After getting selected for the project ‘Sustainable Action for Transforming Human Capital (SATH)’ through a competitive selection process at national level, Odisha government has formulated a roadmap for the next 24 months.

The plan was approved at a meeting chaired by chief secretary Mr Aditya Prasad Padhi here on Thursday. Principal Secretary School & Mass Education Mr P K Mohapatra made a presentation at the meeting.

The meeting was informed that recruitment process for 14,000 elementary teachers has been completed. Padhi directed the department to focus on improving quality of teaching and learning activities in schools while Development Commissioner Mr R. Balakrishnan advised to improve educational administration at district and block level and make it more facilitating for the teachers and students.

The meeting decided the modalities for strengthening the remediation programmes like Ujjwal, Uttthan and Utkarsh. Principal Secretary Mr Mohapatra appraised that the recruitment process for 14000 elementary teachers has been completed.

The newly recruited teachers are expected to join during April 2018. It was decided to develop an online data-driven teacher-student rationalization system. It was also decided to initiate the process for recruitment of secondary teachers as per requirement.

Director OPEPA Mr Bhupindarsingh Punia proposed modifications in 3 remediation programmes. Modified Ujjwal would focus on equipping students from Class-1 to 5 with basic skills in Odia, Mathematics and English.

The programme Utthan would focus on equipping the students of class-6 to 8 with grade-level skills in these 3 subjects. Similarly, the modified Utkarsh would focus on improving the skill and knowledge base of the students of class-9.

Learning Camps would be conducted on mission mode in all primary and upper primary classes from 18 to 31 July. During the campaign period the whole day would be devoted towards remediation skills.

No new syllabus would be introduced. It was decided to complete orientation training of the teachers before 5 May. The meeting also finalized the roadmap with 15 action points.

The basic objectives of these action points were fixing basics in schools, ensuring equality of access to education in different regions, strengthening assessment mechanism, accountability, award and incentives etc.