Kapil Sibal, Union Minister for Human Resource and Development (HRD) while inaugurating the World Education Summit 2011 said, “At present we have Gross Enrolment Ratio of 15 per cent and through Right to Education Act and Sarva Shiksha Abhiyan we are trying to ensure that it reaches 30 percent by 2020 which will allow about 45 million children to go to colleges. But at that level we have to also ensure that it is not only access but also it is a matter of quality of education being provided to them at that level. We must ensure that quality education is imparted to our children who go to school. The teacher-pupil has to be less than 30. What’s the point of opening a school if you do not have enough classrooms, what the point of opening a school if you don’t have enough teachers? What’s the point of opening a school where the quality of teaching is poor? We must ensure that teachers who are recruited have requisite qualifications for teaching.”

“These are very serious issues that we need to address as a nation and there is a whole national effort taking place in collaboration with state governments to ensure that in next five years we are able to impart the quality education and ensure that there is 100 percent access to all children”, opined Sibal.         

He stated the need of mobility of students from one university to the other mid-session and the need for Public Private Partnership (PPP) so that major reforms in the education system could be embarked upon. He also emphasized upon the parallel system of vocational education exactly like the formal system of the Central Board of Secondary Education (CBSE). 

“In higher education, to collaborate between the universities, you need mobility and choice of set standards to easily move to reform the examination system so that the entry should be based on one exam. You need a semester system to allow that mobility. All this requires a whole range of reforms. No university doing a three years course would allow a semester learner. We must dismantle the structure. It should not only be the question of access but quality which is necessary. This is a country centric problem therefore, this has to be addressed by us,” he said.

“We must ensure that a child must develop employable skills during his schools days. Why can’t a child take music with mathematics, geography with physics? We need flexibility and change of mindset. Discipline of knowledge is only acquisition of knowledge. What we need is skills for tomorrow with a change in content of education.”

“Globally 80 million are out of school and 8 million are from India. Unless there is a collaborative effort from the government, private sectors and the corporate there could not be a significant change,” he further added.

Prof. V. N. Rajasekharan Pillai, Vice Chancellor, IGNOU while delivering his opening address said that, “Education today is not just about spreading knowledge and skills but developing, training and capacity building. India is witnessing a great change in terms of quality and quantity at all levels. Establishing universities, instituting reforms, creating a national vocational framework, technology integration, all these are important areas to network.”

by Abhay Anand