World Bank approves $250-mn loan to boost skill training in India

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July 11, 2017

The World Bank has approved a $250-million loan to train job seekers under Skill India Mission.

The move will aid Skill India Mission and make Indian youth more employable through re-skilling. The multi-lateral lender is keen to support the Indian government in its efforts to better equip the young workforce with employable skills. The bank’s support will help in boosting the youngsters contribution to India’s economic growth.

“The $250-million Skill India Mission Operation (SIMO), approved by the World Bank board of executive directors, will increase the market relevance of short-term skill development programmes (3-12 months or up to 600 hours) at the natiounder SKill nal and state level,” the bank said in a release.

Underemployed or unemployed Indian citizens between 15-59 years of age will get the skill training under the programme. 1.2 crore Youngsters between 15-29 years who are entering the labour market every year will also be included in it.

Under the programme, it is mandatory to increase women’s exposure to skill training along with providing placement and entrepreneurship opportunities to them. SIMO is a six year programme of World Bank’s Washington based headquartered in support of the Indian government’s National Policy for Skill Development and Entrepreneurship (2017-23).

It will be implemented through the National Skill Development Mission and will target labour market entrants specifically. According to an official study, by 2022, 109 million skilled workers will be required in 24 key sectors in India.

“This programme will support the government’s vision of investing in the human capital of India’s youth, enable greater off-farm employment and increase women’s participation in the labour market,” World Bank Country Director to India Junaid Ahmad said.

“India continues to be on its path of structural reforms and a higher-skilled labour force can potentially serve as a catalyst in transforming it into a competitive middle income country”, Ahmad added.

As per the Bank’s estimate, by the end of the programme, at least 8.8 million youth will be trained with relevant skills and improved employment opportunities. The programme will benefit approximately 15,000 trainers and 3,000 assessors, it added.

President launches Swayam Prabha, devoted to high quality 24X7 edu-programmes

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Akash

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July 10, 2017

The President Pranab Mukherjee has launched “Swayam Prabha”, conceived as a group of 32 DTH channels devoted to telecasting high-quality educational programmes 24X7 using GSAT-15 satellite.

The educational courses to be taught on Swayam will feature among others engineering, management, science, humanities, language and mathematics.

Speaking in the national capital on the occasion of “Guru Purnima” during the launch of “Swayam Prabha”, the President said, “We are well positioned to become the powerhouse of global growth. The crucial input in this drive is to get highly qualified and trained youth, to be shaped and delivered by the higher educational institutions in the country.” Swayam Prabha is adigital platform intent on revolutionising education in the country.

Underlining that many initiatives and ideas like the GIAN, IMPRINT and GRIN have taken root, he gave a call “to ensure that these initiatives are taken to their logical conclusion for the benefit of the nation”.

Stating that there has been “a big leap in high quality publications in the country”, the President said, “We have seen initiatives like IMPRINT and Uchhatar Avishkar Yojana which has increased the funding for high quality research.” We must ensure that this trend is continued and further invigorated in the years to come.

“I must emphasise that the fruits of research have to be ploughed back into the teaching process, so that students are benefited by this new knowledge. I urge all of you to work more systematically in this regard,” he added.

Stating that the use of satellite technology to reach the unreached is time-tested, the President said, “The scale and reach of this technology has been raised manifold through the 32 SWAYAM Prabha DTH channels”.

“These channels will help students in the rural areas and in the remote areas where IT infrastructure have not penetrated so well. It is essential that all of you first start using these channels in your own institutions extensively, and later urge others to use it in their own homes,” the President said.

Greeting those who worked for bringing about these digital initiatives, the President called upon all the institutions to work out an action plan for adopting these to benefit every student. “We also need to bring in suitable regulations that would encourage these efforts and would allow greater freedom to the institutions to introduce innovative curriculum and pedagogy in their teaching process,” he further said.

Stating that there is “need to bring participation of the larger teaching community in implementing these initiatives”, the President said, “We need to bring more innovations in pedagogy which can help students understand concepts much better. We need to adapt to the changing requirements of the market.”

JEE Counselling 2017: SC vacates stay, counselling dates soon

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Akash

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July 10, 2017

The Supreme Court has vacated its stay on JEE Advanced 2017 counselling. Now, all Indian Institutes of Technology (IITs) are allowed to conduct counselling and admissions of students.

The JEE Advanced counselling will be conducted on the basis of JEE Advanced results 2017. Candidates are now allowed to choose the course and IITs based on their JEE Advanced Rank through the counselling process.

Earlier, the court had restrained the IITs from conducting further counselling after reports of some incorrect questions in JEE Advanced paper. The institutes’ governing body’s meeting held twice on the issue and later it decided to award bonus marks to the candidates who had at least attempted the incorrect questions.

