Page 11 - Education Ministry

'CUET-UG not based on CBSE, equally examines students of different boards'

The Common University Entrance Test (CUET)-UG is not based on CBSE syllabus but the general understanding of different class 12 subjects, the Ministry of Education said on Wednesday. The test examines students of different boards on equal footing, Union Minister of State for Education Subhas Sarkar said in a written reply in Rajya Sabha. "CUET is being conducted for admission in central universities from the academic year 2022-23 to reduce the burden on students, universities and the entire education system. "The syllabus is based on general understanding of subject at class 12 level and therefore the test examines the students of different boards at equal footing. CUET is not based on CBSE syllabus," he said. The minister also denied there was any proposal to scrap any school board and recognise only one from which students can take class 12 exams before appearing for the CUET. The CUET-UG is the second-largest entrance exam in the country in terms of the number of applicants. In

Education ministry selects Oracle Cloud Infrastructure to modernise DIKSHA

The Ministry of Education has selected Oracle Cloud Infrastructure to modernise national education technology platform Digital Infrastructure for Knowledge Sharing (DIKSHA), the company said on Wednesday. The migration will help make DIKSHA more accessible and lower its IT costs. The platform supports 1.48 million schools across 35 states and Union Territories and is available in 36 Indian languages. "We have transformed and migrated DIKSHA onto Oracle Cloud Infrastructure (OCI)," said Shailender Kumar, senior vice-president and regional managing director, Oracle India and NetSuite Asia Pacific and Japan, at a briefing. Under the seven-year collaboration pact, OCI will help the ministry use DIKSHA to provide educational resources to millions of additional students, teachers and collaborators across the country. DIKSHA was built for school education and foundational learning programmes and represents one of India's largest and most successful Digital Public Infrastructure (DPI) ...

Muslim student enrolment in higher education up by 183,000 in 2016-21: MoE

The enrolment of Muslim students in higher education institutions increased to 19.22 lakh in 2020-21 from 17.39 lakh in 2016-17, Union Minister of State for Education Subhas Sarkar said on Wednesday. The number of teachers from the Muslim community also increased significantly to 86,314 in 2020-21 from 67,215 in 2016-17, he said. The minister shared the statistics from the All India Survey on Higher Education, 2020-21, in response to a written question in the Rajya Sabha. "As per the All India Survey on Higher Education (AISHE), 2020-21, the enrolment of Muslim students has increased to 19.22 lakh in 2020-21 from 17.39 lakh in 2016-17. The number of teachers from the Muslim community has shown (a) significant increase to 86,314 in 2020-21 from 67,215 in 2016-17, as reported under AISHE, 2020-21," he said. "The government is encouraging minority students through various initiatives," Sarkar added. He shared that the Union Ministry of Minority Affairs implements three educational ..

Education ministry signs 106 MoUs to foster innovation, research, knowledge

The Ministry of Education on Sunday signed 106 MoUs with various esteemed organisations and institutions to foster innovation, research and knowledge exchange in multiple domains, ushering in a new era of collaboration in education and industry-academia linkages. The memoranda of understanding (MoUs) were signed on the culmination day of the Akhil Bhartiya Shiksha Samagam to mark the third anniversary of the launch of the new National Education Policy (NEP). The Central Board of Secondary Education (CBSE) signed 15 MoUs with different institutes and sector-skill providers to give a specific focus on skill development and education. "These partnership will also promote skill assessment and capacity building," a senior MoE official said. The MoUs were signed in association with the Atal Innovation Mission, IBM, Intel, Microsoft, Apparel Made-Ups and Home Furnishing Sector Skill Council, Automotive Sector Skill Council, Sports, Physical Education, Fitness and Leisure Skills Council, .

Education minister Dharmendra Pradhan meets META President Nick Clegg

Union Education Minister Dharmendra Pradhan on Wednesday met Nick Clegg, President, Global Affairs, META and former Deputy Prime Minister, UK. The minister invited META to strengthen entrepreneurship, Digital India and Skill India for empowering the country's population. Pleased to meet Sir @nickclegg, President, Global Affairs, @Meta. Good conversations around India's talent base, tech-innovations, growing spirit of enterprise as well as skilling efforts. Invited Meta to strengthen the entrepreneurship as well as #DigitalIndia and #SkillIndia mission for empowering India's population as per the vision of Hon. PM @narendramodi ji, Pradhan tweeted. The education minister also presented 'Pattachitra', a traditional handicraft of Odisha, to Clegg.

