Daily PIB Analysis For UPSC/IAS | 13th January 2019 -

Table of Contents

Department of Space

Chairman ISRO addresses media in Bengaluru Dr Sivan also briefed about the challenging missions envisaged during this year including the Chandrayaan-2 mission. Several new technologies such as Small Satellite Launch Vehicle, Reusable Launch Vehicle and in-flight connectivity (with launch of GSAT-20) are planned to be demonstrated this year. “Enhanced industry interface for production of PSLV by industry will be a major milestone and the efforts in this regard are initiated” Dr. K Sivan remarked. Dr K Sivan while briefing about India’s first manned mission flight, Gaganyaan, said “The mission will be capable of carrying three Indian astronauts and will orbit the Earth for seven days.
▪It is a major expansion in ISRO’s Programme.
▪A new Centre – Human Space Flight Centre is formed and will be the lead Centre for the overall management and realization of Gaganyaan”.

Year End Review 2018 Ministry of Human Resource Development

In pursuance to Hon’ble Prime Minister’s vision for ‘Transforming India’ , Ministry of Human Resource Development took a leap forward in transforming education sector with the motto of “सबको शिक्षा, अच्छी शिक्षा ”(Education for All, Quality Education).
In the year of 2018 MHRD has launched an integrated scheme Samagra Shiksha for School Education to treat school education from pre-school, primary, upper primary, secondary to senior secondary levels as a whole for the betterment of the students

MHRD has given graded autonomy to selected Higher Educational Institutions to promote research and innovation in their campuses so that they can entre in global institutions ranking.

Some new important schemes/Initiatives of MHRD like

▪ IMPRESS,
▪ Study in India,
▪ SPARCK,
▪ STARS,
▪ NTA,
▪ NDL,
▪ HEFA,
▪ LEAP,
▪ ARPIT and
▪ Innovation Cell etc. are the game changer in the field of education in the country.

The Department of School Education & Literacy, Ministry of Human Resource Development has launched an Integrated Scheme for School Education – Samagra Shiksha from 2018-19.
Samagra Shiksha envisages ‘school’ as a continuum from pre-school, primary, upper primary, secondary to senior secondary levels.
Preference will be given to educationally backward Blocks (EBBs), Special Focus Districts (SFDs), Border areas and the Aspirational Districts identified by NITI Aayog.

Library Grant under Samagra Shiksha (Padhe Bharat Badhe Bharat)

In order to complement the activities under Padhe Bharat Badhe Bharat and inculcate the reading habits among students of all ages, strengthening of school libraries is being undertaken including provision of books by providing library grant for government schools, under the newly launched centrally sponsored scheme of Samagra Shiksha from 2018-19.
For the first time the provision for separate annual library grant has been made covering schools from Primary to Senior Secondary.
Sports Grant under Samagra Shiksha (Khele India Khile India)
Realizing the need for holistic development of children, Samagra Shiksha has included the Sports and Physical Education component to each school under which sports grant is being provided for sports equipments for indoor & outdoor games.
Sports Education has been an integral part of the curriculum. Every school will receive sports equipments at the cost of
Rs.5000 for Primary Schools, Rs.10,000 for Upper Primary Schools and up to Rs.25,000 for Secondary and Senior Secondary Schools to inculcate and emphasize relevance of sports.
The scheme of Samagra Shiksha has provision for existing KGBVs at upper primary level and Girls Hostels at secondary level to be extended/ converged to provide residential and schooling facilities upto Class-XII.
This would provide the facility of at-least one residential school for girls from Classes VIXII in every educationally backward block which does not have residential schools under any other Scheme.
1232 KGBVs have been approved for upgradation during 2018-19.
More than 7.25 lakh rural girls, as per sanctioned capacity, will benefit & mostly from SC, ST, OBC, Minority & other deprived sections of the society
The girls in the age group 10-18 aspiring to study in Classes VI to XII and belonging to SC, ST, OBC, Minority communities and BPL families form the target group of the scheme

Vocational Education

Vocational Education is a scheme under the umbrella of ‘Samagra Shiksha. The scheme seeks to integrate vocational education with general academic education.
The scheme covers Government schools and Government aided schools.
The scheme has a provision for providing exposure to vocational education to students of Classes VI to VIII.
NSQF compliant vocational courses are taught to the students of class 9th to 12th.
At the secondary level i.e. class 9th and 10th, vocational modules are offered to students as an additional subject.
At Sr. Secondary level, i.e. class XI and XII, vocational courses are offered as a compulsory (elective) subject. Under the program, there is a provision for arranging hands – on training for students in industrial set up and guest lectures from industry.
The Learning Outcomes document for elementary level has been developed in two forms.
The complete document includes Curricular Expectations, Pedagogical Processes and
Learning Outcomes of classes I to VIII.
This document is meant for teachers and teacher educators and school administration to ensure and enhance the quality of learning in schools and the compact version contains only the learning outcomes for each subject in each class.
24 States and UTs (UTs without legislature and Jammu and Kashmir have adopted central rules mutatis mutandis) have incorporated the learning outcomes in their State rules.

