By Our Reporter
SHILLONG, Oct 26: Education Minister, Rakkam A Sangma on Thursday stated that the many metrics and indicators of education paint a terrible picture of the state education system and that the government and Education department will not hesitate to make the historic decision to change the textbooks if necessary.
“As of right now, our state has the lowest learning outcomes in the nation, the highest drop rate, and the lowest PGA ranking. For this reason, the government and the Education department will not think twice to make the historic decision to change the textbooks if necessary,” Sangma stated.
“We may have to adopt the recommendations to use the NCERT textbooks with certain conditions and copyright to ensure our culture and traditions are not overlooked. We are currently awaiting the deliberations and consultations of the DRT. They have completed the exercise and met many subject experts from the state, various state boards, CBSE, and academicians,” he stated.
Informing that he recently met heads of various schools in Garo Hills, he said, “We listened to their concerns about the curriculum and syllabus not being at par with the national standard. They have asked the government to reconsider and update the curriculum to conform to the national requirements.”
Additionally, he said that he will meet with the headmasters and principals of the secondary and higher secondary schools of Khasi-Jaintia Hills region on Friday. During their meeting, they will discuss a number of topics, including curriculum standards and textbook comparisons with national standards.
“We will be having the first sitting to review about textbook and curriculum on Nov 1, where the textbook revision committee comprising of officers from the Education department, the DRT, MBoSE, and some expert members will be there,” he said, stating that the goal of the entire exercise is to raise the standard of the state education system to a level that is comparable to the national standard.
When asked if they would also be talking about NCERT textbooks at the school level, he responded: “That will depend on the report from the DRT. Allow the DRT to provide us with a roadmap that includes the whole curriculum, a syllabus, a comparison of the current state and national curriculum standards, and their recommendations.”