The National Education Policy was adopted in 1986 and the last time it was modified was in 1992. In May 2019, the government presented the draft NEP which aimed to provide quality education to every child in the age group of 3-18 by 2030. The draft for NEP was checked by the Prime Minister in May 2020 last time.

The New Education Policy or NEP has been released for School Education with the new policies for schools and Higher Education for colleges, universities and other higher institutes. Check Below.

Some important facts of New Education Policy

1. NEP suggested the extension of the Right to Education, RTE covering children under age group 3 to 18 year. Currently, the rule applies only to students until the age of 14 years. Thus the new education policy aims to universalize the pre-primary education by 2025 and provide foundational literacy to all by 2025

2. As per the draft NEP Document released earlier, ‘The draft NEP is based on the foundational pillars access, affordability, equity, quality, and accountability.’ This is expected to be the sentiment of the New Education Policy.

3. In the draft, a 5+3+3+4 curricular and pedagogical structure had been proposed based on the cognitive-developmental stages of the children rather than their age. This further divides the K12 years into Foundational Stage (age 3-8 yrs): 3 years of pre-primary plus Grades 1-2, Preparatory Stage (8-11 years): Grades 3-5, Middle Stage (11-14 years): Grades 6-8 and Secondary Stage (14-18 years): Grades 9-12.

4. The new education policy has provisions that provide the students with increased flexibility and choice of subjects to study across various streams of arts, humanities, sciences, sports, and other vocational subjects.

5. There has been a proposal of multilingual studies too in the NEP. Since children between 2-8 years have the ability to learn languages quickly and multilingualism has cognitive benefits for them, children would be engaged in three languages early on, from the Foundational Stage as per the draft. There would also be a focus on the classical languages of India.

6. The NEP also aims to create a new highest regulating body, the Rashtriya Shiksha Aayog or National Education Commission, that would be headed by the Prime Minister of India.