Unfortunate that India failed to implement Vivekananda’s ideas on Education: CBSE Director Dr. Biswajit Saha

Noida, 14th February: Speaking at the 5th Annual conference of Sahodaya School Complex, NCR (East) as a guest of honor, CBSE Director Dr. Biswajeet Saha said that India has failed to implement even a single line from the ideas shared by Swami Vivekananda on education during the 1893 Chicago conference, despite having good infrastructure, universities, schools, colleges and a good number of intellectuals who are managing these.

“We have not realized the potential of those lines (ideas on education shared by Vivekananda), if we can try to understand those lines and translate it in as many languages, I think the “Ashanti” which is measured by the “Development Index” will be diminished over a period of time.”

Speaking on Sahodaya, Dr. Saha said, “The concept of Sahodaya is rising together, if we can nurture the same collaboration between schools in the classroom then we do not need to see the NEP, every school can come up with their own NEP.”

Dr. Saha further claimed that the freedom and flexibility that CBSE board has given to schools cannot be matched by other boards worldwide, atleast in secondary and senior secondary schools. “In international boards there is a structured format that you cannot go beyond.”

Speaking on NEP, Dr. Ashok Pandey, Director, Ahlcon Group of Schools said, “The entire crux of NEP is excellence for every child irrespective of the wealth, background, parentage of the child, power and influence that the parents wield in the society. If the government and society really wants to excel and sustain itself then you cannot have education available to only a few and not to the rest.”

Dr. Pandey further talked about how the NEP bases itself on 2-3 assumptions for which no proof is required.

“One of the foundational beliefs of NEP is “Teacher insight” which means teachers influence children. Second is the collective belief of teachers that we can transform education. The third is teaching and learning beyond textbooks.”

Further, Dr. Pandey vouched for the use of mother tongue as the medium of instruction in schools. “A child who is only listening to the vocabulary of a particular language from the parents and suddenly if you interfere with another vocabulary from another language, the child will get distrubed cognitively. This is the basic premise of mother tongue education.”

While sharing her thoughts on NEP, Dr. Upma Arora said, “NEP was long awaited and it was the need of the hour. The provision for experiential learning in the NEP will give necessary exposure to our children.”

On Cambridge curriculum, Dr. Upma Arora said, “5 years back we started with the Cambridge curriculum and one can really make out the difference between the students who have pursued Cambridge curriculum and those who are doing CBSE curriculum, even the teachers of these curriculum’s stand apart.”

Speaking on the education system, Sandeep Mittal lamented that India had ignored the foundational stage in the education system. “We did not consider pre primary education as part of education despite scientific research proving that 80% of the IQ is developed by the age of 8.”

“But now, multilevel play activities, experiential learning, local language, local art and culture has been introduced in the foundational stage.”

Lauding the government for its efforts in implementation of the NEP, Sandeep Mittal said, “The best thing about this policy is that the government has ensured implementation of this policy. The government is very serious about the implementation of this policy and it is organizing many seminars to ensure the same.”

Briefing about the Sahodaya NCR, its president Deepti Sharma said, “Sahodaya NCR East was founded in 2016 with a motto of rising together. The learning community works together with a common motto of sharing educational experiences and sharing new benchmark of quality benefiting all the stakeholders.

5th Annual conference of Sahodaya School Complex, NCR( EAST) was organized at JBM Global School Noida and was attended by the Directors and Principals of almost 80 schools.

The mentors of Sahodaya who graced the event were, Sandeep Mittal, Abhirag Sharma, Rahul Rathi and Harish Sharma.

The core committee members of Sahodaya NCR(EAST) who toiled to make this important event successful were
President, Deepti Sharma; Secretary, Dr. Gourpreet Singh; Deputy Secretary, Pravesh Mehra; Treasurer, Gunjan Bansal; Deputy Treasurer, Nidhi Gulati; Public Relation Officer, Deepa Bhatt; and Executive members, Parul Singh, Geeta Dang and Aditi Basu Roy.