Frontlist | Cabinet approves STARS scheme under NEP 2020 to strengthen school education system

Frontlist | Cabinet approves STARS scheme under NEP 2020 to strengthen school education system
on Oct 15, 2020

The Union Cabinet chaired by Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Wednesday approved the implementation of the Strengthening Teaching-Learning and Results for States (STARS) project with a total project cost of Rs 5718 crore with World Bank support amounting to approximately Rs. 3700 crore. The STARS project would be implemented as a centrally sponsored scheme under the education ministry’s department of school education and literacy and would involve setting up a National Assessment Centre, PARAKH as an independent and autonomous institution. The STARS project also includes a Contingency Emergency Response Component (CERC). It will help the government respond to situations leading to loss of learning such as school closures/infrastructure damage, inadequate facilities, and the use of technology for facilitating remote learning, etc. The CERC component would facilitate the rapid re-categorization of financing and the utilization of streamlined financing request procedures. The project covers 6 States namely Himachal Pradesh, Rajasthan, Maharashtra, Madhya Pradesh, Kerala, and Odisha. The identified states will be supported by various interventions for improving the quality of education. Besides this project, it is also envisaged to implement a similar ADB-funded project in 5 states namely Gujarat, Tamil Nadu, Uttarakhand, Jharkhand, and Assam. All states will partner with one other state for sharing their experiences and best practice, an official statement said. The STARS project seeks to support the states in developing, implementing, evaluating, and improving interventions with direct linkages to improved education outcomes and school to work transition strategies for improved labor market outcomes. The overall focus and components of the STARS project are aligned with the objectives of the National Education Policy (NEP) 2020 of Quality-Based Learning Outcomes. The project also aims to strengthen the Union Education ministry’s national data systems and the strengthening of learning assessment systems. At the State level, the project envisages: strengthening early childhood education and foundational learning, improving learning assessment systems, strengthening classroom instruction and remediation through teacher development and school leadership, and strengthening vocational education. The STARS project also aims to focus on initiatives of PM e-Vidya, Foundational Literacy, and Numeracy Mission and National Curricular and Pedagogical Framework for Early Childhood Care and Education as part of the Atmanirbhar Bharat Abhiyan. Some of the measurable outcomes of the project are an increase in students achieving minimum proficiency in grade 3 language, improvement in secondary school completion rate, improvement in governance index scores, etc.