Education minister Pradhan meets Australian counterpart Brendan O'Connor

Union Education Minister Dharmendra Pradhan met his Australian counterpart Brendan O'Connor here on Thursday and discussed ongoing collaborations between the two countries in education and skill development. "The two countries should explore ways to replicate such processes in India and train the youth for the emerging job roles," Pradhan said. "Areas like agricultural technology, mining, water management, renewable energy and emerging technology like AI and robotics could be explored extensively. This the best moment for India-Australia engagement which is already at a historic high," he said. Recalling the signing of the agreement on 'Mutual Recognition of Qualification' signed between the two countries earlier this year, Pradhan called for its implementation so that a two-way mobility of students and skilled persons between the two countries could be facilitated. Pradhan also invited O'Connor for the 7th meeting of Australia-India Education and Skills Council scheduled to take

Atishi issues order to save Delhi govt school buildings amid heavy rain

"As we are aware that during last few days, the city has faced continuous heavy rainfalls and it might have affected the conditions of government school buildings," stated the order

'Districts' performance in school education sees notable drop during Covid'

The performance of districts in school education saw a significant drop during the Covid pandemic, with none of the districts figuring in the top two categories in the Ministry of Education's Performance Grading Index for Districts (PGI-D) for 2020-21 and 2021-22 released on Sunday. Punjab with 18 districts in "Ati-Uttam" category (the third grade out of total 10), in 2021-22 has outperformed Rajasthan whose number of districts in this category came down to five from 26 in 2020-21. Punjab too has one less district in this category compared to 2020-21. The report on PGI-D assesses the performance of school education system at the district level by creating an index for comprehensive analysis. It graded 742 districts during 2020-21 and 748 districts during 2021-22 across the states and Union territories. PGI-D grades the districts into 10 grades with the highest achievable grade being "Daksh", which is for districts scoring more than 90 per cent of the total points in that category or

Kollam highest performing district in school education during 2020-21: MoE

Kerala's Kollam and Thiruvananthapuram were the highest performing districts in school education during 2020-21 followed by Kannur and Thrissur, according to a Ministry of Education's report on Performance Grading Index for Districts (PGI-D). The report released on Sunday assesses the performance of school education system at the district level by creating an index for comprehensive analysis. The districts' performance has been graded under the "Ati Uttam" category, which is the third best category of PGI-D. None of the districts have figured in the two categories with highest grades -- "Daksh" and "Utkarsh". Among the best performing districts, maximum are from Rajsthan (26) followed by Gujarat (22) and Punjab (19). All nine districts of Delhi have figured in the "Ati Uttam" category. The ministry released the PGI-D for 2020-21 and 2021-22. The PGI-D report graded 742 districts during 2020-21 and 748 districts during 2021-22 across the states and Union territories. PGI-D grades t

Assam govt releases Rs 96.21 cr grant, holds back grants to 11,480 schools

The Assam government, in April, launched its own Siksha Setu Asom Portal App to collect information about schools, teachers, students and other information

Assam to weed out 'ghost schools and teachers': Education minister

After "ghost students", Assam is planning to weed out "ghost schools and teachers", state Education Minister Ranoj Pegu said on Sunday. Special grants to schools which failed to provide complete information about staff have been put on hold, with salaries of such employees to be stopped in next two months, he said. Addressing a press conference here, Pegu said, "We had already detected ghost students. Now, there could be ghost schools and teachers." Ghost students, schools and teachers are those which exist only on paper. It is done to obtain government funds for various purposes. Around 4.50 lakh ghost students in government and private schools were detected in the state in June during reconciliation of enrolment figures with that of the previous year. Pegu said over 11,000 lower and upper primary government schools have failed to provide complete data of their staff, comprising both teaching and non-teaching, as sought by the department. "The information was to be uploaded on

Rashtrapati Bhavan to host two-day Visitor's Conference 2023 on Monday

Rashtrapati Bhavan will host a two-day Visitor's Conference 2023 on July 10 and 11

Govt releases report on Performance Grading Index 2.0 for 2021-22

The Ministry of Education has released the report on Performance Grading Index (PGI) 2.0 for states/UTs which comprises of 1,000 points across 73 indicators grouped into two categories

NExT for 2019 batch of final-year medical students to be held in 2 phases

The National Exit Test (NExT) for the 2019 batch of final-year MBBS students will be held in two phases next year, official sources said on Tuesday. According to the sources, the NExT will be conducted in two phases -- NExT Step 1 and NExT Step 2 -- by the All India Institute of Medical Sciences (AIIMS), New Delhi. The NExT Step 1 for the final-year batch is likely to be held in February 2024, the sources said. After clearing the NExT Step 1, the students will be doing an internship for a year and the NExT Step 1 score will be considered for their admission in post-graduate courses, Dr Yogender Malik, member of the National Medical Commission's (NMC) Ethics and Medical Registration Board (EMRB), explained. After the internship, the students will have to clear the NExT Step 2 to become eligible for getting the licence and registration to practise modern medicine in India, Malik said. Foreign medical graduates who want to practise in India will have to appear in the NExT Step 1, do

