The roadmap for Sustainable Action for Transforming Human Capital in Education (SATH-E) project of NITI Aayog, being undertaken in partnership with three participating states of Jharkhand, Madhya Pradesh and Odisha, was released on Saturday, March 17 by Amitabh Kant, CEO, NITI Aayog, in presence of Sudhir Tripathi, Chief Secretary, Jharkhand, Alok Kumar, Adviser (HRD), NITI Aayog, Principal Secretaries for education, State Project Directors (SPDs), knowledge partners and representatives operating in the field of education.
“SATH-E aspires to be a ‘saathi’, to the educational system with the student and the teacher at its centre”, said Amitabh Kant, underscoring the significance of this project. “The aim is to make the entire governmental school education system responsive, aspirational and transformational for every child.”
These programmes and other initiatives stated in the roadmap will be further strengthened, customized and executed by the SATH-E states in consultation with knowledge partners - the Boston Consulting Group and Piramal Foundation for Education Leadership – over the next 24 months.
About SATH-E
In May 2017, the NITI Aayog wrote to all States offering assistance for improving their health and education sectors. 16 States responded favorably. Following presentations and consultations with MHRD, the three States of Jharkhand, Madhya Pradesh and Odisha were selected for the programme. The Sustainable Action for Transforming Human Capital-Education (SATH-E) was thus, born.
The SATH-E initiative in based on formal agreements with the States and will be funded through a cost-sharing mechanism between NITI Aayog and the participating states. The Boston Consulting Group (BCG) and Piramal Foundation for Education Leadership (PFEL) were chosen as knowledge partners for the project facilitating review, data collection and implementation.
SATH-E has been envisaged as a programme which aims to transform elementary and secondary school education across these three states. SATH-E roadmap refers to a time-bound, goal-driven exercise that will reach its logical culmination by the end of the academic year 2020. Further, the foundations of other long term interventions,as is found necessary by each state, would be laid during this period.
Limiting interventions to only those where there is complete state buy-in for sustainability, the whole process would be done in consultation with the states and MHRD. This will be facilitated by the National Steering Group (NSG), chaired by the CEO of NITI Aayog and including the Chief Secretaries of the States, which will continuously monitor progress, introduce course-corrections and offer a platform for addressing issues in implementation.
Thus, SATH-E aims to create role model States for education and mainstream ‘islands of excellence’ across the country to facilitate qualitative and quantitative transformation of learning outcomes. Marrying technology with need-based, data-driven assessment and a ‘giving it what it takes’ approach - be it innovation, incubation, external third party funding and Public- Private- Philanthropic Partnership (PPPP) experimentation – SATH-E puts the states in the driver’s seat to transform education at scale.
