The State’s achievements in the education sector are something to be proud of, Minister for General Education V. Sivankutty has said. Officials of the General Education department should strive hard to preserve these gains, he said.
He was speaking after inaugurating a State-level workshop for education officials here on Wednesday.
The Minister said no other State could come close to achieving what Kerala had done. It was always the State that others looked to emulate. All children in the school-going age in the State took school admission. It also had the lowest dropout rate. A good number of schoolchildren completed Class XII. Also, schools had trained teachers. These were all huge strengths.
The government, he said, had always taken the position to protect schools facing the threat of closure. When it had announced four missions, one of them was the Public Education Rejuvenation Mission. The education mission led to a huge jump in the development of public school infrastructure. In most States in the country, private schools were being shown the green flag at the cost of government schools. Kerala, however, thought differently. In the past seven years, investments to the tune of ₹3,800 crore had been done in the public education sector.
However, education today should not be limited to physical infrastructure development. Academic excellence too was needed. Some corrections needed to be made on the academic front. These should be given priority, the Minister said.
Director of General Education Shanavas S., State Council of Educational Research and Training (SCERT) director Jayaprakash R.K., Samagra Shiksha Kerala State Project director Supriya A.R., State Institute of Educational Technology director B. Aburaj, Vidyakiranam Mission assistant coordinator C. Ramakrishnan, and senior officials of the General Education department were present.
