It is about a decade since it was decided to phase out the Proficiency Certificate Level (PCL) from Tribhuvan University and let the schools alone conduct the 10+2 education under the Higher Secondary Education Board (HSEB). A timeframe was also made public and a policy was announced to help the government schools upgrade themselves to cover Plus-Two education. But TU’s PCL still exists alongside the Plus-Two system, which has widely been adopted by private, and increasingly by government, institutions and colleges. It was a good idea that universities should concentrate on higher education, as excessive pressure of PCL students on the country’s oldest and largest university was one of the factors that weakened TU’s focus on higher education. In addition, the PCL curricula have not been revised for over two decades, making most of them increasingly irrelevant. On the contrary, the fresh Plus-Two curricula have become more popular, as it offers more choices to students in selection of subjects unlike the watertight compartments of TU.

Sadly, it is now that the education ministry has formed a task force to examine the feasibility of scrapping the PCL. The ministry has also decided that the campuses affiliated to various universities should now switch over to HSEB’s Plus-Two system, as education minister Pradip Nepal announced on Tuesday. It has also been decided to merge Classes 9 and 10 into the HSEB. The new TU vice chancellor Prof Madhav Prasad Sharma, appointed on the CPN-UML quota, echoes the minister, saying that the PCL will be scrapped to remove the ‘Panchayat-day hangover’ and to suit the general idea of a university. Conceptually, almost all agree with this. But Minister Nepal seems to be in a hurry to decide things. This gives an unnatural colour to the decisions. First of all, the ministry should think of an alternative for some one and a half lakh students who study PLC courses. Even students from weak financial backgrounds can afford TU courses, but HSEB education even in government campuses is much more expensive.

Removal of the PCL without an affordable alternative for the poor is bound to invite fierce opposition. Secondly, without scrapping the system, it is unfair, and even outrageous, to compel institutions outside TU’s own campuses to opt for the HSEB courses.

Colleges must have a choice. Some of the colleges are even running both the HSEB and PCL courses simultaneously. There is another hasty decision — in favour of incorporating Classes 8 and 9 into the HSEB structure. This goes against the concept underlying both the school sector approach paper and the draft of the Three-Year Interim Plan. Both aim at merging Classes 11 and 12 instead into the Department of Education. The government is to treat

Classes 1-8 as primary and 9-12 as secondary education. Strictly speaking, then, HSEB might have to be renamed. Minister Nepal and his pro-UML officials at TU and HSEB will have to justify how their courses of action, not alternatives, will best serve the needs of education.