Planning

All organizations whether it is the government, a private business or small businessman require planning. To turn their dreams of increase in sale, earning high profit and getting success in business all businessmen have to think about future; make predictions and achieve target. To decide what to do, how to do and when to do they do planning.

Educational Planning

Meaning:

There is a saying that if there is a will there is a way. It signifies the will of an individual comes into picture after thinking which can be done through planning in mental level. The term planning is the major guideline for development of any individual, institution, organisation and society in every respect.

Definitions:

1.       “Planning is to design some action to be done before hand.”

—Oxford English Dictionary

2.      “Planning selects among alternatives explores, routes before travel begins and identifies possible or probable outcomes or action before the executive and his organisation committed to any.”

—Hugman and Schwartz

3.      “Planning is regarded as the process of setting out in advance a pattern of action to bring about overall national policies by the closest possible articulation of means and ends.”

—Philips

Significance of Educational Planning:

1.      To make every programme of an educational institution or organisation grand success.

2.      Proper educational planning saves time, effort and money as planning in every field is a time-saving, an effort-saving and a money-saving activity.

3.      Educational planning is a sound method of solving educational problems by avoiding the trial and error method of doing things.

4.      Educational planning is essential for the best utilization of available resources.

5.      Educational planning checks wastage and failure and contributes to the smoothness, ease and efficiency of the administrative process in the field of education.

6.      Through proper planning in education, education can be the best means by which society will preserve and develop its future value system, way of life of an individual, knowledge, skills and applications, and culture of the country.

7.      Through proper educational planning, the means and ends of the society can be properly interacted through educational system. It implies that the educational system utilizes a large proportion of the country’s educated talents and a major part of public expenditure.

8.      Educational planning is highly essential for preparing a blueprint or plan of action for every programme of an educational institution or organisation.

9.      Planning in education is necessary for making one’s educational journey goal-oriented and purposeful.

10.  It is essential to maintain, sustain and enhance the thinking process of an individual, institution or organisation.

11.  Planning in education is necessary to highlight the universal aims of education required for every nation for its development in every respect.

12.  To bring total development of a nation in time, in which educational development is one among its various aspects.

13.  To reflect the modern developments like explosion of knowledge, advancement of science and technology, development of research and innovation while reformulating the aims and objectives of education in the light of the particular situation a country is facing.

14.  It explores and provides the best possible means of making the wide use of available resources leading to maximum realization of the educational goals.

15.  Educational planning facilitates gathering of educational experts, teachers, supervisors and administrators for taking decision in relation to the realisation of purposes of educational programme.

16.  Educational planning gives equal importance to the purposes of different classes of experts such as sociologists, economists, scientists, politicians, educationists etc.

Planning Process Models

A process is defined as the series of steps or followed in doing an activity. These steps can be illustrated in graphical or symbolic terms atypical of a model. A planning process model provides proper guidance in what ought to be done in practice. It also dictates explicitly what people ought to do in order for them to act accordingly and behave rationally so as to ascertain the successful completion of the process of activities.

planning is the process of determining in advance the best possible way of achieving specified development objectives within given time period at the least possible cost. The model, as presented in Figure 1, had six major steps. These are (NEDA, 1993):

1. Goal-setting
2. Situational information
3. Policy/Strategy formulation
4. Plans/Programs/Projects
5. Implementation
6. Evaluation

Figure 1. Development Planning Model (NEDA, 1993)

The model was later refined and improved where the major steps were expanded into eight represented by circles arranged from left to right. The model, as shown in Figure II, has the following steps (NEDA, 1993):

1. Situational analysis
2. Goal/objective/target setting
3. Policy/strategy formulation
4. Program/project identification
5. Investment programming
6. Budgeting
7. Implementation and monitoring
8. Evaluation and plan update

12th Five Year Plan

India’s 1.25 billion citizens have higher expectations about their future today, than they have ever had before. They have seen the economy grow much faster in the past 10 years than it did earlier, and deliver visible benefits to a large number of people. This has understandably raised the expectations of all sections, especially those who have benefited less. Our people are now much more aware of what is possible, and they will settle for no less. The Twelfth Five Year Plan must rise to the challenge of meeting these high expectations.

Definition of five-year plan

 

1. : one of a continuing series of Soviet governmental programs designed to achieve usually specified goals in the planned, coordinated, and cumulative development of the Soviet economy and other sectors of Soviet life (as education and science) over a period of five years

 

2. : a national governmental program of planned, coordinated, and cumulative economic and social development over a period of five years

                                                                        --------(Merriam Webster Dictionary)

India was left with crippling economy when the British left. After Independence, India needed well planned strategies to sustain and grow the economy and compete with other developing countries.

