and more. Even the National Education Technology Foundation (NETF) will promote contemporary products and solutions from the Ed-Tech industry in order to leverage the education ecosystem of the country. The policy also states that there will be no disconnect between the extra-curricular, co-curricular or curricular sphere among the streams of Arts, Science and Humanities or between vocational streams. Children will be provided with flexibility of choice in the subjects they wish to pursue. Vocational training, internships and practical exposure integrated in the curriculum can make graduates better at problem-solving, decision-making and better hands-on working experience. The policy also announced that by 2025, at least 50% of students through the school and the higher education system shall have exposure to vocational education.
As per the National Research Foundation (NRF), research is being encouraged across various educational institutions, which will help the Industry have an opportunity to work closely with Academia and have a grasp on their resources for promoting their research and development along with Open Innovation initiatives. This will also promote Apprenticeship, as the Industry will gain from engaging a substantial number of apprentices, thus, saving on prices and generating a skilled workforce simultaneously. Post-COVID, Apprenticeship will act as a crucial mechanism for a smooth transition from school to work. In accordance with NEP 2020, NRF will yield a bona fide foundation of merit-based but unbiased peer-reviewed research funding to grow a research ecosystem in India.
With an early exposure to future skills such as Machine Learning (ML), Artificial Intelligence (AI), Cyber Security, the Industry would gradually gain a better workforce that drives the digital operations across sectors. AI powered interfaces can embrace how learners interrelate with content and promote fruitful learning. The National Education Policy 2020 has arrived as big news in our country for altering the adaptation of technology which will let equality and excellence to co-exist and flourish in accordance.
