(The Gist of PIB) Union Finance Minister announces several initiatives to boost Education Sector

[JUNE-2020]

Union Finance Minister announces several initiatives to boost Education Sector

Union Finance Minister announced several initiatives to boost Education Sector.

These are:

A comprehensive initiative called PM e-VIDYA will be launched which unifies all efforts related to digital/online/on-air education. This will enable multi-mode access to education and includes:
DIKSHA (one nation-one digital platform) which will now become the nation’s digital infrastructure for providing quality e-content in school education for all the states/UTs;
TV (one class-one channel) where one dedicated channel per grade for each of the classes 1 to 12 will provide access to quality educational material;
SWAYAM online courses in MOOCS format for school and higher education;
IITPAL for IITJEE/NEET preparation; and study material for the differently-abled developed on Digitally Accessible Information System (DAISY) and in sign language on NIOS website/ YouTube.
The Manodarpan initiative is being launched to provide psychosocial support to students, teachers, and families for mental health and emotional wellbeing through a website, a toll-free helpline, national directory of counselors, interactive chat platform, etc.
Government is expanding e-learning in higher education. Top 100 universities will start online courses. Also, an online component in conventional Universities and ODL programs will also be raised from the present 20% to 40%.
It has been decided to prepare a new National Curriculum and Pedagogical Framework for school education, teacher education and early childhood stage to prepare students and future teachers as per global benchmarks.
A National Foundational Literacy and Numeracy Mission will be launched, for ensuring that every child in the country necessarily attains foundational literacy and numeracy. This mission will cover the learning needs of nearly 4 crore children in the age group of 3 to 11 years.