History:

v  The Planning Commission was set up in March 1950.

v  The main objective of the Government to promote a rapid rise in the standard of living of the people by

a)      efficient exploitation of the resources of the country

b)      increasing production and

c)      offering opportunities to all for employment in the service of the community

v  The Planning Commission was charged with the responsibility of

v  making assessment of all resources of the country, augmenting

v  deficient resources, formulating plans for the most effective and

v  balanced utilisation of resources and determining priorities.

v  Jawaharlal Nehru was the first Chairman of the Planning

Functions of the Planning Commission of India:

v  To make an assessment of the resources of the country and to see which resources are deficient.

v  To formulate plans for the most effective and balanced utilization of country's resources.

v  To indicate the factors which are hampering economic development.

v  To determine the machinery, that would be necessary for the successful implementation of each stage of plan.

v  Periodical assessment of the progress of the plan.

v   The commission is seeing to maximize the output withminimum resources with the changing times.

v  The Planning Commission has set the goal of constructing along term strategic vision for the future.

v  It sets sectoral targets and provides the catalyst to the economy to grow in the right direction.

v  The Planning Commission plays an integrative role in the development of a holistic approach to the formulation of policies in critical areas of human and economic development.

Steps taken by government in accelerating Education Planning in India:

v  The central as well as the state governments have been emphasizing on the growth of education at all levels. Moreover there are District Literacy Societies or Zilla Saksharta Samiti who also plays the most pivotal role in the pursuance of adult education. The first step taken by the Indian government is to initiate measures for universal elementary education among all. The other significant steps taken on

the Education Planning in India are -

v  to increase the number of institutions, teachers and students at elementary level

v  to provide for incentives like textbooks, free uniforms and scholarships

v  to offer Centrally Sponsored Program of Nutritional Support to Primary Education or Mid Day Meal Scheme

v  to launch the Sarva Siksha Abhiyan Scheme

v  to initiate the District Elementary Education Plan

v  to launch the National Literacy Mission for providing functional literacy to the non-literates between the age group of 15 and 35

v  to provide free and compulsory education for children

v  to improve the Industrial Training Institutes, Boards of Technical Education and Engineering Colleges, and Polytechnology and Apprenticeship Schools

v  to upgrade the Indian Institutes of Technology and Indian Institutes of Management

v  to progress in new technology based areas like biotechnology, bioinformatics, and nano-technology

12th Five Year Plan 2012-17 as per the draft document released by the Planning Commission aims at a growth rate of 8%. This is the revised rate when compared to the initial approach paper. Other targets of the Twelfth Five Year Plan in different sectors are listed below.

12th FIVE YEAR PLAN (2012-2017) :

An Overview---

v  Ensure quality secondary education with relevant skills including basic competency in mathematics, science, languages and communication

v  Implement common curricula and syllabi of nationally acceptable standards for Science, Maths and English in all schools in the country 

v  Develop life skills including skills of critical and constructive thinking, use of ICT, organisation and leadership, and community services

v  12th Plan Expected Outcomes India achieving a MYS of seven years. Regional, Gender and Social gaps in Elementary Education enrollment bridged & that in Secondary Education substantially reduced. GERs in Secondary and Sr. Secondary levels exceeding 90% and 65%, respectively. Gender gap in Literacy reduced to 10%age points. A significant improvement in quality and standards of education in Government Schools 

v  Extend RMSA gradually to Higher Secondary stage and cover all Government and Aided Schools 

v  Set national norms of secondary schooling for Universalization of Secondary Education (USE)

A.     Highlights of 12th Five Year Plan (2012-17):

v  Average growth target has been set at 8.2 percent

v  Growth rate has been lowered to 8.2 percent from the 9.0 percent projected earlier in view adverse domestic and global situation.

v  Areas of main thrust are-infrastructure, health and education

v  Growth rate has been lowered to 8.2 percent from the 9.0 percent projected earlier in view adverse domestic and global situation.

