According to Statista, as of 2018, the Indian schooling system is one of the largest globally and caters to over 250 million students. With a number that big, we're looking at a gold mine of human resource potential for the future.
But since every student can't afford the necessary resources, they encounter issues completing their education. So, to help these students reach their potential, the Indian government has introduced various educational initiatives.
From construction and development to improving teaching and learning accessibility, here is a look at some vital educational initiatives that the government has launched recently.
- PM POSHAN (PM Poshan Shakti Nirman)
PM POSHAN, earlier known as the Mid-day Meal Scheme, is an initiative designed to improve the nutritional standing of school-age children nationwide. Apart from that, its introduction helped enhance enrollment, retention, and attendance in schools.
The program supplies free lunches on working days for children in primary and upper primary classes in government and government-aided schools.
The scheme will cover 118 million students enrolled in classes 1 to 8, making it one of the biggest schemes in the world. - SWAYAM (Study Webs of Active –Learning for Young Aspiring Minds)
Launched in 2017, SWAYAM is an Indian Massive Open Online Course (MOOC) platform.
One of the government's educational initiatives, SWAYAM, offers free access to an integrated platform that provides quality online courses to all, especially the underprivileged section in the country.
Under this program, Professors from the top centrally funded institutions like IITs, IIMs, etc., offer free online courses to students.
The platform provides almost all the courses taught in classrooms from Class 9 till post-graduation. - National Digital Library (NDL)
The National Digital library is one of the educational initiatives by the Indian government to promote education through the digital platform.
The NDL is a digital repository containing textbooks, videos, articles, audiobooks, simulations, and other learning media. It is available for different subjects supporting multiple languages and can be accessed by students, working professionals, and researchers. - DIKSHA (Digital Infrastructure for Knowledge Sharing)
Introduced in 2017, DIKSHA is one of the educational initiatives of the Indian government that provides a platform for access to school curriculum-based engaging learning materials to students. It is the 'one nation; one digital platform' for school education.
It supports various NCERT, CBSE, and SCERTs courses and is accessible through a web portal and mobile application.
The portal supports more than 18 Indian languages and is available for all states and the central government schools from classes 1 to 12. - Beti Bachao Beti Padhao Abhiyan
One of the educational initiatives by the Indian government launched in 2015 was the 'Beti Bachao, Beti Padhao' scheme, which promotes saving the girl child and educating them to promote gender equality.
With this initiative, the government hopes to limit the sex ratio imbalance by increasing awareness and increasing the social and economic status of the girl child. The campaign is active in more than 640 districts in the country. - NISHTHA (National Initiative for School Heads' and Teachers' Holistic Advancement)
NISHTHA is an ability-building education initiative for improving the quality of education in school through teacher training.
It aims to build competencies among educators at the early stages of their careers.
The teachers get trained in an integrated manner on learning outcomes, school-based assessment, inductive style pedagogy, new initiatives in education, and addressing diverse needs of children through multiple pedagogies, etc.
It is organized by constituting National Resource Groups (NRGs) and other State Resource Groups (SRGs) at the National and the State level, training 42 lakhs teachers subsequently. - OLabs
The OLabs is an online platform designed to show that lab experiments can be performed equally efficiently and less expensively using the internet.
These labs work great for students who don't have access to physical labs or where the lab equipment is unavailable due to being limited or expensive. In addition, you can look at videos for Physics, Chemistry, and Biology for classes 9-12. The content for the same is for the NCERT/CBSE and other state board syllabus. - Rashtriya Aavishkar Abhiyan (RAA)
Launched in 2015 by the Indian government, this educational initiative promotes innovation by nurturing a spirit of inquiry and creativity in science and mathematics and practical use of technology amongst children.
The RAA encourages those who show an inclination and talent for these subjects to be encouraged and supported to academic excellence and research heights. - Swayam Prabha TV Channels
One of the educational initiatives launched by the Indian government is the introduction of the Swayam Prabha DTH channels. This initiative aims to empower students living in remote and rural areas that lack internet access.
It offers 34 channels, telecasting some of the best educational programs from the top institutions like IITs, UGC, IGNOU, etc.
These channels are available to the students 24*7 and telecast at least 4 hours of fresh content daily. If the students miss an episode, they can also see the repeat telecast at a different time. - National Digital Educational Architecture (NDEAR)
In 2021, the Indian government established the NDEAR to strengthen the country's digital infrastructure and other support activities related to education planning.
Its vision is to establish a tested system, procedures, models, and specs to improve the country's digital infrastructure for education. - Vidyanjali 2.0
The Ministry of Education launched the Vidyanjali initiative to strengthen schools through community and private-sector involvement.
Vidyanjali 2.0 offers a portal that will facilitate donations, contributions from Corporate Social Responsibility funds, and volunteering, all aimed at developing and improving schools.
This initiative has two aspects for the volunteers. First is participating in the school service and activities. The other is supporting government and government-aided schools through asset/material/equipment.
Through this initiative, the schools get connected with volunteers like young professionals, school alumni, in service and retired teachers, government officials, etc.
Final Words
In this blog, we looked at some educational initiatives launched by the government recently to help students reach their potential. These initiatives are meant to improve learning accessibility for the students in the country by providing free resources to the needy.
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