Around 300 schools adopted under Odisha's adoption programme
Over 200 bureaucrats, judges and lawmakers have adopted around 300 schools, weeks after the Odisha government announced a schools adoption programme to improve their standards.
Over 200 bureaucrats, judges and lawmakers have adopted around 300 schools, weeks after the Odisha government announced a schools adoption programme to improve their standards.
Odisha school and mass education department manages over 60000 schools in the State and is responsible for the education of about 65 lakh students. (Hindustan Times Media)
Chief minister Naveen Patnaik on January 25 called on everyone to adopt schools and help students of government and aided schools to stay motivated and dream big to transform the state’s educational system. The adoption is part of the Mo School programme launched in November 2017 to boost the education system with the involvement of alumni and the general public. Around 40,00,00 alumni have raised ₹60 crore under the programme.
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The state government last month started the adoption programme under which individuals can adopt a maximum of three schools for improvement in the academic and co-curricular activities.
"An institution to become world-class needs physical, digital, intellectual and emotional infrastructure. All these components are interlinked and complementary to each other. School adoption programme brings everyone together to help build all the four components so that government schools can excel. The school adoption programme would leverage the intellectual capital and professional success of the alumni," said Mo School programme's member secretary Bhupendra Singh Poonia. He added 224 people have so far adopted 292 schools.
Lawmaker Pranab Prakash Das, Odisha Skill Development Authority chairman Subroto Bagchi, and chief secretary Suresh Mohapatra are among those who have adopted schools.
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The state has 67,961 schools up to class 10.
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The state has 67,961 schools up to class 10.
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Officials said the adoption programme is expected to take care of the falling academic quality in government schools.
According to the 2018 National Achievement Survey, only 53% of students in Odisha were able to answer questions on basic competencies correctly.
Poonia said he expects the number of adopted schools to cross over 1,000 in the next six months. "The response has been very encouraging so far. Any Indian citizen with wide experience and exposure can adopt schools. The adopting person is expected to be a mentor and influencer and not be involved in any administrative or financial activities."
The mentors adopting schools can arrange coaching classes for certain subjects, career counselling sessions, tie-ups, inspirational talks and cash awards to motivate the students.
Debabrata Mohanty is a senior assistant editor of Hindustan Times who works as state correspondent from Odisha covering the state's politics, governance, public policy, natural disasters, environment and its society for close to three decades. With his long years of reporting from the state capital of Bhubaneswar, Mohanty has been known as one of the most experienced and credible journalists covering Odisha for the national English dailies. His reporting combines on-ground detail with deep institutional knowledge detailing the state's changing politics, governance issues, administrative reforms and the functioning of its public institutions. He has regularly reported on issues ranging from legislative developments and public policy implementation. Politics is his core areas of expertise as he closely tracks Odisha's political landscape, including the rise and transformation of the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), the Biju Janata Dal (BJD), the two principal political parties in Odisha. His long association with the state's political establishment enables him to write on contemporary developments in a larger political context. Mohanty takes a deep interest in writing human interest stories, environmental issues and documenting the impact of cyclones, floods, heatwaves, and other climate-related events in one of the most disaster-prone states. His coverage extends to public health, governance reforms and stories on accountability of government institutions. Before joining Hindustan Times, Mohanty worked with The Indian Express, Mail Today, and The Telegraph, where he covered at least six general elections and as many assembly elections. In 2007, he was selected for the prestigious Chevening Young Indian Print Journalist Programme at the University of Lincoln, United Kingdom, where he received advanced training in print journalism. In 2009 he won the Press Institute of India-International Committee of Red Cross award on conflict reporting for his on-ground reportage of 2008 Kandhamal riots.
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