(Chairperson : Prof. S. P. Govil : Initiators : Dr. S. S. Sangal : Dr. H. L. Sharma)

Dr. S. S. Sangal, Director (Acad.), National Open School welcomed Prof. S. P. Govil and introduced to the participants of the plenary session. He mentioned that noted Gandhian and freedom fighter, Prof. S. P. Govil is the Honarary Secretary, Nehru Bal Samiti and is associated with NOS for a long time. Initiating the session, Dr. S. S. Sangal pointed out that the mandate of the NOS is from pre-primary to pre-degree level thereby providing a continuum to various levels of Open Schooling. So far, the National Open School has concentrated mainly at the Secondary and Senior Secondary level with Bridge Course equivalent to VIII class. The National Open School has already set up the National Consortium for Open Schooling (NCOS). The NCOS is responsible to set up and establish State Open Schools and State Centres for Open Schooling in order to facilitate their activities pertaining to open schooling, preferably in their respective regional medium/local languages. Currently, the National Open School offers programmes in three mediums – English, Hindi and Urdu. Now, Open Basic Education at A,B and C levels is being given top priority with a focus on the upper Primary/Elementary level below 14 years of age-group. The existing programme of Open Basic Education is mainly aimed at the neo-literates who want continuing education after TLC/PL. In this context, the National Open School looks forward to the co-operation, collaboration and linkage with various organisations in the field-voluntary agencies, NGOs, Govt. organisations, institutions, centres, etc. The National Open School will be co-ordinating and monitoring the programme, would provide these agencies with proto-types of curriculum and self instructional material for their adoptation to local needs, functional relevance and learner centred activities. The primary centres would be free to adapt
whatever modes and modals in accordance with the needs of the learners.

The collaborating institutions/agencies linked/accredited by NOS under Open Elementary Education Programme are expected in their own way to enroll learners, teach them in their own environment and social and educational settings following the models, guidelines and prototypes provided by NOS for ensuring equality, uniformity, quality and standards necessary for Universalisation of Elementary Education.

The major task of these agencies would be to enroll learners, provide them curriculum and instructional materials, facilitating their contact with teaching learning process and finally assessing their minimum levels of learning, skills and competencies acquired and thus providing them a certificate of scholastic and non scholastic achievements jointly signed by NOS and the nodal Agency concerned. These Centres will have a MOU to be signed for the purpose of mutual commitment and learners’ benefit. Enrolment data in an analytical forms will be sent to NOS. Professional, technical, consultive and financial support, wherever required, will be provided by NOS in curriculum development, instructional package preparing, learner-contact facilitation and transformation from national to regional medium with local, relevant and functional specificities. He visualised three major roles and dimensions for the Open Elementary Education Scheme namely, exemplar curriculum and instructional material supported by NOS; delivery and transaction by the nodal accredited centres in the operational field and ultimately open assessment and evaluation for joint certification. Concluding his talk, Dr. Sangal said such an experiment at this level and in this magnitude would be a unique venture on the part of NOS and in the history of Indian Education at the Elementary stage.

Elaborating on the conclusions of the survey team of the OBE project in the National Open School, Dr. H. L. Sharma, said that the survey covered agencies like Vidya Bharati and foundations like Rajiv Gandhi Foundation and Surya Foundation. He added that active participation from NGOs are expected to reach the unreached in the distance mode of Basic Education. Dr. H. L. Sharma used the opportunity to thank the faculty of the National Open School for making the study a success.

Prof. N. K. Ambasht made further intervention and clarified more elaborately on the expected role of the NGOs and said that the National Open School would provide these agencies with the learning outcomes expected at the end of each stage. Citing examples, he added these agencies need not adopt the instructional material provided by the National Open School. Rather they should be adapted. If the situation demands, the NOS would come forward in sharing the financial burden of the agencies attempting to make the local adaptations. Stating that these agencies would be treated as partners of the National Open School in terms of the certification of the learners, he added the guidelines for developing question papers would also be provided by the National Open School.

Guiding the group in the post initiation session, Prof. K.G. Rastogi said that ‘educating’ is the job of the society while the Government should provide financial assistance, infrastructure and human resources. Hence he proposed that the present NGOs should be titled as social agencies rather than emphasise on their non-governmental character. The material production should be preceeded by a survey conducted by the participating social agencies to come out with a need analysis. The curriculum should be need based and help in solving problems of that area. While designing the instructional material for the languages, regional variations have to be taken care of and dialects should also be given due importance and weightage. He also requested the social agencies to identify local resource persons and use their expertise in developing the programme.

Rev. Sr. Cyril, Loreto, Calcutta doubted whether there would be any radical difference between the curriculum of the conventional system and the distant mode. She feared whether it would be economically viable for a social agency to adapt the instructional material provided by the NOS. She also suggested the need to take up ‘themes’ instead of ‘subjects’ in making the learner attain the required competency level. The National Open School may also play the role of a ‘clearing house’ of the localised versions of the instructional material.

Prof. N.K. Ambasht joined the initiators and the Chairperson and concluded the session by highlighting that convergence of institutions at all levels is necessary to attain the goal of Open Basic Education. He thanked Prof. S.P. Govil for guiding the session.

l Girls are unreached because of social constraints. So, a survey is needed on the basis of educational needs, giving emphasis on learners, parents and community profiles.

l In order to reach the unreached, we have to first define the target group.

l Once the target group is defined, next to be seen their socio-economic characteristics.

l The members expressed their willingness to run the NOS programme. However, they expected sufficient financial assistance support from NOS.

l The NOS may provide extra money to certain agencies in support of their innovative schemes.

l The rate of payment to instructors who conduct NOS programmes is very low and it should be increased.

   l The agencies should network amongst themselves and share the material developed          locally for awareness and information other institutions in the region.

l The need for teacher training zone/region wise was also discussed and deliberated upon.

l There should be an effective role on the part of agencies working in the field of elementary education. The National Open School should play an important coordinating role between these agencies. There should be an in-depth study by conducting surveys for sorting out the areas/pockets/cluster which in real sense are un-reached.

l At national level material for Primary and Upper Primary level should be developed and provided to the contact persons and nodal agencies.

l NOS should operate with nodal agencies and its branches in each region.

NOS——Regional Centres——Agencies——Contact Persons——Learners

 l Besides having the contact with nodal agencies working in the field they should also be evaluated from time to time.