The apex court has also asked the institutes to submit an undertaking affirming that such mistakes will not take place in the future. The court has also instructed the high courts not to interfere with the petitions regarding counselling and admissions of JEE Advanced. The Supreme Court went by its 2005 decision to not allow bonus marks to candidates who have not attempted the incorrect questions.

On June 30, after IIT aspirants’ petitions seeking bonus and thereby to rectify the rank list, the court had issued a notice to the human resource department seeking to quash the JEE 2017 rank list.

Now after the apex court’s decision, dates for rest five rounds of seat allotments will be announced soon which was halted after the completion of first two rounds.

Indian professor selected as young scientist to address BRICS meeting

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Akash

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July 10, 2017

University of Hyderabad (UoH) assistant professor Murali Banavoth has been selected as a young scientist to participate in the second BRICS meeting.

Banavoth, an assistant professor at School of Chemistry in UoH, will address the BRICS meeting on Solar Energy. The meeting is scheduled from July 11-15, at Hangzhou in China, said a release from the University.

Banavoth has obtained his Ph D from the Indian Institute of Science, Bengaluru. He later worked as a post-doctoral associate in King Abdullah University of Science and Technology (KAUST) where he carried out work in the field of hybrid functional materials for solar harvesting.

Banavoth’s contributed in the field of photovoltaic (solar cells) research through his 45 publications. His research interests are broadly classified as organic, inorganic, and hybrid solar cells and photovoltaics.

Presently, he is also the editor of few prestigious journals like Frontiers in Optics and Photonics, Frontiers in Physics.

Banavoth has selected as young scientist to address and participate in BRICS meeting, the release added.

British Council and Mumbai First ink MoU on education and culture

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Akash

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July 10, 2017

British Council India in collaboration with Mumbai First is going to work in the areas of education, tourism, art and culture for the Mumbai Metropolitan Region (MMR).

The two have signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) to initiate projects and conduct various activities that will positively impact the citizens of MMR region in the areas of education and culture.

Under the MoU, educational initiatives will enrich teaching skills and improve the quality of low-cost private English medium schools in MMR. To improve teaching skills and learning outcomes, training programmes on professional development and language proficiency will also be introduced.

Various primary and secondary teachers of government schools across MMR may attend these programmes face to face or digitally. The new schools will focus on developing the school leadership, 21st century core skills of learners and quality in the classrooms. The schools that meet the quality standards will be awarded jointly by both the organisations.

To promote the MMR as a preferred tourism destination, the two organisations will support the creative and cultural economy of the region under the MoU. Mix the City Mumbai is an initiative under the collaboration to spread the diverse range of music of Mumbai to a global audience. The project will feature the recordings of performances by Mumbai musicians curated online. To make the city’s people a part of the city’s rich musical heritage, installations will be placed in multiple public spaces across the city through the collaboration.

“We’re delighted that in Prime Minister Modi’s UK-India Year or Culture, we can deepen our connections with the city through a new partnership with Mumbai First. For almost 70 years we have helped put education and culture at the heart of the UK’s relationship with Mumbai. Through our collaboration with Mumbai First we will build on recent successes like Mix the City Mumbai – a digital cultural initiative showcasing the sights and sounds of the city with people all over the world – and our support to almost 10,000 teachers in municipal schools,” said British Council OBE Director India Alan Gemmell in a release.

Mumbai First Chief Executive Officer Shishir Joshi said, “This collaboration is in line with our vision to transform Mumbai / Mumbai Metropolitan Region (MMR) into a worldclass safe city, one of the best places in which to live and do business in. It will be a critical milestone in impacting the lives of people through initiatives around education, creativity and culture empowering them and making MMR a better place to live, work and play for the citizens.”

IIT Kharagpur acquires four major projects from MHRD

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Akash

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July 10, 2017

IIT Kharagpur (IIT-KGP) has acquired four mega research projects from Ministry of Human Resource Development. The ministry has a special focus on these projects as they are critical for the country’s development.

“We have undertaken four mega projects in sustainable food security, future of cities, signals and systems for life sciences and science and heritage interface along with six integrated projects. These are very important for the future of the country,” said IT-KGP deputy director Sriman Kumar.

Out of four, the project – Sustainable Food Security seeks to leverage technology for food production, processing and distribution logistics. The project is in line with the requirements of technological interventions under the National Food Security Act.

Another mega project – Signals and Systems for Life Sciences with its focus on technology and through biometric signal processing will provide analysis, prognostics, and diagnostics of health along with affordable health care.

