Are reforms in education-a necessity

Answer 1

Reforms in education � a necessity

Education Summit: Innovating for Excellence

To bring to table the key issues affecting our school, vocational and higher education system, CII organized a national level Education Summit: Innovating for Excellence on 14 May 2007 at Vigyan Bhawan; New Delhi. The event was inaugurated by Dr. APJ Abdul Kalam, President of India. Vice Chancellors and professors of Universities, delegates from the industry, representatives of government, principals, teachers and students from schools and colleges, NGOs and educational organizations attended the summit.

President A P J Abdul Kalam in his inaugural address spoke about the large gap in the availability of employable skill; requirement of skilled manpower in IT, healthcare and small scale industries; need of large number of talented youth with higher education for the task of knowledge acquisition, knowledge imparting, knowledge creation and knowledge sharing; role of universities and secondary school education system to work towards increasing the out-put of the university education system from the existing 10% to 15% by the year 2015, 20% by the year 2020, 25% by the year 2025 and 30% by the year 2030.

He advocated for a National Policy for creating a "Global Development Cadre for India" to be evolved through a national team drawing experts across all fields. He also stressed on the importance of entrepreneurship and various capacities required to be built in the students in their formative years by the educational institutions, to make them capable of participating in nation building. He emphasized on inclusion of Moral Studies in school education.

Mr. Sunil Bharti Mittal, President Designate, highlighted the progress on concrete steps taken in CII initiatives in Skills Development; The Shiksha India Trust; proposed signing of MoU with All India Council of Technical Education; academia � industry interface; Indian industry assisting SC/ST youth to access opportunity and dignity by creating 100 entrepreneurs and setting up of coaching centres in 10 universities for 10,000 students; CII new scholarships in national institutes of excellence.

Mr. Vijay Thadani, Chairman, CII National Committee on Education and CEO NIIT Ltd informed that CII has been focusing on all the dimensions of education for relevance, excellence and access. Mr. Rajiv Kumar, Director and Chief Executive, ICRIER advocated for multiple accreditation systems in education; entry of private sector and FDI in education and improving the faculty conditions and their salary structure.

The first copies of reports, CII � ICRIER White Paper: Towards Excellence - Higher Education in India and CII � Endeavours in Education were presented to the President APJ Abdul Kalam at the occasion.

The session on School Education: Imperatives for Effectiveness focused on the need of a model school to equip and empower students to meet the various challenges of our fast changing world; necessity to introduce ICT in schools to meet the demands of the twenty first century; close cooperation between government and private sector for expanding access; public private partnership; quality and values in education and Private experiences and initiatives of Educomp Solutions Ltd. and Azim Premji Foundation.

Interaction between Vice Chancellors of Universities across India and Industry leaders from CII membership set the stage for the launch of University � Industry Council, an initiative of CII- a platform for a fruitful correlation between academia & industry to strengthen the human capital of India. Some of the key areas identified to work together were quality of faculty; accreditation; solving of industrial research problems by university; formulation of need based syllabi in association with industry; support of industry to develop quality institutions; exchange of resource persons between industry & university for training & teaching; scholarships, funding of research, internship of students and improvement in publication work with industry's help. Stress was also laid on building employability clubs across the country and developing centres for excellence.

The session on Building Competency through Vocational Education emphasized that "Skills" are the key for a globalizing world. The problems of unorganized sector, social appreciation of skills as a livelihood asset and linking education to employability in an innovative way were highlighted. Presentations were made on CII Skill Initiative; network of National Institute of Open Schooling, initiatives of City & Guilds and its partnership with CII to skill workforce; their efforts of Amar Jyoti Research and Rehabilitation Centre to provide vocational training to persons with disability; constraints and mindsets on vocational education and its spectrum in India and abroad. The live examples, role of civil society, innovative approaches presented were testimony to the role of skills in creating an inclusive society. Unanimously, every one felt public private partnership to be the best approach to further the impact of skills based education.

The summit was a platform for both technology providers and users to discuss the role of technology in transforming education. The session on Leveraging Technology in Education showcased CII's concept of "Minds on Fire", developed in association with The Aspen Institute; initiatives of technology giants like Intel, Cisco Sun Microsystems and Educomp and Education Grid Initiative for quality education of Indian Institute of Information Technology and Management, Trivendrum. It strengthened the fact that technology is imperative to increase access and inclusiveness in current world scenario.

No initiative will ever see the light of the day without immediate reforms at all levels and in all processes of education, agreed the participants of the summit. The panel discussion on Reforms in Education outlined the immediate concerns and steps required to make quality education accessible and affordable to the meritorious. The ever-existing gap between longer pay off period of education and short attention spans of politicians, necessity of developing structured accreditation process; key reform by the unaided sector for the primary and secondary school children were some startling facts that came to light.

The Valedictory Session summed up the summit. Mr. Rajendra Pawar, Chairman, NIIT Ltd. in his address mentioned that revolutionary changes and breakthrough innovations are the need of the hour for Indian Education.

Thus the CII Education Summit, supported by Educomp Solutions Ltd., CISCO Systems, NIIT Ltd., Sun Microsystems and Centre for Civil Society as knowledge partner, set the ball rolling to relook at the approach towards Indian education, its immediate requirements and deliverables and redefine the roles of all stakeholders in the process of reinventing, restructuring, and reforming the educational system.