v  The commission had accepted Finance Minister P. Chidambaram’s suggestion that direct cash transfer of subsidies in food, fertilizers and petroleum be made by the end of the 12th Plan period

v  After the cabinet clearance, the plan for its final approval would be placed before the National Development Council (NDC), which has all chief ministers and cabinet ministers as members and is headed by the Prime Minister

v  Agriculture in the current plan period grew at 3.3 percent, compared to 2.4 percent during the 10th plan period. The growth target for manufacturing sector has been pegged at 10 percent

v  During the 11th Plan period, the average annual growth was 7.9 percent

v  A full Planning Commission chaired by Prime Minister Manmohan Singh on September 15 endorsed the document which has fixed the total plan size at Rs.47.7 lakh crore

v  The 12th Plan seeks to achieve 4 percent agriculture sector growth during the five-year period

v  On poverty alleviation, the commission plans to bring down the poverty ratio by 10 percent. At present, the poverty is around 30 per cent of the population.

v  According to commission Deputy Chairperson Montek Singh Ahluwalia, health and education sectors are major thrust areas and the outlays for these in the plan have been raised.

v  The outlay on health would include increased spending in related areas of drinking water and sanitatio

B.     Vision of 12th Five Year Plan (2012-17):

Twelfth Five Year Plan focuses on Growth – Growth which is

·         Faster

·         Inclusive

·         Sustainable

Core Monitorable Targets of the 12th Five Year Plan (2012-17)

1.      Economic Growth

·         Real GDP growth at 8%.

·         Agriculture growth at 4%.

·         Manufacturing growth at 10%.

·         Every state must attain higher growth rate than the rate achieved during 11th plan.

2.      Poverty and Employment

·         Poverty rate to be reduced by 10% than the rate at the end of 11th plan.

·         5 Crore new work opportunities and skill certifications in non-farm sector.

3.      Education

·         Mean years of schooling to increase to 7 years.

·         20 lakh seats for each age bracket in higher education.

·         End gender gap and social gap in school enrollment.

4.      Health

·         Reduce : IMR to 25; MMR to 1. Increase Child Sex Ratio to 950.

·         Reduce Total Fertility Rate to 2.1

·         Reduce under nutrition of children in age group 0-3 to half of NFHS-3 levels.

5.      Infrastructure

·         Investment in Infrastructure at 9% of GDP

·         Gross Irrigated Area 103 million hectare (from 90 million hectare)

·         Electricity to all villages; Reduce AT&C losses by 20%.

·         Connect Villages with All Weather Roads

·         National and State high ways to a minimum of 2 lane standard.

·         Complete Eastern and Western Dedicated Freight Corridors.

·         Rural Tele-Density to 70%.

·         40 Litres Per Capita Per Day Drinking Water to 50% of rural population; Nirmal Gram Status to 50% of all Gram Panchayats.

C.     Broad Objectives of 12th Five Year Plan :

v  To reduce poverty

v  To improve regional equality across states and within states

v  To improve living conditions for SCs. STS, OBCs. Minorities

v  To generate attractive employment opportunities for Indian youth

v  To eliminate gender gaps

D.    12th Five Year Plan lists various growth indicators as follows:

v  It aims at average GDP growth rate of 8%

v  it seeks to achieve 4% growth in agricultural sector

v  it aims at reducing head-count poverty by 10%

v  it aims at generating 50 million work opportunities in non-farm sector and providing skill certifications

v  it aims at eliminating gender and social gap in education

v  Reducing Infant Mortality Rate (IMR) to 25, Mumma! Mortality Rate (MMR) to 100 and Total Fertility Rate (TFR) to 2.1

v  Increasing infrastructure investment to 9% of GDP

v  Achieving universal road connectivity and access to power for all villages

v  Provision of banking services for 90% households

v  Major welfare benefits and subsidies via Aadhaar card

v  Secondary Education for all by 2017

v  Increase public spending from 1% (11th plan) to 2.5% of GDP by the end of 12th

v  Development of a National Action Plan for Climate Change to achieve target of 20% to 25% reduction in emission levels by 2020

v  Getting S Indian universities in the list of top 200 universities in the world

v  For the purpose of providing electricity to households it aims at addition of 88.000 MW electricity generation capacity and 55.000 MW of renewable energy capacity.

v  Eliminate gender and social gap in school enrollment

v  Improving child sex ratio (0-6) to 950

v  Reducing under nutrition among children aged 0-3 to half of the NFHS-3 level

v  Increasing Gross Irrigated area from 90 million hectares to 103 million hectares

v  Connecting all villages with all-weather roads and upgrading national and state highways to minimum two-lane standard • Complete Eastern and Western Dedicated Freight Corridor

v  Increase rural tele-density to 70%, currently it is 40.81%

v  Ensuring 50% of rural population has access to 40 Ipcd piped drinking water supply and 50% of Gram Panchayat achieve Nirmal Gram Status

