Issue # 287 | 10 June 2014

STUDENT FIRST! NEWS

YOUR WEEKLY EDUCATION DIGEST

Blog | Farah Mendjour Punjab: A Hotspot For Closure Of Budget Private Schools In the year 2013-2014, more than 1000 schools in the state of Punjab have seen their doors closing because of matters of non-compliance with the Right To Education (RTE) Act - a phenomenon clearly heightened by the end of the three year deadline (March 2014) which had been given to the private schools to meet the necessary norms. Among the impacted ones, the blossoming sector of Budget Private School (BPS) has particularly made the news - it saw school management out demonstrating and parents publically expressing their anger. It is not surprising that BPS would be the first to suffer from this situation. Serving mostly underprivileged sections of Indian students with low fees and with rather limited resources, being able to meet the infrastructure norms of the RTE appeared like a distant dream for school owners. Even if the media has captured some of these stories there is still very little clarity on the actual number of impacted schools which foresees to be much higher that one could expect. Read full story >>
Video | Centre for Civil Society Education 2025: Student First! – A shared vision for India
		The fourth edition of Centre for Civil Society’s annual flagship School Choice National Conference (SCNC) focused on ways of shifting the focus of education from inputs to outcomes, and by putting the student at the centre of the teaching learning exercise. Watch the video. Download the full report.
Research | Huma Kidwai, Denise Burnette, Shreyanka Rao, Seema Nath, Monisha Bajaj and Nirupam Bajpai; Columbia Global Centers, South Asia (Mumbai) Columbia University; Aug 2013 In-service Teacher Training for Public Primary Schools in Rural India: Findings from District Morigaon (Assam) and District Medak (Andhra Pradesh) Abstract: India has made significant advances in school education in the recent years which being the political recognition of Universalization of Elementary education (UEE) as a legitimate demand and the Right of Children to Free and Compulsory Education. This has led to a higher demand of qualified elementary school teachers. However, questions are being raised on whether the current cohort of teachers is being trained properly to meet the ever-increasing demands of being educators.The paper concludes with a list of recommendations to the local governments and education authorities which encourages the local offices to partner with other actors in the field to better understand educational quality and achievement and its determining factors: teacher training, school participation, district level education and budget planning, school environment, and monitoring and evaluation. Read full story >>
Opinion Would you send your child to a government school  if their private school closed down under RTE? Join the talk More polls and discussions	Did you know? “Gujarat State school recognition norms assign 85% weightage to learning outcomes, making the focus truly student centric with an emphasis on continued education.” Source: Spontaneous Order More DYKs	Featured Publication RTE State Rules Matrix: A comprehensive analysis of state rules under the Right To Education Act Download More publications
News and views on education THE RTE NEWSREEL Times of India, 10 June 2014 Letter to Smriti Irani: Five steps to take India's education system from mediocre to world class Dear HRD minister, Congratulations on BJP's victory in the general elections. We now eagerly await the measures that your government will take to drive socio-economic prosperity for the country. As the government prepares for such measures, it is important to note that for any growth model to be successful we need an educated and skilled population. That's why PM Narendra Modi placed skills at the head of his "skill, scale and speed" formula to transform India. Economic Times, 10 June 2014 World Bank to offer transition support of $3.5 billion to India for infrastructure, education initiatives NEW DELHI: The World Bank will continue its concessional lending meant for poorer countries to India and has also significantly upped the country's single-borrower limit, looking to provide a helping hand to the new government in taking forward its agenda on infrastructure, skilling, river cleaning and tourism. The New Indian Express, 10 June 2014 National Education Policy Soon, Sports to be Part of School Curriculum NEW DELHI: Emphasising its priority on social sector, the NDA Government would soon formulate a National Education policy. The policy would be aimed at setting up IITs and IIMs in each state and establishment of AIIMS-like institutions in every state as well as providing 33 per cent reservation for women in legislature. Times of India, 9 June 2014 Teacher training weakest link in education chain One of the most important streams of higher education is teachers' training. It is from here that thousands of young men and women spread out to teach children in schools, virtually holding the destiny of the future generations in their hands. Yet teachers' training remains one of the most chaotic, neglected and deficient sectors of India's vast education system. Business Standard, 6 June 2014 India must regain its past glory in education: President President Pranab Mukherjee has expressed disappointment over the fact that not a single modern Indian educational institution is amongst the top 200 educational institutes in the world, whereas from 3rd century BC to 12th century AD, for a period of 1500 years, India was the leader in higher education in the world.

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