The under construction super-speciality hospital at IIT Kharagpur will act as a platform to harness all its energy to bring greater focus to its effort in healthcare domain, the institute officials added.

The project named as Future of Cities intends to identify and address the concerns related to the development of urban India.

The fourth project – Science and Heritage Interface, a science-culture initiative will use technology for preservation, archival, development and scientific exploration of the country’s heritage, including a holistic project on Varanasi.

The institute conducts about 300 plus sponsored research and consultancy projects worth Rs 150 crore. The four mega projects along with another six integrated projects will get special focus.

Smart Education through Smart Classes in Tripura: Dr Sandeep Mahatme

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Akash

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July 8, 2017

In order to equip the youths of border areas with jobs, the government is trying to develop coaching centres for competitive exams. The government is also running capacity building programmes for youth to make them to compete in National level competitive exams, says Dr Sandeep N Mahatme, District Magistrate and Collector, Khowai, Tripura in an interview with Souvik Goswami of Elets News Network (ENN).

What are the initiatives by the government to improve the employment status among youths in Tripura?
The State of Tripura with one of the highest literacy rates in the country has a significant number of educated unemployed youths. Lack of coaching/training institutes that offer facilities to prepare for various Central and State
Government Departments’ recruitment exams result into less number of persons making it to Central/State Government jobs.

Border Area Development Programme (BADP) is a Centrally Sponsored Scheme for ensuring balanced development of border areas through development of infrastructure and promotion of well being and a sense of security among the border population. At the District level it is implemented by the District Administration through various line departments. One of the important components of BADP is capacity building and skill development. Under this component, the Digital Classroom Coaching programme for Railways and Banking exams for SC/ST and other students is being implemented.

Facilities at Coaching Centres:

A coaching institute, namely, Janakalyan Parishad, Dharmanagar, that tied up with Institute of Career Advancement, Agartala, is engaged through open bid following Quality & Cost Based Selection (QCBS) method.
100 students are selected through screening tests by the coaching institute out of which 50 students are enrolled to undergo coaching for banking exams and the remaining 50 for Railways exams.
The coaching institute will train 100 students, selected through a test, to make them capable of facing recruitment exams of Railways (Group C and D) and Banks (IBPS Probationary Officers, IBPS Clerk Recruitment etc.).
The coaching Institute has set up digital classrooms at Dharmanagar and at Kanchanpur.
The coaching Institute has supplied books and study materials to the students. In addition, it will also supply tablets with access to videos and other information based upon syllabus.
The duration of coaching is for a 4 months session. The coaching institute is required to conduct at least 8 classes per month. The coaching will also conduct at least 2 tests per month. Attendance of the students is taken in Biometric system.
Trainee students will be provided with Travelling Allowance @ Rs 50 on attendance.

What are the opportunities for Tripura’s youths as far as government sector is concerned?
As per Indian Institute of Bank Mana Jement (IIBM), Guwahati, there is heavy demand for trained professionals to man the branches and also to replace those who are retiring in near future. The problem is more acute in the North
Eastern region where officers and staffs of Banks are reluctant to be posted. So, there is perennial shortage of skilled manpower in North East.

Also Read: Smart Education

Institute of Banking Personal Selection (IBPS) quoted that there is acute need of banking persons. Around 7.5 lakh people were to be recruited in next five years. Every year the trend is almost same.
BFSI sector skill council of India (Banking Financial Services and Insurance) (Under NSDC)- has projected manpower recruitment of the sector by 2022 to be 8.5 million, which is as increase of 4 to 4.5 million from where we stand today.
As estimated by NSDC, Tripura require 3.25 lakh employee workforce by 2022. So, banking sector job opportunity must be grabbed by the youth of North East/Tripura.
North Eastern Frontier Railway Division has its Railway Recruitment Board (RRB) in Guwahati. Opportunities in Rail recruitment lies with Rail Wheel factory Recruitment, Rail coach factory recruitment, IRCTC amongst many others.
Recent RRB recruitment shows vacancies of 2,24,656 during 2016-17.

Who and how beneficiaries/people/Departments are affected positively?
The programme is targeted for educated unemployed youths of border villages of North Tripura District who lacks competitive edge due to absence of opportunities to prepare for recruitment exams conducted by Banks and
Railways. Particularly, the focus is on SC and ST students.
This type of coaching would augment, to a great extent, the skills of individuals from remote border villages who are looking for better opportunities but does not have the means to avail quality coaching to prepare themselves for
the competitive exams.