Tablet: Composition of Total Allocation for Education in Different Five Year Plans

(Figures in percent)

Plan	Elementary	Secondary	Adult	University	Technical	Others	Total
First Plan	57.6	5.5	0.0	7.8	14.2	15.0	100
Second Plan	34.8	18.7	0.0	17.6	17.9	11.0	100
Third Plan	34.1	17.5	0.0	14.8	21.2	12.4	100
Fourth Plan	50.1	0.0	1.7	25.2	10.5	12.5	100
Fifth Plan	513	0.0	2.1	27.9	9.4	8.9	100
Sixth Plan	32.1	20.4	5.9	21.4	10.4	9.8	100
Seventh Plan	37.3	24.0	6.2	15.7	14.2	2.6	100
Eighth Plan	47.7	24.0	5.2	9.6	10.1	3.4	100
Ninth Plan	57.1	21.3	1.7	8.7	8.1	3.0	100
Tenth Plan	65.6	9.9	2.8	9.5	10.7	1.5	100
Eleventh Plan	46.5	19.8	2.2	15.5	11.1	4.9	100

Source: CBGA (2011 b) Planning Commission (2008) and Planning Commission (2002).

Twelfth Five Year Plan in Educational Sector:

INTRODUCTION :

 Education is the most important lever for social, economic and political transformation. A well educated population, equipped with the relevant knowledge, attitudes and skills is essential for economic and social development in the twenty-first century. Education is the most potent tool for socioeconomic mobility and a key instrument for building an equitable and just society. Education provides skills and competencies for economic well-being. Education strengthens democracy by imparting to citizens the tools needed to fully participate in the governance process. Education also acts as an integrative force in society, imparting values that foster social cohesion and national identity. Recognising the importance of education in national development, the Twelfth Plan places an unprecedented focus on the expansion of education, on significantly improving the quality of education imparted and on ensuring that educational opportunities are available to all segments of the society.

Twelfth Plan Strategy for Primary Education

 1. Shift from a project-based approach of SSA to a unified RTE-based governance system for UEE;

 2. Address residual access and equity gaps in elementary education by adopting special measures to ensure regular

attendance of children in schools and devising special strategy to tackle the problem of dropping out before completing

the full cycle of elementary schooling;

 3. Integrate pre-school education with primary schooling in order to lay a strong foundation for learning during primary

school;

 4. Prioritise education quality with a system-wide focus on learning outcomes that are assessed through classroombased

CCE independently measured, monitored and reported at the block/district/State levels;

 5. Focus on early grade supplemental instruction to ensure that all children achieve the defined age-/class-specific learning

levels by the end of class 2;

 6. Articulate clear learning goals that have to be achieved by the end of each class or set of classes. These goals should be

understood by parents and teachers;

 7. Improve teacher training with an emphasis on effective pedagogy given the realities of Indian classrooms such as multiage,

multi-grade and multi-level contexts. Also, make teachers’ professional development a needs-driven process as

opposed to top-down decision wherein curriculum design and delivery is centrally driven;

 8. Invest in both top-down administrative oversight and bottom-up community-driven monitoring of schools;

 9. Focus on strengthening practices of good governance in all schools and related institutions that ensure performancebased

internal and external accountability for teachers and administrators at all levels and also ensure holistic assessmentdriven

development of schools;

 10. Invest in strengthening ongoing and continuous field-based systems of academic support to schools and teachers and in

strengthening district and block-level capacity for better management and leadership;

 11. Support States to set learning goals and invest in independent monitoring of outcomes, but provide States with substantial

autonomy in how to achieve these goals, and provide additional results-based financing to States who show the most

improvement in educational outcomes;

 12. Provide a supportive environment for evaluation of innovative practices, and sharing of best practices across States and

districts;

 13. Support States towards motivation, capacity development and accountability of community and parents for

ensuring regular attendance and quality education; and

 14. Ensure convergence with panchayats, Community-Based Organisations (CBOs) and other sectors at school level.

Secondary Education: Twelfth Plan Goals

1. Achieve near-universal enrolment in secondary education, with the GER exceeding 90 per cent by 2017;

2. Raise the GER at the higher secondary level to 65 per cent by 2017;

3. Reduce Dropout rate to less than 25 per cent by 2017;

4. Ensure quality secondary education with relevant skills including basic competency in mathematics, science, languages and communication;

5. Implement common curricula and syllabi of nationally acceptable standards for Science, Maths and English in all schools in the country.

