Bhubaneswar: Scholars, educationists and others gave their feedback on the ‘Draft Education Policy 2019’ at a state-level consultative meeting here Wednesday.
The meeting was attended by many chancellors of universities and college principals who suggested changes to the policy.
The Minister for Higher Education, Arun Kumar Sahoo, and the Vice Chairman of the Odisha State Higher Education Council (OSHEC), Ashok Das, also attended the meeting.
Calling upon participants to deliberate on the reforms, the higher education minister said he was satisfied with the discussions.
“We will compile all suggestions and send it to the Centre by July 31. All aspects have been discussed. We will propose what is best for Odisha, keeping the state’s socio-economic status and geography in mind,” said Arun Sahoo.
Many ideas bounced around at the meet. Amiya Mohanty of the Joint Forum for Movement on Education said that the draft policy was framed without proper consultations with stakeholders.
Calling for a comprehensive discussion on the subject, he stressed that there is centralisation, commercialisation, communalisation and privatisation of education in the draft policy.
Many educationists opposed more colleges going autonomous as they fear that it will pave the way for privatisation of education. They said that affiliated systems and existing bodies like UGC should stay.
Sanghamitra Mohanty, a former Vice Chancellor of North Orissa University, said that technology has to be integrated and upgraded significantly to help the state’s rural students. She focused on the need for live streaming lectures for improving the teaching experience and to disseminate knowledge.
“For this we need proper funding for infrastructure and bandwidth. It will be significant if this is coded in the education policy and monitored, said Dr Sanghamitra.
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