Sisodia’s ‘Shiksha’ new hope for education

The book vividly explains in detail his hands-on experience in crafting some of the best and creative interventions in the education system

Dr Manasvi M Kamat | SEPTEMBER 19, 2019, 02:49 AM IST

Dr Manasvi M Kamat

Delhi has shown the way to the country when it comes to educational reforms,” remarked former President Pranab Mukherjee at the recent launch of Delhi Deputy Chief Minister Manish Sisodia’s book titled ‘Shiksha: My Experiments as an Education Minister.’   

The academia was waiting for this memoir by the author which he had claimed was in the making sometimes in April 2019 for the ‘ordinary teachers, practitioners of education and scholars’. Now that the debut book by this ‘experimental’ Minister for Education (as the NDTV preferred to call him) is published in English and Hindi by Penguin Random House India, one gets an account of his challenging, yet exciting, journey about the ‘idea of India through education’.   

Sisodia has well established himself as a visionary, able administrator, and a creator of a role model in education of modern times in the country. For being successful in ushering a turnaround and transformation in the education sector he has drawn considerable admiration and respect from the UNDP, the World Bank and other international institutions of repute.   

The author comes from a political party whose key election agenda was education, something very usual and unheard in India. The UT of Delhi has been since allocating almost 25 per cent of the total budget, currently a whopping close to Rs 14,000 crore to education. The book ‘Shiksha’ has thus turned out to be about his ideals, a vision and plenty of ideas from a person who not only dreamt about quality education but also toiled to see all his dreams come true within a short time frame of four-and-half years.   

The author, son of a government school master, has documented his contribution to significantly reform the education system in Delhi after being recognised as one of the best education administrators and educationists in any government. Thus the entire thing he has penned comes from a ‘first-person account’ of what he practised and extensively achieved.   

Sisodia is credited with laudable efforts to create an educational system with state-of-the-art facilities in government schools, making them hallmarks of excellence, for the brilliant improvement in the board examinations and transforming public schools from ‘those for poor’ to a ‘prospering and enterprising body’ delivering quality education to the masses.   

The author writes that the turnaround in education in Delhi involved three phases, beginning with ‘clerical works’ focused on improving the infrastructure, followed by ‘motivation and reinvigorating of principals and teachers’ and finally, not only focussing on ‘better results’ in board exams but also on ‘creating better human beings’ too.   

Sisodia established pilot schools, new colleges with professional courses and developed new campuses for the University. There were drastic improvements in the learning environment and infrastructure in nearly thousands of government schools with some of them having the luxury of lifts and swimming pools. Some schools were transformed into world-class skill centres offering skill-based courses. The curriculum was revamped, new educational aid was prepared based on age-appropriate expected learning outcomes and the teachers and principals were trained in best of institutions in the country and abroad. Sisodia made textbooks affordable, eased the method of securing educational loans and improved the involvement of the parents in education by organising parent-teacher meetings in a big way; thus raising the bar of public education in the state.   

Innovative interventions like the ‘Mission Buniyaad’ campaign helped students (between classes III and IX) who were not up to the mark due to the nationwide no-detention policy, while concepts like ‘Happiness Curriculum’ and ‘Entrepreneurship Mindset Programme’ turned out to be ‘out of the box’ ideas that were well implemented.   

The qualitative and quantitative success was unbelievable and reflected in the higher success of government school students in cracking IIT JEE Examinations compared to those from private schools. With a 90.68 pass percentage, the government schools outperformed the private institutions with a pass percentage of 88.35, but also surpassed the overall pass percentage of 83.01 per cent in the last Board exams. This was also the highest pass percentage for Delhi’s government schools in the last decade.   

The fallout of this tremendous and unprecedented revolution in education the author anchored has led to experts and administrators including other countries to visit Delhi.   

‘Shiksha’ has a narrative approach divided into two parts, ‘fixing of the foundation of education’ and ‘using education as a foundation for India’. Claimed to be penned by the author through the help of the Google Text-to-Speech tool, it becomes interesting with riveting anecdotes and real-life excerpts qualifying it best to be referred as a ‘Case-Book of innovative approaches in education’ which were turned into reality.   

Sisodia vividly explains in detail his hands-on experience in crafting some of his best and creative interventions in the education system, the ‘Happiness Curriculum’ developed a year ago and that has had an impactful visibility creating global curiosity. Currently being run for almost 8 lakh students for one period every day from nursery to class 8, this book documents the behavioural changes in verbatim words of teachers and students.   

Recently, the Delhi government has shown readiness to pay the examination fees of students of government schools charged by the CBSE while it has also set up a high-level committee for ‘reforming higher education’ in the national capital to make Delhi a knowledge and innovation centre. The committee is expected to recommend goals, metrics, policies, and actionable plans for reforming Delhi’s higher education system within a year.   

Sisodia’s book well documents the challenges the author overcame to improve the quality of education.  It offers an amazing account. It certainly has the power to inspire everyone and enough ingredients to be called a ‘how-to-do’ book for those poised to make a difference in society through education.   

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