The NEP can be used between students in India and those of Indo-American descent in the United States.
Maryland: Indo-American education diplomacy is booming in Washington and New Delhi. Nearly 50 US universities are eyeing India for educational collaborations and tapping into India’s vast student market.
In every gathering of the Indian diaspora, it is being talked about, and many are eagerly awaiting how this new high-level educational partnership will unfold for future Indian students aspiring to come to American universities. After the health diplomacy that sprung up between the world’s largest and oldest democracies during the Covid-19 pandemic, perhaps education diplomacy will be a game-changer for more people-to-people contact between the two. country.
India’s National Education Policy (NEP, 2020) targets foreign collaboration, establishment of foreign universities on Indian soil and exchange of scholars and students at tertiary level. As a student of Indian origin, who transited to the greatest academic center in the world – USA in 2021, I always feel that there is still something missing when it comes to the full potential of NEP. I studied earlier in the USA in 9th grade and have been studying now since 2021, and I see an opportunity to be tapped on how school-level partnerships can be established between Indian and American schools.
The NEP can be used at the school level between Indian students and those of Indo-American descent in the United States. Technology is key to bringing them together on a single platform to share expertise from an early age and leverage leadership and entrepreneurial skills in each other. A glimpse of this is emerging from the many startups, tech apps, and leadership projects that Indian American high school students, and students like me, who accompany their parents on official and academic visas, are doing to build our academic profile ahead of college admissions. university. I had missed this academic rigor in India, where grades matter more than creative and extracurricular activities. There is an opportunity waiting to be tapped when students from Indian schools, even those from the poorest parts of India, connect with students from Indian schools in the United States. Academic partnerships must start at the school level so that Indian students can be better exposed to a global and diverse curriculum, which will boost their academic profile and ease the route to the United States and other universities. world.
In fact, many Indian American students do their projects in India with underprivileged and underinformed children in the rural belts of India, but this number needs to be increased and formalized so that Indian American students can be invited as part of a scholarship to do collaborative projects and share their experiences of school programs with Indian students in their home country. Both ways, as Indian American children also learn about their cultural roots and the new India, which will help them form the right narrative to discuss their country more at social gatherings and among multiracial friendship circles. Many students here in the United States do community education, open businesses, and do long hours of social service, which somehow gives them a sense of entrepreneurship and leadership at a young age. Concepts like artificial intelligence, robotics, nanotechnology, business, entrepreneurship and leadership need to be encouraged at the school level.
The potential is immense for this school-level partnership with Indian schools. The infrastructural handicaps and educational capacity limitations in India’s rural belts can be overcome by collaborating with innovative community education projects led by Indian American children in American schools. NEP 2020 can find its real and supported partners in American schools to begin the new chapter of Indo-American educational diplomacy!
The writer is a 12th grade student at Bethesda Chevy-Chase High School.
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