IAS officer points out flaws in education system, minister seeks report

An IAS officer in Gujarat has claimed students of some primary schools in Chhotaudepur district cannot even read a word or do simple mathematical calculations, promoting the state education department to seek a report on it from authorities. Indian Administrative Service (IAS) officer Dhaval Patel, serving as the commissioner of geology and mining in Gandhinagar, expressed shock and anguish over the state of education in the tribal-dominated Chhotaudepur district. In a letter sent to the education department on June 16, Patel termed the education being imparted to tribal children as "rotten" and claimed such education will only ensure the next generation of tribals continues to work as labourers and never progress in life. State Education Minister Kuber Dindor, who also has charge of the tribal development portfolio as cabinet minister, on Monday said he has sought a report from officials about the observations made by Patel. "I have asked officials of my department to give a detai

Bihar govt plans to initiate measures to boost education sector: Circular

The Bihar government will initiate a slew of measures to strengthen the education sector such as carrying out regular inspection of government schools and deduction of a day's salary for teachers found absent during the exercise, a circular said. Officials of the department will need permission directly from the Additional Chief Secretary (ACS) even if they travel outside their district headquarters for appearing before a court. District Magistrates were urged to ensure inspection of all schools, at least twice every week, and take steps for deduction of a day's salary for teachers found absent during the inspection. According to a circular issued by the State Council of Educational Research and Training (SCERT) on June 24, all officials and other staff at the SCERT have been asked to report for work at 9.30 in the morning and continue till 8 pm on weekdays. The offices will function till 6 pm on Saturdays. The new work schedule will be effective from June 26. All officials would

1,500 children from Manipur have enrolled in Mizoram schools: Official

More than 1,500 children who have shifted along with their families from violence-hit Manipur have been enrolled in various schools across Mizoram, a senior official of the education department said. Mizoram Education Director Lalsangliana told PTI that the displaced children were given free admission in government schools. Considering their situation, the students were allowed to enrol in the schools even if they could not produce the required documents, he said. Meanwhile, Mizoram Home Commissioner and Secretary H Lalengmawia expressed hope that the state government would receive monetary assistance from the Centre to provide relief to over 11,800 internally displaced people from Manipur. Lalengmawia told the meeting of the executive committee on internally displaced people of Manipur on Tuesday that, he along with other officials had accompanied Tourism Minister Robert Romawia Royte to Delhi to pursue the assistance sought by the state government recently. He said that the stat

NIT Rourkela to host CSAB-2023 and co-host JoSAA; registrations start today

For the Union Territories of Andaman and Nicobar, Lakshwadeep, Daman and Diu, and Dadra and Nagar Haveli, separate CSAB-Supernumerary rounds will also be conducted

We should trust our education planners, says minister Jitendra Singh

Union Minister Jitendra Singh on Friday said the National Education Policy 2020 is one of the best things that has happened under Prime Minister Narendra Modi's rule, asserting that the people should trust education planners. He said whatever is happening in the education sector under Modi is in the best interests of the country. "We recently concluded a discussion on the National Education Policy 2020. It is one of the best things that has happened in recent times under Prime Minister Modi," Singh said. "We should rather trust the educationists and education planners of the country", he told reporters, responding to a question about the revision of school textbooks by the Karnataka government. Karnataka Primary and Secondary Education Minister Madhu Bangarappa had on last Thursday said the revision of school textbooks will be done in the interests of the students. "Whatever is happening under Prime Minister Modi is happening in the best interest of educationists as well as the pe

NTA to reschedule CUET exam for Meghalaya students: Education Minister

Meghalaya Education Minister Rakkam A Sangma on Thursday said the National Testing Authority (NTA) has decided to reschedule CUET examination for students from the northeastern state who have been allotted centres elsewhere in the country. The Common Universities Entrance Test (CUET) is scheduled to be held on Friday. "The Union Ministry for Human Resources has directed the NTA to reschedule the exam for students from the state who were allotted CUET examination centres outside the state," Sangma told PTI. The rescheduled exam date for the affected students from Meghalaya will be announced as soon as the state administration submits to the NTA the list of the affected students, he said. The students on the list will get another opportunity to sit for the exam on a rescheduled date, he said, adding that data is being collected at the moment and the list will be submitted to the NTA at the earliest. He said the development took place after Chief Minister Conrad K Sangma wrote a lett