NISHTHA CAPACITY building programme

• Ministry of Tribal Affairs and NCERT come together on a joint mission for NISHTHA Capacity Building Programme for EMRS Teachers and Principals.
• It is a capacity-building programme to build competencies among teachers and school principals and Improving the Quality of School Education through Integrated Teacher Training.

National Initiative for School Heads’ and Teachers’ Holistic Advancement (NISHTHA):

• It is the world’s largest teachers’ training programme of its kind in the world.
• It was launched in 2019
• It aims to build competencies among all the teachers and school principals at the elementary stage.
• The basic objective of this massive training programme is to motivate and equip teachers to encourage and foster critical thinking in students.
• The Standardized training modules are developed at the national level for all States and UTs.

Key features:

• Activity-based modules including educational games and quizzes, Social-emotional learning, motivational interactions, team building, preparation for the school-based assessment, in-built continuous feedback mechanism, online monitoring and support system, training need and impact analysis (Pre and Post training).
• States and UTs have an option to contextualize the training modules and use their own material and resource persons also, keeping in view the core topics and expected outcomes of NISHTHA.
• A Mobile App and Learning Management System (LMS) based on MOODLE (Modular Object-Oriented Dynamic Learning Environment) have been developed by NCERT.

• Initially, the NISHTHA programme was launched through face-to-face mode to improve learning outcomes at the elementary level in the country.
• But, due to COVID-19, NISHTHA has been customized for the online mode to be conducted through Digital Infrastructure for Knowledge Sharing (DIKSHA) and NISHTHA portals.

Eklavya Model Residential School (EMRS):

• As per the budget 2018-19, every block with more than 50% Schedule Tribe (ST) population and at least 20,000 tribal persons, will have an Eklavya Model Residential School by the year 2022.
• These are being set up by grants provided under Article 275(1) of the Constitution.

• There will be an autonomous society under the ministry of tribal affairs — similar to Navodaya Vidyalaya Samiti — to run the EMRSs.

• objective --- to provide quality middle and high-level education to Scheduled Tribe (ST) students in remote areas, not only to enable them to avail of reservation in high and professional education courses and as jobs in government and public and private sectors but also to have access to the best opportunities in education at par with the non-ST population.