Delhi Management Association (DMA) hosted a knowledge sharing session on Aligning CSR with NEP2020 on 23rd October 2020 highlighting the emergent need to align the ongoing and forthcoming CSR programmes in education with NEP2020 and areas where effective interventions are required immediately.
The workshop was conducted under the aegis of CSR and Sustainability Committee of DMA, Chaired by Dr Neelam Gupta, (Founder President and CEO of AROH Foundation).
Nidhi Pundhir (Director, HCL Foundation) graced the session as the Guest of Honour. Amitav Virmani (CEO, The Education Alliance), Jaishree Goyal (Chairperson, Angelique Foundation), Sanjay Gupta (Managing Trustee, Chetna an NGO and Dr. Vineeta Dutta Roy (Head, CSR and Sustainability, BIMTECH) joined as the key speakers.
In her welcome address and opening remarks, Dr Neelam Gupta spelt out that the ambitious National Education Policy is offering a bouquet of Choice, Chance & Change, but how it unfolds would depend upon good implementation and execution and with around 350 million population in school and college-going age groups, the NEP calls for a large-scale implementation of a magnitude never before attempted anywhere in the world.
Nidhi Pundhir, the Guest of Honour also appreciated the spirit of NEP2020 and said that it was a much-needed and very well-articulated Policy emphasizing rightly on the need of paradigm change in the Education system. She also underlined various challenges that we would encounter while implementing the ambitious plan and reaching the child in the remotest location. She also narrated her personal experiences while being on ground on how COVID had triggered shoving the education system suddenly into a turmoil and forced digitization, which is already a big challenge for the poor and underprivileged.
Amitav Virmani took the participants through an educating and comprehensive presentation highlighting the K12 aspects of the NEP, brought out its key highlights, gaps and opportunities of CSR interventions and investments in each domain.
Working for Early Childhood Development for more than 15 years, Ms Jaishree Goyal expressed her exhilaration on how most significant change envisioned by the National Education Policy (NEP) 2020 is at the very beginning of a child’s educational journey, the first step of the learning ladder and how NEP 2020 boldly states that if the stage-wise goal of foundational skills is not achieved by class 3, the rest of the policy is irrelevant.
Sanjay Gupta elucidating post-COVID scenario within education system, said that although many privileged children could swift through the pandemic emergency as schools could immediately switch to digital mode with proper content and infrastructure, majority of underprivileged children are left in oblivion with being hopeless for a long future due to unavailability of resources. He further suggested to invest in creating the digital infrastructure for these children and mitigate the divide between the ‘Haves’ and ‘Have nots’ for equal access to education by the children.
Touching the aspects of NEP with respect to higher education, Vinita Dutta Roy termed India as the knowledge economy and suggested how implementation and investment in NEP in the higher education with technology, innovation with PPP models will promote the cause of higher education in India to a whole new level.
An educating question answer session further nurtured the audience to resolve various queries regarding the CSR with respect to NEP 2020 and arbitrated further course in their investments and planning.
Rajan Pandhi, Director DMA, thanked the distinguished panelists and the participants in his valedictory remarks for an interactive and stimulating session and assured the audience that DMA shall draft the highlights in a white paper, and shall be presented to the leading CSR stakeholders, policy makers that shall guide the way forward for CSR in Education considering the NEP.
