59th Meeting of Central Advisory Board of Education : Summary Record of Discussion

            The Fifty Ninth Meeting of the Central Advisory Board of Education (CABE) was held here, today under the Chairmanship of Shri Kapil Sibal, Union Minister of Human Resource Development. Smt. Krishna Tirath,   Union Minister of State (I/C) for Women & Child Development, Dr. Narendra Jadhav, Member (Education), Planning Commission along with 18 Ministers-in-charge of Education from various States/UTs attended the meeting. Smt. Anshu Vaish, Secretary, Department of School Education & Literacy, Shri Ashok Thakur, Secretary, Department of Higher Education and Member Secretary (CABE),  Dr. M. K. Bhan, Secretary, Department of Biotechnology, Dr. T. Ramasami, Secretary, Department of Science and Technology, eminent educationists, authors, artists, linguists etc. apart from Heads of different autonomous organizations and senior officials of different departments of the Government of India attended the meeting as its members.

2.         The CABE is the highest advisory body to advise the Central and State Governments in the field of education. The previous meeting i.e. 58^th meeting of CABE was held on 7th June, 2011. The minutes of the previous meeting were confirmed today along with the Action Taken Note on them.

3.         In his opening remarks, Shri Sibal  indicated that this august body would be charting the course of action in the education sector. While making policy prescriptions, the child’s interest is of paramount importance and this should be the foremost consideration for all of us.  Education is one sector which greatly impacts the socio economic fabric and the changes that are taking place in the society are such as were never envisaged earlier. The challenge therefore is how to cope with these changes and address the issues of access, inclusion and quality that concern this sector. The multilayered problems require a holistic approach. 

Shri Sibal highlighted the importance of teacher and teacher education in the society as also the use of ICT in education. He said that we propose to have a National Mission mainly to address the quality related issues.  Teacher is no longer the sole repository of knowledge and inputs of information flow from different sources.  Therefore, we should have a national mission to address issues relating to teacher education in a holistic manner. Referring to the higher education sector, HRM mentioned that a major challenge before us is to increase our GER which is less than the global average.  To achieve higher GER, we need to explore newer ways of access as the existing conventional models would not be adequate and concept of Meta University needs to be considered.   He also proposed to set up a Credit Guarantee Fund to facilitate larger numbers of students to gain access to higher education.  HRM also highlighted the use of ICT in education and appreciated the work done by the CABE Committee on ICT in School Education which has submitted its report.

The HRD Minister also thanked the outgoing members of the previous CABE Committee for their valuable contributions and stated that he looks forward to this august body in furthering the course of action to give every child the opportunity for a quality education.

4.         Union Minister of State (Independent Charge) for Women & Child Development Smt. Krishna Tirath in her speech thanked the Shri Sibal  for his endeavour in educational development of the country particularly of the girl child.  She highlighted various issues related to education of girls and women, both at school and higher education levels. 

5.         Dr. Narendra Jadhav, Member (Education), Planning Commission expressed delight in participating in this august forum and mentioned that Education and skill development have been identified as a priority area in the Approach Paper to the XII Five Year Plan.  Highlighting the broad contours of the XII Plan as far as the education sector is concerned, he said that we need to align education to the growing aspirations of a large youth population as well as with the economy and labour market.  The three Es of Expansion, Equity and Excellence in both school and higher education call for a holistic approach.

6.         After deliberations on all the agenda items, the CABE resolved as under:-

(i)           CABE decided to constitute a Committee for assessment and implementation of Continuous and Comprehensive Evaluation (CCE) in the context of the no detention provision in the RTE Act.  While there was agreement that Board Examinations are not required, guidelines for implementation of CCE need to be evolved for examining and testing the child during the elementary education cycle.  The CABE Committee would be chaired by Smt. Geeta Bhukkal, Minister of Education, Haryana which will include other State Education Ministers with representation from academics and civil society.  The Committee will submit its report in 3 months after consulting State Governments and other stakeholders.  

(ii)         CABE appreciated the initiative to launch the National Mission on Teachers and Teaching.  It was decided to constitute a CABE Committee for developing the framework and processes of the National Mission on Teachers and Teaching.  The CABE Committee would be headed by Dr. D. Purandeswari, Minister of State for HRD.  The Committee will include other State Education Ministers with representation from academics and society.  The Committee will give special focus on Teacher Educators and developing teachers for inclusive education for children with special needs.  

(iii)       The report of CABE Committee on ICT in School Education and the draft National Policy on ICT were unanimously adopted.  Suggestions were made on making available digital version of test books on Akaash Tablet for use by both teachers and students in schools, focus on capacity building of teacher educators and need for States to review their current ICT Policy and strategies in light of the provisions of the National Policy.

(iv)       The proposed concept of Meta University as a collaborative platform for a network of universities with a view to utilise create and synergise between different programme activities and institutions providing credit based multi disciplinary courses was appreciated by members.  It was felt that the States universities and other state institutions could take similar innovative measures to bring a paradigm shift in higher education.

(v)         Members endorsed the initiative to create a Credit Guarantee Fund to ensure better flow of credit to deserving students.