Although universal primary education is received wisdom in all countries worldwide including India which passed its Right to Free and Compulsory Education (RTE) Act, 2009 four years ago, over the past two decades a new awareness has dawned upon nations and communities across the world that pre-primary early childhood care and education (ECCE) which prepares children for induction into formal education systems, is the prerequisite of their balanced growth and development. A large and growing body of evidence indicates that children’s brain development and cognitive growth is 80 percent complete by age eight. If love of learning is aroused in them through unpressurised, joyful and experiential ECCE, children will develop into well-balanced life-long learners and creative individuals.
The editors of EducationWorld which completed 14 years of uninterrupted publishing last month, were quick to be converted to the cause of universal ECCE. Since 2010, the EducationWorld India Preschool Rankings have become an annual feature and have undoubtedly prompted ECCE institutions and providers to appreciate the fundamentals and nuances of early years education and constantly improve teaching-learning standards in ECCE. In addition to highlighting the importance of professionally-administered ECCE through the annual EW India Preschool Rankings, to educate pre-primary providers and teachers about the finer points and latest developments in ECCE in western and foreign countries, your editors have organised three EducationWorld Early Childhood Education global conferences in Mumbai and Bangalore, addressed by internationally-reputed ECCE professionals. The 4th EducationWorld Early Childhood Education Global Conference 2014 is scheduled to be held in Bangalore on January 25.
Although there is no official acknowledgement, quite obviously this sustained effort to impact the critical importance of ECCE upon parents, educators and education policy formulators has paid off. On September 20, the Union ministry of women and child development promulgated draft guidelines of a National Early Childhood Care and Education policy under which it recommends transformation of the country’s 1.35 million Central government anganwadis — early childhood nutrition and maternal care centres — into fully-fledged preschools, a longstanding demand of EducationWorld. Moreover the policy draft also proposes minimum infrastructure and teacher-pupil ratio norms for all pre-primaries including private preschools.
Whether this signals the advent of incremental government interference and dreaded inspector raj in private preschools which have thus been spared the midas-in-reverse hand of government, is a moot point. But you can be sure that EducationWorld will stridently protest leveling down of standards in privately provided ECCE while insisting upon setting global benchmarks for early years education in the country’s 1.35 million anganwadis. Merry Xmas and a Happy New Year to all!
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