Economic Survey 2021-22: Education Sector Top Schemes & Initiatives for Students During COVID-19

Economic Survey 2021-22: As per the latest updates, today, Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman presented the Economic Survey 2021-22 in Parliament. In the Economic Survey 2021-22, FM has shared some key highlights for the education sector highlighting the top educational schemes and initiatives. 

The Economic Survey 2021-22 says, "It is difficult to gauge the real-time impact of repeated lockdowns on the education sector because the latest available comprehensive official data dates back to 2019-20." 

Further, the Finance Minister will present the Union Budget 2022 on 1st February 2022. In the budget, it is expected that announcements are to be made regarding education and the strengthening of the country's infrastructure.  

Top Schemes & Initiatives for Students During COVID-19

• Samagra Shiksha Scheme: As an integrated scheme for school education, it covers the entire gamut from pre-school to class XII. The scheme not only provides support for the implementation of the Right to Education (RTE) Act, but is also aligned with the recommendations of NEP 2020: to ensure that all children have access to quality education with an equitable and inclusive classroom environment, to take care of their diverse background, multilingual needs, different academic abilities, and make them active participants in the learning process.
• National Digital Education Architecture (NDEAR): A digital infrastructure for Education, was launched on 29th July 2021. It will be set up within the context of a Digital-First Mindset where the Digital Architecture will not only support teaching and learning activities but also educational planning, governance administrative activities of the centre, the states and union territories. It will provide diverse education eco-system architecture for the development of digital infrastructure.
• Pradhan Mantri Poshan Shakti Nirman (PM POSHAN) Scheme: The National Programme for Mid-Day Meal in School has been renamed as PM Poshan Shati Nirman Scheme. PM POSHAN Scheme in schools has been approved for implementation over the five-year period 2021-22 to 2025-26 with a financial outlay of 54061.73 crores from the Central Government and 31733.17 crores from the State Governments and UT Administrations.
• NIPUN Bharat Mission: The National Initiative for Proficiency in Reading with Understanding and Numeracy (NIPUN Bharat) has been launched for ensuring that every child in the country gets foundational literacy and numeracy by the end of grade 3, by 2026-27. This has been launched as per the new National Education Policy (NEP) under the aegis of the centrally sponsored scheme of Samagra Shiksha. The unique feature of the initiative includes the goals of the mission being set in the form of "Lakshya Soochi" or Targets for Foundational Literacy and Numeracy. 
• Vidyanjali: A school volunteer programme and an initiative of the Ministry of Human Resource Development of India to boost community and private sector participation in government schools. Under the programme, volunteers, including NRIs, retired teachers, government officials, defence personnel, professionals will offer their services for co-scholastic activities for children from class I to VIII.
• PM e-VIDYA: The education sector is one of the most affected sectors due to COVID. Keeping this in mind the finance Minister Mrs Nirmala Sitharaman has announced a PM eVIDYA program for students. Through this program, various types of online models will be launched in order to provide quality education to the students. PM e-Vidya unifies all efforts related to digital/online/on-air education to enable coherent multi-mode access to education. 

Economic Survey 2022 has not just presented this surprising outcome, but also shown stakeholders an opportunity in this sector. The report mentions that these figures show that "public schools need to be equipped with additional support, in terms of teacher-pupil ratio, classroom space, and teaching/learning materials, to absorb students migrating from private schools and from urban to rural areas. 

Also Read: Economic Survey 2021-22: Education Expenditure Rises by 20%, School drop-out rate falls, GER Improves - Key Highlights