If there is one thing to revolutionize Indian schools, what would that be? There might be several answers – changing the syllabus, teaching styles, and many more.
But have you ever thought of the management side, and the general absence of HR Departments in Indian schools? If yes, you would have reflected on the reasons. The most obvious one would be cost cutting.
“Education is the eternal foundation of a nation’s development”
And therefore, the effect of such cost cutting is far-reaching, affecting the quality of future generations and thus the nation as a whole. But there must be someone who can change the situation, certainly. In case you are wondering, it is none other than the Ministry of Human Resource Development.
Education is a people- centred intention. Managing human resources in educational institutions therefore means restructuring the whole educational setting.
Restructuring the process of recruitment, selection, orientation, performance evaluation, compensation and career development enhance the effectiveness of teaching and non-teaching staff in ways that develop and augment the whole learning experience of students.
In India, Ministry of Human Resource Development (MHRD) performs the functions of improving the human resources through its two departments namely the Department of School Education and Literacy and the Department of Higher Education. These two departments aim at developing the school education and building up better citizens out of the youth.
The initiatives taken by these departments to revamp the educational policies and developmental aspects illustrate the functions of MHRD in a more apparent way. Before diving on to our topic of concern let’s see the initiatives of MHRD in a nutshell.
Road to success
- To enhance the status of the girl child and sex ratio, MHRD has supported the Ministry of Women and Child development
- Efforts have been taken to provide functional girls toilet in all schools before 15th August 2015
- Developed a framework to assess and evaluate schools with an objective to enhance their effectiveness
- To ensure better quality and standards in schools new regulations regarding the monitoring and assessment has been made
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All these initiatives and schemes better equip students to compete with the international standards. And it compels us to wonder about the lack of initiative in implementing an HR department in Indian schools!
Identifying the gap
An educational institution’s people management can be made effective by identifying and analyzing the gaps in its administration. Identifying gaps help to understand persistent problems and once these are identified, efforts can be taken to provide a perfect solution. One such void, the HR gap, can make a huge difference in the processes of hiring, training, evaluating performance etc.
Addressing the gap
Addressing the need of having an HR department in your school starts with your initial assessment. MHRD’s initiative in implementing an HR department in schools can be backed by proper understanding of the functional aspects of human resources catering to the specific needs of each school.
Meanwhile, you don’t need to overlook your school’s future. Just because you do not need a particular system that comes under Human Resource Department, it doesn’t necessarily mean you will not require that system within a year’s time. Therefore various factors need to be considered before a proper system is put in place. And for this to happen it’s necessary to view the needs of each schools distinctly. MHRD can analyze the specific needs of each school through proper research as each educational institution is unique in its own way.
Fulfilling the gap
Your school doesn’t require an HR department to perform its human resource functions, right? Wrong. Considering the diverse activities involving the management of students and school staff, it has become vital as never before to implement in-house human resource experts or staff. They can specifically perform the functions and responsibilities pertaining to the activities regarding the staff and students of your school.
If Human Resource Development Ministry makes it mandatory to have an efficient HR department in Indian schools, it would facilitate the learning and development activities at schools in a more productive manner.
How HR Department helps?
Attracting, training, evaluating, compensating and retaining people! This is what HR department generally do. But having an HR department in your school can facilitate your school management process in a more diverse manner.
To be specific, evaluating teacher performance is of prime importance considering the influence teachers have in shaping the future of students. As such, there are lot of areas which really needs attention if providing quality education is your key motto. An HR department can therefore aid activities such as managing teacher performance, assessing student progress, dealing with disciplinary problems etc.
In spite of this, what if there is a way for you to get the benefits of an HR department at an affordable rate? We will discuss about that next week. Stay tuned.