Tokato K Sumi
Lizumi village
Education is the most powerful weapon which you can use to change the world - Nelson Mandela
The calendar year 1968 proves pivotal in Indian history when the Government of India under the then Premier Indira Gandhi announced its first national policy on education based on the recommendation of the Kothari Commission which seek to develop proposals to bring overhaul reformation in the Indian education system. Till then three significant reformation on the education policy has so far been introduced with Narendra Modi administration kicking the latest spot that formidably prints 'New Education Policy 2020'. The NEP 2020 unequivocally manifest galore positive feedback from the intelligentsia and the stakeholders who believes a better implementation and cooperation from the Indian states will bring education revolution thence elevating the Indian education system on the par with other developed countries. Yet the stain on the white clothe persists with the southern states of India obstructing the new language formula and the raising issue of anganwadi workers to educate the children at pre primary level storms the deck with many perceiving it could handicap the children education as less educational qualifications are conveyed by most of the anganwadi workers/teachers. Wherever the pros and cons the New Education Policy eye promising.
The education landscape in Nagaland needs revamping and the NEP 2020 could prove influential. The Gross Enrollment Ratio which seeks to target 100 percent in the secondary school and 50 percent in the higher education by 2035 marks a significant step. Article 21a and 45 of the Indian constitution clearly guarantees right to free education. Nagaland GER in higher education currently holds at 18.7 in contradictory to India's GER at 26.3 percent. The contract of GER by the NEP will impetus the children from Nagaland to eschew crucial insurmountable task for instance the major school drop outs due to socio economic condition or financial constraints particularly advancing the children to work in domestic or commercial field. The World Day against Child Labour 2020 focuses on the theme 'children shouldn't work on fields but on dreams' perspicuously solicits towards the child education. The child labour survey conducted by the Kailash Satyarthi Children's Foundation (KSCF) which aims to achieve Sustainable Development Goal 8.7 of eliminating Child labour by 2025 in the country interprets the inclusion of Nagaland as among the 10 states of India which constitute 14 percent of the total child labour population in the country is daunting. The GER targeted could henceforth bear out noteworthy. The Plato's "allegory of the cave" explains on how education can implicate the ignorant people by transforming them into being rational and how it can eliminate the ideologies they perceive or illusion as it ought be. This explicit extraction from the Plato's work audibly shows the education paramount and how it can impact the people living in poverty and without education.
The 5+3+3+4 formula which seek to replace the 10+2 current system of education will infact prove titanic to the Naga students as it will enhance their cognitive skills and the aptitude inherent. The new 4 system formula will perhaps activate the thunderstorm and bring joy of rain to the students as it will enable them the right to choose the subjects based on their individual interests which will open up various combinations for students unlike the 10+2 system where the students are required to plump for one of the streams like science, humanities, social sciences or commerce. The likes of IIT Delhi and IIT Kharagpur attaching department of humanities and social sciences in their institute is the perfect paradigm which NEP envisages on attaining multiple disciplines in various schools and institutions. The co-curriculum and vocational subjects like sports, arts, commerce, and science will be treated at the same level. This will enable many enthusiastic Naga sportsperson, photographers, designers, artisans etc to display their proficiency in their field of interest hence evading the incoming unemployment which strike at the boastful 21.4 percentage according to the report tabled by Periodic labour Force Survey 2017-2018. This will also churn out less anxiety and hence could prove beneficial to the students possessing different enterprises.
The NEP unveils a host of opportunities to the students in the educational technology sector. This will enable many students from Nagaland to avail the elbow room. This edtech will make their learning more accurate, interactive and engaging. For instance online tutoring and peer learning platforms will not only integrate the students-teacher relationship but simultaneously student-student integration. The Diksha application will also help teachers to create training content, profile, in-class resources, assessment aids and connect with teacher community. The students will in addition be able to get access to diverse digital platforms such as Divyang Friendly Educational Software, Massive Open online Courses (MOOCS), e-content in various languages, virtual labs etc which will make them competent suffice to throw one's hat in the ring with the outside world. This edtech will ease the learning burden of the Naga students.
The Mother tongue which the NEP proposed to bring until at least grade V sounds viable. Research has shown that children’s first language is the optimal language for literacy and learning through primary school (UNESCO 2008a).Without sceptic mother tongue in primary education will succor the child in the learning process as the child is taught in the language he or she is familiar to. This will help them to develop critical thinking and evolve better comprehension. This was rightly stated by Nelson Mandela when he quoted "If you talk to a man in a language he understands, that goes to his head. If you talk to him in his own language that goes to his heart.” This policy indeed looks quite fascinating and deliberates word of honour. The backlash of this policy averred where English is the dominant language of internet, science and technology. It will also affect the children of people in transferable jobs and so forth. In the binocular context of Nagaland where English is literally the taste, colour and blood of the Nagas as most of the communication process is done in English in the educational sector, official premises or paper documents, the inception of mother tongue as the medium of instruction at the primary level may not prove so considerable as reflected and it will hamstrung the child communication skills in the long sprint where English is entirely a requisite subject and indispensable. After the primary level the child has to learn English anyhow as English is still regarded as the heart and soul in our education system. With English being used excessively in our everyday life from the time we wake up to greet good morning till the dawn of goodnight shows how depended the word English has set foot our life. For example a well qualified person with tad proficiency in English pitch will distinctly face time embarrassment when confronting an interviewer and more likely to experience disconcert as lack of proper speech will tend to one evince detrimental. With 16 tribes and languages spoken indistinctively it is quite difficult to bring any specific mother tongue into our education system. The Andhra Pradesh government recently approved English as the medium of instruction at the primary level taking into account the English necessity in the age of artificial intelligence. If at this juncture the Nagas genuinely want to excel and compete with the exterior factor then English should be given utmost importance of all at the primary level irrespective of any languages be it regional or local. However mother tongue should in no way remain unacknowledged and the current process of MIL (Modern Indian languages) should be given at par importance to that of English. It is now up-to the Nagaland government to deal with this issue intensively and implement policies essentially as of attractive and perpetual beneficial to the students.