6. Develop life skills including skills of critical and constructive thinking, use of ICT, organisation and leadership, and community services.

Key elements of the strategy to achieve these objectives include:

(i) consolidation and optimum use of existing resources;

(ii) facilitating private growth,

 (iii) improving quality,

(iv) focus on teacher availability and teacher training,

(v) ICT integration in education and

 (vi) renewed focus on vocational education at the secondary level.

Higher education                                                             

Higher education is about promoting excellence in more ways than one: at individual level, it is an instrument of upward mobility through cultivation of excellence; for national economy, excellence of work force is a pre-requisite of sustained growth; and for humankind, excellence is a must for extending the frontiers of knowledge and cultivation of values. Deepening of excellence requires simultaneous and multidimension effort at improving the quality of higher education: generous support for individuals and institutions who work at the highest level and in the frontiers of knowledge, measures to uplift the quality of teaching-learning in an average institution and support for attempts to redefine relevant knowledge in keeping with our context.

Higher education in India suffers from quality deficit in all these respects. Very few Indian institutions have global recognition in terms of being Centres of Excellence in their field. It is essential that these islands of excellence be nourished and if possible expanded. There is a need to ensure that in widening the base of higher education, the apex must not be allowed to slip down. At the same time, it is erroneous to focus exclusively on these islands of excellence in order to raise levels of excellence in the system. The burden of public policy should be on deepening this excellence to other institutions with some potential which can be supported to join this league.

The toughest challenge of excellence lies in improving the quality of teaching-learning in a majority of non-elite universities and colleges which continue to admit but fail to do justice to an overwhelming proportion 88 Inclusive and Qualitative Expansion of Higher Education of our talented students. Since most of these talented students do their secondary education through Indian languages as the medium of instruction, and effectively depend on these for higher education as well, creation of teaching-learning material in Indian languages is a critical and long-neglected need for expanding the pool of excellence. Since colleges enroll the vast majority of the students in higher education, promoting a culture of excellence requires recognizing colleges as sites of creation and not just dissemination of ideas. Research capacities need to be consciously developed in the colleges. Colleges and their teachers should be encouraged and supported in taking up research including generation of innovative teaching-learning material. Adequate funding and initiatives/schemes need to be developed here. In fact, if the importance of College as a space that effectively transits students out of some of the non-salutary learning habits they pick up in secondary education.

Similarly, there is a need to outgrow the unstated assumption that cultivation of excellence is the prerogative of any particulars domain of knowledge or discipline. With necessary recognition and support, India has the potential for extending frontiers of knowledge in all disciplines. Finally, if excellence is about extending frontiers of knowledge, it cannot be cultivated without interrogating the received definitions of what these frontiers are. India is one of the few places that can offer a creative yet critical engagement with the globally dominant templates of knowledge. This would require that research and teaching-learning should be encouraged to encounter the context and needs of our society, its traditions of knowledge and the challenge of effective fostering of Constitutional values. There is a need for clearer articulation of what is meant by internationalization of higher education. Extending frontiers of knowledge for the larger good of humankind requires that knowledge seekers all over the world join in a common quest for mutual learning. What often passes for internationalization is more often than not a one way traffic. Genuine internationalization of higher education in India would require setting Inclusive and Qualitative Expansion of Higher Education 89 up networks and exchanges of mutual learning with global north as well as global south. India can emerge as an important educational hub for South Asia in particular and also other countries of the developing world.

A number of initiatives were launched during the 11th FYP and these included setting up of new institutions, strengthening of existing institutions and implementing reforms agenda. In order to gain full benefits of these initiatives and consolidate the efforts further, the schemes and programmes launched during the 11th FYP be continued with full support. Besides, the 12th FYP should be flexible to make changes in the mid-course, based on independent evaluation studies by reputed institutions, of the success of the 11th FYP initiatives. In addition, the innovative new initiatives to enhance quality and excellence across the country are to be facilitated in the 12th FYP.

References:

v  http://www.planningcommission.nic.in/plans/planrel/fiveyr/welcome.html

v  http://www.educationforallinindia.com/fiveyearplans.html

v  http://mhrd.gov.in/overview-secondary-education

v  https://india.gov.in/topics/education/secondaryhigher-secondary-education