Pune: State Education Minister Vinod Tawde recently proposed that the government will permit private school chains to form their own education boards.
The Education Department is said to have proposed this in a bid to ease the norms for the private schools that have long been complaining of government interference in their autonomy.
Speaking in Mumbai, Tawde said as the marks of ICSE and CBSE are normalised before they apply for college admissions, the government will have to figure out a way to put all the students, even from the different private schools, on the same level before admissions. While the private school owners might certainly be happy about the proposal, the government hasn’t yet sent any official notification about the same to the Maharashtra State Board of Secondary and Higher Secondary Education (MSBSHSE).
“We haven’t been intimated in any way by the Education Minister yet. We won’t be able to comment anything until we receive an official communication on the issue,” Shakuntala Kale, Chairperson, MSBSHSE said.
Tawde has said that the proposal will be scrutinised and studied by experts before any further step is taken. He also asserted that this will allow schools to add the subjects of their choice to the curriculum and adopt alternate methods of learning, something they cannot do presently.
Rajendra Singh of the Independent English Schools Association (IESA) said that the Association welcomes the statement calling it positive and bold.
“Many schools have a very successful curriculum and numerous brilliant ideas. If this proposal is implemented, the schools will finally be able to transform all their ideas into reality. This will also offer a wide variety to the parents, to choose the best for their kids and promote the spirit of competition. This is an example of how the government is taking positive steps towards taking education to another level,” Singh added.
However, as the statement by the Education Minister has come when the government is being criticised for adopting a commercial approach towards education, if this proposal is approved, the decision is sure to receive a lot of flack from activists as well as the public.
