Climate Change Chapters Dropped From Syllabus to Be Restored, Says Education Minister

New Delhi: Following strong criticism, Union education minister Dharmendra Pradhan announced on July 9 that chapters on climate change that had been dropped from the school syllabus will be restored.

Earlier last week, a platform of teachers expressed dismay at the NCERT’s decision to cut chapters on climate change in several textbooks to reduce the burden on students who have that their school year disrupted by COVID-19.

At a conclave organised by the education ministry, Pradhan mentioned that the chapters will be brought back in his speech about the changes being brought by the National Education Policy 2020.

“We have to include such elements in our universities and education system so that we can deal with the challenges of climate change and achieve sustainable development goals,” Pradhan said, as reported by Deccan Herald.

NCERT has pruned over 30% of the syllabus of classes 6 to 12 to decrease the academic workload on students in the aftermath of the pandemic.

The Wire had published a report on the July 6 statement of the forum, Teachers Against the Climate Crisis (TACC). 

The teachers had said that while they appreciated the need to cut syllabus due to disruption of learning schedules, such a move could involve culling material that overlaps with similar material or is “irrelevant in the present context”.

The chopped chapters – Greenhouse Effect from the Class 11 Geography syllabus, Weather, Climate, Weather Systems and Water from the Class 7 syllabus, and information about the Indian monsoon from the Class 9 syllabus – deal with “fundamental issues”, the statement asserted.

“It is extremely important that senior school students all over India are conveyed the essence of such updated information in an accessible, easy-to-understand manner,” TACC noted.

This article was first published on The Wire.