The State government signed an MoU with American educational agency International Baccalaureate (IB) in the presence of Chief Minister Y.S. Jagan Mohan Reddy at the Secretariat at Velagapudi near here on Wednesday.
The MoU was signed by IB Chief Development Officer Matt Costello and Principal Secretary of Education Department Praveen Prakash.
Speaking on the occasion, the Chief Minister said that the MoU with IB, which specialises in modern examination systems, will help introduce innovative questioning and answering methods that will be closer to practical life.
The IB syllabus, which is in vogue in American schools, would be accessible to students, he said, adding that it would be introduced in government schools at the foundation-level initially and will be expanded to higher classes gradually.
“It is a historic event as our students would get good opportunities in global universities and improve their worldly knowledge,” Mr. Jagan Mohan Reddy said.
“We have already introduced the TOEFL training at primary, secondary and higher levels and when the students reach Classes VIII and IX, they would attain good communication and writing skills,” he said.
“The main objective in signing the MoU is to make our students gain knowledge of emerging and future technologies and make them competitive on par with IB students of other countries. It is a challenge for the government, and I appeal to IB to cooperate in achieving the goal,” the Chief Minister said.
He told the IB officials that the State government has been implementing several measures for improving the standards of government school students and strengthening the school education system through digitalisation of classrooms, upgrading the school infrastructure, distribution of tabs, introduction of bilingual textbooks, TOEFL training to school students and introduction of English medium of instruction in schools.
The signing-in was virtually witnessed by IB officials from the US, UK and Switzerland. Education Minister Botcha Satyanarayana, Chief Secretary K.S. Jawahar Reddy, Education Department Commissioners S. Suresh Kumar (School Education) and K. Bhaskar (School Infrastructure), IB Development and Research Manager (South Asia) Mahesh Balakrishnan, and Chief Education Officer Dr. Anton Beguin were present.
