SubscriberWrites: Focus on education

India’s education overhaul needs honest feedback, clear Centre-State roles, and global best practices, else degrees rise, but jobs, quality, and equity continue to fall behind.

Centre’s Performance Grading Index was released Wednesday | Illustration: Prajna Ghosh | ThePrint

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Education and Science & Technology being inevitable two vital inputs for the development of the society and nation and the nation to become a super power to reckon with, it is advisable for everyone to constantly give feedback /their opinions and suggestions on the state of affairs of education and science & technology in the country. Academic fraternity must be coherent, diligent, vigilant and active. 

It is a matter of providence that India is a vast and highly complex country. Huge population (1.46 billion) coupled with huge social heterogeneity (3000 social denominations and 25,000 sub-denominations) makes anyone to comment an extremely difficult task. Rather many simply avoid to make comments. Academic heterogeneity and magnitude is no less. Huge number of different categories of Institutes-colleges, universities, research institutes, standalone institutions etc,. Cumulatively total HEI (Higher Educational Institutes) are seventy thousand plus. Still dissatisfaction and strong demands to further increase the different categories of instituters.  Pros and Cons are never/seldom analyzed. Even to analyze the ground realities of the above mentioned institutes and to monitor & evaluate them is really not possible. -though some details maybe mentioned in the records. /

How and what to prioritize? Following is just a random selection to discuss issues.

1. Both education providers ( Sate and Central Governments including private sector and different apex/administrative bodies associated with education sector) and education receivers ( students & parents/guardians) should seriously ponder over the future prospects of the students. Degrees maybe distributed in any number . But can due employmet be  provided to such gargantuan number ? Different extent of unemployment and underemployment bound to persists , Even with the present number it is so,  What to say of further increase ? Above situation can result in any type of chaos in the country.   
2. . Because of the magnitude of the task,  it is essential that the onus and responsibility of training and employment and monitoring and evaluation be devolved to different levels. 
3. In the above context the following maybe pondered over : 

1. Education currently being a concurrent subject it should be clearly demarcated further as to what is mandatory and what is recommendatory? Above mentioned onus should be duly divided between state and central governments. There should not be any friction between state and centre because of the concurrent nature. Of course an extreme decision is to totally separate Federal (central) and State as in some countries . 
2. Lot of friction had been going on between states and central government    with respect to NEP ( National Educational Policy) since its formulation . Due negotiations should take place and see that there is absolutely no friction . Students and parents feedback maybe collected a fresh. If there is a considerable division of opinion options may be considered.    
3. With the gargantuan number of students there is a serious problem in science disciplines regarding the funding.    Adequate funding is simply not possible   to impart training the way it is required. In science there are many experiments to be done and also research work. Ground realities one should know whether this is possible ? Alternative methods of curriculum and training should be thought of. 
4. Many parameters pertinent to education /academic sector have to be thoroughly analysed and fixed and ensured in letter and spirit   : Teacher to  student ratio ; number of working days in an academic year for students and faculty ; number of working hours; course work/credit load on the students and faculty ; mentioning the course syllabus lecture wise ;  number of colleges to be affiliated to a single university also taking into consideration the number of students ( alternatively no affiliation system but only unitary universities with colleges under a different apex body); due autonomy to the faculty to utilise grants obtained by them form funding agencies; total number of faculty in a department and university ;  ensure uniformity in vital parameters like retirement age , promotion policies , availing sabbatical leave etc.   
5. NEP devotes lot of space to school education on which again there is a friction /differences of opinion. Number of school are huge –about 1.5 million . Here again feedback of parents and students maybe taken.  Same old complaints little expanded : heavy school bags (12-18 KG ) ; home work; tuitions becoming inevitable/increasing; transport problems to and from schools; heavy course load, teacher absenteeism etc. 
6. One way of improving the state of affairs  is to follow an ancient Indian saying –“Let Nobel Thoughts come to Us from Every side”. There are 195 plus countries on the globe. Observe them and borrow and implement . Of course in toto they may not be possible but they may have to be tailored and introduced into our system. 

These pieces are being published as they have been received – they have not been edited/fact-checked by ThePrint.