What role do nominated departments play in employment and skilling of youth?
The office of the District Magistrate and Collector North Tripura, invited Expression of Interest (EOI) which was published widely including the official websites of the State Government and District Administration. A good response was received during the second call for EOI. A technical committee evaluated the bid documents
and called the shortlisted eligible applicants for a presentation before the committee. The final selection was made based on QCBS method. The District Administration is also monitoring the day to day progress of the programme as
well as every other aspects of implementation.

What will be the outcome of the initiative?
The implementation of the programme is still ongoing. By May, 2017, around 50 students were trained for Railways and around 50 students were trained for banking recruitment exams.

Centre to launch 4 digital initiatives to promote e-learning

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Akash

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July 7, 2017

The Central Government is going to launch four major initiatives to push e- learning in higher education.

President Pranab Mukherjee will launch the initiatives this week. The initiative include the launch of Swayam — an indigenously designed massive open online course (MOOC), Swayam Prabha — a project for transmitting high-quality educational content through 32 Direct-to-Home channels, National Digital Library – online collection of over 6.5 million books, National Academic Depository – to authenticate all certificates issued by institutions across India.

“These initiatives will increase the Gross Enrolment Ratio in the higher education from 24.5 (2015-16) to 30 by 2020,” said a ministry of human resource development (MHRD) official.

“The modalities on granting degrees to students undertaking online courses are still under deliberation,” the official added.

According to the MHRD, the students registered with recognised institutes would have the option of earning online credit through programme running on the platform. Through Swayam Prabha, the government would air new content of four hours every day. It would be repeated six times a day.

“The content would be mainly for students from Class IX to XII and those who are preparing for admission into IITs,” the official added.

Nearly 1,000 vice-chancellors of central, state, deemed and private universities along with directors of premier institutes such as Indian Institutes of Management (IIMs) and Indian Institutes of Technology (IITs) were present at the launch.

Bombay HC orders to formulate pre-primary education policy by year end

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By

Akash

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July 7, 2017

The Bombay High Court has questioned the delay in bringing out pre-primary education policy and directed the concerned authorities to frame the same by year end.

The court has directed that the policy in Maharashtra must be in line with the provisions of the Right to Education Act underlining the importance and benefits mentioned in the act for a child to acquire from pre-primary education.

“Having regard to the importance and benefits a child can acquire from preprimary education, the framers of the statute took care of pre-primary education also, which is a foundation in the education of any person,” said the High Court.

The bench of chief justice Manjula Chellur and justice RM Borde has passed the order recently in Aurangabad during the hearing of a public interest litigation (PIL) filed by Dr Jagganath Patil. The PIL has highlighted the hardships and expressed the grievances faced by parents while securing admission for their children in good pre-primary schools education of the state.

It is important to lay down the procedure for pre-primary education as it plays a major role in the education system of the country, described under Section 11 of the Right of Children to Free and Compulsory Education Act, 2009.

The court said it failed to understand why the authorities were unable to bring any procedure or policy in Maharashtra even after having a study tour in other states like Rajasthan.

“If such policy is under active consideration of the authorities, we fail to understand, why they need one year to bring it out,” said the bench, when told by the state lawyers that it was working on a policy.

The court set a deadline of December 31 to bring out the policy and disposed the PIL.

Centre constitutes committee to revamp minority education

By

Akash

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July 7, 2017

The Minority Affairs Ministry has constituted an 11 member committee to revamp the minority education in India.

The panel has suggested setting up of more than 200 schools and 25 colleges to overhaul the education system for minorities.

The panel has submitted its report to the minority affairs ministry suggesting that the new schools should follow the CBSE syllabus. Students belonging to minority communities may also be allowed to attend Madrasas for religious education.

As per 2011 Census, literacy rate of largest minority community – Muslims is 68.53%. The literacy
rate of Muslims is lowest among all minority communities and is also lesser than the national average of 72.98%. The poor quality of education with lower literacy rate among the community is a matter of concern keeping them at a “double disadvantage.”

Former parliamentary affairs secretary Afzal Amanullah will head the panel. He suggested that five national research and specialised education institutes will be set up in fields like science and technology, health sciences and architecture. As per the Government’s instructions, all the institute will provide co-education to help in improving the abysmally low literacy rate among Muslim women, said Amanullah.

“We have not said only minority students will be allowed to study in these institutes. But we want these institutes to come in minority-dominated areas so that the local boys and girls have an advantage,” Amanullah said.

The panel has proposed to set up 211 schools in places like Anantnag, Darbhanga where students will be taught free of cost.

Claiming that though Muslims are in dire need of modern education, the panel will also look at the needs of other minority communities as well, Amanullah said. “We have focused on imparting secular education. But if anyone wants to pursue theological studies, we have said that students can go to madrasas before the school hours,” he added.

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