NCERT conducted research studies in six blocks of the country to enhance achievement of learning outcomes The research studies will help

to assess the age and development appropriateness of learning outcomes identified for each class
to assess adequacy of strategies and materials developed by NCERT in achievement of learning outcomes

National Achievement Survey 2017-18

NAS assessed the learning levels of the students in Classes 3, 5, 8 and 10, initially the District report cards were released and later the State Learning Reports were made available on the website for Classes 3,5 and 8 in May, 2018 and for Class 10 the State Learning Reports were available in the month of November, 2018.
Operation Digital Board (ODB) would provide Smart Classroom facility to all 101580 schools with secondary and senior secondary classes, over the next five years

Participation of India in Programmefor International Students Assessment (PISA)

▪ The Programme for International Students Assessment (PISA) will be conducted by the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) in 2021.
▪ PISA was launched by OECD in 1997, first administered in 2000 and now covers approximately 80 countries
▪ PISA is a triennial international survey (every three years) which aims to evaluate the education system worldwide by testing the skills and knowledge of 15- year-old students.

PISA, unlike content-based assessment, measures the extent to which students have acquired key competencies that are essential for full participation in modern societies.
v. Participation in PISA allows benchmarking performance against a wide range of countries
India will participate in PISA 2021 through schools run by Kendriya Vidyalaya Sangathan (KVS), Navodaya Vidyalaya Samiti (NVS) and the UT of Chandigarh.
It was decided after due consideration that the computer-based testing mode would not be suitable for Indian students at this point in time and as of now the mode of testing would be paper-based.
The preparations for PISA 2021 have been initiated.
An International Treaty will be signed between MHRD and OECD for this purpose.
The World Bank will be providing technical support as well as financial assistance to the tune of USD 5.6 million for all activities related to PISA
The NCERT has undertaken review of Syllabi and Textbooks developed by the NCERT as a follow up of the National Curriculum Framework-2005 in 2017-18
A portal for teachers’ suggestions on the NCERT textbooks was created.
Further, national initiatives such as Clean India, Digital India, Beti Bachao Beti Padhao, Demonetization, etc., have also been given space in the reviewed textbooks in integrated manner. Data was updated in the light of Census 2011. Reviewed textbooks have been implemented for the year 2018-19.
Seven joint committees drawing memberships from the NCERT, CBSE, NVS and KVS were constituted by the NCERT to discuss syllabus and textbooks at the secondary and senior secondary stages and the issues regarding assessment and examination
two major recommendations were made-
1. CBSE will not publish any textbook henceforth. All the textbooks shall be published by the NCERT only and
2. Joint Committees to be constituted to discuss these issues further.
Now, NCERT is in the process of finalizing its textbooks for 2019-20 including QR codes in each of the textbook titles.
NCERT to distribute over 6 crore textbooks
It is expected that NCERT will be able to print 6.03 crore textbooks by June, 2019 for the session 2019-20.
Textbooks will be distributed through four Regional Production-cum-Distribution Centres already established at Ahmedabad, Bengaluru, Guwahati and Kolkata apart from Delhi

e-Pathshala

NCERT books are available free in digital version. 15 lakh students have downloaded the e-pathshala app. Visits in one year has crossed 30 million mark

UDISE+ (UDISE plus)

▪The Unified District Information on School Education (UDISE) collects data on all schools in the country.
▪From 2018-19, it has been decided to update the UDISE and introduce new features.
▪The UDISE+ (i.e., UDISE Plus) application will be online and will gradually move towards collecting real-time data.
UDISE+ application, in addition to data collection, will have the following features:

Data analytics and data visualization
Key performance indicators
GIS mapping and school report cards

Performance Grading Index (PGI)

The PGI is for the purpose of grading States and UTs on their performance across 70 indicators on school education.
The Index will grade States and UTS thus allowing for more than one State/UT to occupy the same grade, and therefore all 36 States and UTS to ultimately reach the highest level.
The PGI has been conceptualised as a tool to encourage States and UTs to adopt certain practices like online recruitment and transfer of Teachers, electronic attendance of Students & Teachers etc.