The government will enter into a memorandum of understanding (MoU) with Wadhwani Foundation to teach free spoken English to government college students, Minister for Higher Education M.C. Sudhakar told the Legislative Council on Monday.
Replying to a debate on National Education Policy-2020 under Rule 330, the Minister said that the training in spoken English will be offered to empower students to be well-equipped on a par with others in the competitive era.
The challenge in higher education now is to offer students job oriented courses, he said, adding that the State government is committed to introduce State Education Policy (SEP) once it is ready.
No confusion
The Congress had also promised the same in its manifesto ahead of Assembly elections. The government will introduce the SEP by debating it, assessing the financial implications once the commission set up to form the policy submits it to the government. Till then, there need not be any confusion.
The Minister said that the last BJP government implemented the NEP-2020 in a hurry without making any preparations to take the credit for becoming the first to introduce the same. “It should have had the roadmap before introducing it,” he said. The government should have assessed whether the educational institutes have infrastructure facilities to offer the open electives, he said, adding that the feasibility factors should have been studied.
Budgetary allocation
Mr. Sudhakar said that Chief Minister Siddaramaiah has been apprised of the need to hike the budgetary allocation for higher education and the government will do it from the next financial year.
Minister for School Education and Literacy Madhu Bangarappa said that the government will open 3,000 Karnataka Public Schools in the next three years. Of them, 500 schools will be opened in the next one year.
