National Education Policy (NEP) 2020: Implementation and Challenges

Abstract

The National Education Policy (NEP) 2020 represents comprehensive strategies to reform the Indian education system, since the NEP of 1986. The new policies are designed to suffice the country’s modern needs and aspirations, especially keeping the technological revolution in mind. The policy seeks to promote holistic, multidisciplinary, flexible, equitable and technology-enabled education from early years of childhood, all the way to higher education. It focuses on aspects like foundational literacy and numeracy, competency-based learning, vocational education, digital integration, teacher development, institutional autonomy, all while promoting innovation, research  and experimentation. The successful implementation of the NEP certainly depends on solving specific challenges, usually related to financing, infrastructure, teacher preparedness, digital inequality, governance, language diversity and transparency/reliability with stakeholders. In this paper we shall study all major provisions provided by the NEP of 2020. We shall also assess implementation strategies, identify key challenges and strategic approaches to achieve quality, equitable and inclusive education...