CBSE-like board on cards for skills training standard
The government is working to set up an examination board to benchmark
vocational training in the country as it seeks to bring skill development in
line with international standards.
The labour and employment
ministry is framing the structure and role of the proposed board, drawing from
the experience of the Central Board of Secondary Education, which sets the
curriculum, conducts examinations and regulates the quality of secondary
education in the country.
"Examination system is most critical to
benchmark skilled and semi-skilled workers against the best in the world," a
senior official of the ministry told the Economic Times.
"We plan
to set up a separate examination board to make the entire process more
transparent, robust and match the international standards for vocational
training, and eventually enroll youths in the Skill Development
Initiative."
Once the central board is in place, it would be entrusted
with the responsibility to decide on curriculum, mode of examination and
certification at different levels of training.
In his budget
speech, finance minister Arun Jaitley had announced a new national programme,
called Skill India, to impart employability and entrepreneurship skills to youth
by merging various schemes from across ministries.
India has the
world's youngest workforce with over 12 million new entrants in the labour
market every year but it is short on skills as only 2.5 per cent of
the employees have any certified abilities.
As a result, the
country's demographic dividend has not materialised because industry is unable
to find employable workers, a situation that could lead to socio-economic unrest
if youth remain unemployed and have no training avenues.
The labour
ministry has already introduced the semester system of examination to avoid
negligence both on the part of teachers and students, majority of whom had been
enrolling themselves only towards the end of the courses.
Besides, it has made re-affiliation of trades compulsory every five year,
revamped curriculum and provided rigorous training to principals and teachers to
professionalise the exam system, wlong with introducing flexi MoUs
for employers to decide on the kind of skills needed.