New Education Policy in Brief by Ashish Gaikwad

Key features from the New Education Policy 2020

School education

New pedagogical and curricular structure of school education (5+3+3+4): 3 years in Anganwadi/pre school and 12 years in school.

For children of 3 to 6 years: Access to free, safe, high quality ECCE at Anganwadis /Pre school/ Balvatika.

Foundational Learning Curriculum for age group of 3-8 divided in two parts:

From age 3-6 in ECCE

Prior to the age of 5 every child will move to a “Preparatory Class” or “Balvatika” (that is, before Class 1)

Age 6 to 8, Grade 1-2: Foundational Stage

Age 8-11, Grades 3-5: Preparatory Stage, play, discovery, and activity based and interactive classroom learning.

Age 11-14, Grade 5-8: Middle Stage, experiential learning in the sciences, mathematics, arts, social sciences, and humanities.

Age 14-18, Grade 9-12: Secondary Stage, multidisciplinary study, greater critical thinking, flexibility and student choice of subjects.

Medium of instruction upto grade 5, and preferably till Grade 8 and beyond, will be home language/ mother tongue/ local language.

Beginning with Mathematics, all subjects to be offered at 2 levels.

School students will have 10 bag-less days during which they are taught a vocation of their choice (informal internship)

Board Exams and School Exams -

School Exams will be held only for 3 levels – Classes 3, 5 and 8. Assessment will shift to a formative style which encourages higher-order thinking skills, critical thinking and conceptual clarity.

Board Exams to continue but these will be designed for holistic development. A new national assessment centre PARAKH (Performance Assessment, Review and Analysis of Knowledge for Holistic Development) will be established. Board exams will have less stakes.

All students will be allowed to take Board Exams on up to two occasions during any given school year, one main examination and one for improvement, if desired.

Higher Education and College Entrance Exams

National Testing Agency will conduct a common college entrance exam twice a year. This will be implemented from the 2022 session.

Bachelor’s degree will be of 4 years with exit options as follows.

Exit after 1 year: Certificate

Exit after 2 years: Diploma

Mid term drop outs will be given the option to complete the degree after a break.

Bachelor’s programmes will be multidisciplinary in nature and there will be no rigid separation between arts and sciences.

Indian arts, languages and culture will be promoted at all levels.

M.Phil degree will be discontinued.

By 2040, all higher education institutions like IITs will become multidisciplinary. There will be greater inclusion of arts and humanities subjects for science students and vice-versa.

Selected universities from among the top 100 universities in the world will be facilitated to operate in India.

The system of affiliated colleges will be phased out in 15 years and colleges will be given greater autonomy and power to grant degrees. The deemed university status will end.

That's all about the New Education Policy.

These all new features are eye catching and amazing if implemented. It's time to hope it's is well implemented otherwise it will saty as well initiated and poorly funded policy.

  

 Government must plan the action now and stop making experiments. It's a very positive thing for Indian Education System.