Andhra Cabinet approves IB syllabus; students will now receive education under US curriculum

Amaravati: Andhra Pradesh Cabinet has approved a Letter of Intent between the International Baccalaureate (IB) and the Education Department.

By bringing the IB syllabus, which is in vogue in countries like the USA, the students will be able to make their presence felt across colleges and universities. With this move, over 80 lakh students across 60,000 government schools in Andhra Pradesh will directly benefit.

The government entered into the MoU to bridge the communication barrier for government school students who aspire to study in foreign Universities. The government will upscale the communication skills of the school students by teaching the IB syllabus from Class I.

Chief Minister YS Jagan Mohan Reddy chaired the cabinet meeting and took several key decisions. The Cabinet decided to shift the Chief Minister’s Office (CMO) to Visakhapatnam by Dasara

Further, the government would amend the Universities Act to ensure that the students have the highest academic standards and joint certification with renowned universities. According to the new amendment, the existing and newly established private universities will be tied up with the top 100 universities in the world to deliver the most optimum results.

Other Cabinet decisions include

Housing plots:

The Cabinet has also decided to provide housing plots to eligible government employees who do not own houses on superannuation and also extend fee reimbursement and Aarogyasri schemes to the children of retired employees.

GPS

The cabinet approved the Guaranteed Pension Scheme for government employees and regularisation of contract employees.

Financial incentive program:

Similarly, the Cabinet has decided to introduce the Jagananna Civil Services Incentive Programme, which will award a financial incentive of Rs 1 lakh to those eligible students who clear the prelims stage in the UPSC examination and another Rs 50,000 to those who pass the mains stage of this examination.

Bulk drug factory:

Moreover, the Cabinet has decided to shift the bulk drugs factory from Kakinada to Nakkapalli and also approved a zero vacancy policy to recruit employees in the medical department for efficient operations.

Houses for Polavaram victims

Cabine approved the draft bill for the regularisation of contract employees, building 8,424 houses for Polavaram project flood victims, and providing Rs 1 lakh and Rs 50,000 financial aid for the UPSC aspirants who clear their prelims and mains entrance examination.

The cabinet also gave its nod to implement the GPS Bill for government employees and further assured to provide a permanent house site to those government employees who do not have their own house before they retire from their service.

The cabinet also decided to extend the Aarogyasri scheme benefits to the government employees including their kin, after they retired and implement fee reimbursement for the children of retired government employees.

Other decisions

Jagananna Civil Services Aspirants Scheme: To support civil services aspirants, govt has decided to provide around Rs. 50K for Prelims and Rs. 1 Lac for Mains qualifying candidates (great measure, since most candidates leave their jobs to prepare)

Approval for Regularisation of Assigned Lands: this will facilitate a transfer of ownership of 34.7 Lac acres of assigned lands to 19 Lac farmer beneficiaries

Regularization of Contractual Employees: long-standing demand, 10K employees will benefit from this

AP Vaidya Vidhan Parishad Amendment: an act for managing secondary-level hospitals (CHC, AHs & DHs) in the state — to include PHCs and medical colleges under it

Private Universities Amendment: aims to convert top-performing state colleges into private universities as per guidelines of New Education Policy 2020, may also alter laws on quota seats to provide adequate opportunities to youth

Approval of Proposal to allot 50% seats to Tribals in Kurupam Engineering Colleges