Says under literate Nepal campaign, 53 districts declared literate

Kathmandu, March 7

The Ministry of Education, Science and Technology has initiated a process of formulating federal education act based on socialism oriented National Education Policy.

The ministry stated that NEP-2019 had provided policy level clarity in the absence of the act in line with the federal system. The ministry has begun expanding higher education and technical education with policy formulation, monitoring and evaluation after the management and operation of schools fell under the local levels as per the constitution.

Minister Giriraj Mani Pokhrel said the ministry was committed to transforming education with the concept that education should be the major foundation of prosperity.

According to Minister Pokhrel, the NEP is a major policy formulation. It was brought after rigorous discussion with stakeholders. A regulation is being made to implement Free and Compulsory Education Act-2017. He also reminded that the government brought the National Science and Innovation Policy-2019, for the first time.

A framework of integrated curriculum for school education has also been prepared. Internal and open examinations to manage temporary teachers, who were staging protests for long, were conducted.

The Education Service Commission has started conducting examinations to hire new teachers on time and on a regular basis.

Minister Pokhrel further said redistribution of teachers’ quota was another task done during his tenure so far. “Although there are a lot of good works done by the ministry in the last two years, only a few problems seen in the course of working to improve education sector have been highlighted,” the minister complained, adding that the ministry began all-out efforts for strengthening public education system.

He further said teachers were in the driving seat for ensuring quality education and they were motivated and responsible with the issuance of ‘learning card’.

“In the past, 80 per cent education was general education.

But, we’ve now stressed on technical and vocational education.

Volunteer teachers are being mobilised. A white paper on redistribution of teachers’ quota was issued. School merger scheme is being implemented to solve the problem of teachers’ quota and reduce student to teacher ratio.

Coloured textbooks have been produced and distributed on time,” he said.

Presenting the list of achievement, he said the ministry has been working to bring more children to school by launching national enrolment campaign.

“Under literate Nepal campaign, 53 districts were declared literate. It is expected that a total of 70 districts will be announced literate districts in this fiscal year. Plan for developing model school in each rural municipality has been forwarded. Community school strengthening programme was introduced in the 15th periodic plan and it is dubbed as game changer in education,” he added.

According to the minster, the 15th plan has revolutionary programmes to promote practical education. Technical and vocational education has been expanded to 604 local levels so far. Local levels have been handed over Rs 1.27 billion for distribution of sanitary pads to school girls for this year. The concept of eco-school has been implemented, according to the minister.

“A work procedure for child and technology-friendly education was issued. In order to manage medical education, a mechanism has been established to punish those colleges which increase fee exorbitantly.

The country has achieved nearly 82 per cent literacy, which is continuously increasing. These facts prove that education sector made remarkable achievement in the last few years,” the minister asserted.