In news– Recently, the Union government has set up a National Steering Committee (NSC) for implementation of the NIPUN Bharat Mission. NSC has been set up under the chairpersonship of the Union Education Minister and Vice Chairpersonship of Minister of State for Education.
The other members of the NSC include:
- Secretary, School Education & Literacy.
- Director NCERT; Vice Chancellor NIEPA.
- Chairperson NCTE.
- Secretary Education Uttar Pradesh.
- Secretary Education, Karnataka.
- Director SCERT Gujarat.
- Director SCERT Sikkim.
- Representatives of 7 Union Ministries i.e., Women and Child Development, Tribal Affairs, Social Justice and Empowerment, Health and Family Welfare, Finance, Electronics and Information Technology and Panchayati Raj.
- Two Experts from NCERT and RIE Ajmer; and Three External Experts.
- The Joint Secretary and Mission Director NIPUN Bharat Mission is the convenor for the NSC.
Role and responsibilities of NSC
- To oversee the progress of the National Mission on Foundational Literacy and Numeracy and provide guidance on policy issues.
- To arrive at the target to be achieved nationally in 2026-27.
- To disseminate tools for measurement of yearly progress in the form of guidelines.
- To prepare and approve a National Action Plan (based on the State’s Action Plans) with KRAs for every State/UT vis-à-vis factors attributable for the gaps (i.e., lack of Fund, Vacancies, Teachers, Demography, Local issues, Need of Training for teachers, Curriculum & pedagogy related).
- To review programmatic and financial norms periodically to ensure they are synchronised with targets to be achieved.
- To develop methodology of assessment to analyse the progress and provide feedback to States/UTs.
National Initiative for Proficiency in Reading with Understanding and Numeracy (NIPUN Bharat) Mission-
- The Department of School Education and Literacy had launched the NIPUNBharat Mission on 5th July, 2021.
- It has been launched under the aegis of the centrally sponsored scheme of Samagra Shiksha.
- Aim is to achieve the goal of universal proficiency in foundational literacy and numeracy for every child by grade 3, as envisaged by National Education Policy 2020.
- The mission will focus on children of the age group of 3 to 9 years including preschool to Grade 3.
- The children who are in Class 4 and 5 and have not attained the foundational skills will be provided individual teacher guidance and support, peer support and age appropriate and supplementary graded learning materials to acquire the necessary competencies.
- A five-tier implementation mechanism was set up at the National- State- District- Block- School level in all States and UTs, under the aegis of the centrally sponsored scheme of Samagra Shiksha.
- Central Square Foundation, a NGO with a focus on foundational literacy and numeracy, has provided inputs and technical support to the Centre in the development of this mission.
Vision- To create an enabling environment to ensure universal acquisition of foundational literacy and numeracy, so that every child achieves the desired learning competencies in reading, writing and numeracy by the end of Grade 3, by 2026-27 (2025 was the deadline under NEP-2020).
Source: PIB
