NAS 2021 on November 12: Ministry of education to conduct survey in 22 languages

NEW DELHI: The central government will hold the National Achievement Survey (NAS) 2021, the largest school assessment exercises in the world, on November 12 to assess the learning interruptions and new learnings during the COVID-19 pandemic and help to take remedial measures.

NAS 2021 will be conducted in 22 mediums of instruction covering Assamese, Bengali, English, Gujarati, Hindi, Kannada, Malayalam, Manipuri, Marathi, Mizo, Odiya, Punjabi, Tamil, Telugu, Urdu, Bodo, Garo, Khasi, Konkani, Nepali, Bhutia, and Lepcha.

The government conducts the survey every three years. Last NAS was held on November 13, 2017, for assessing the competencies developed by the children of Classes 3, 5 and 8. However, the survey which was supposed to be held in 2020 got postponed due to the pandemic situation.

Also read | NAS 2021: Schools brace for national test to gauge impact of COVID-related academic loss

The ministry of education said, “The instrument development, testing, finalization of the test items, sampling of the schools etc. has been done by NCERT. However, the actual administration of the test in the sampled schools will be done by CBSE in collaboration with the respective states/UTs.”

NAS 2021 will cover the entire spectrum of schools i.e. Government Schools (Central Government and State Government), Government Aided Schools and Private schools across the country.

It is expected that nearly 1.23 lakh schools and 38 lakh students in 733 districts across 36 States and UTs will be covered in the NAS 2021.

NAS will be conducted in language, mathematics and EVS for Classes 3 and 5; language, mathematics, science and social science for Class 8 and language, mathematics, science, social science and English for Class 10.

Also read | 60,000 posts to be filled in school education department in Rajasthan

For smooth and fair conduct of the survey, 1,82,488 field investigators, 1,23,729 observers, 733 district level coordinators and district nodal officers separately and 36 state nodal officers in each state and UT, have been appointed, as per the education ministry statement.