Come mid-April, when the new academic session starts, some local governments will be using localised curriculum in schools within their areas incorporating their specialties in the national curriculum framework set by the Curriculum Development Centre.

Mobilising the experts, they have already started designing the curriculum taking into account their need and special features. The executives of the local governments say each local body has its own features which the children from the respective area must learn. Similarly, some might have historic and potential touristic destinations, personalities of national importance and special flora and fauna that students need to be taught.

They say the agricultural or development potential vary from one local level to another. One might be strong in horticulture and other in vegetable farming. Similarly, one could have potential of hydro electricity and other might provide feasible environment for wind energy.

“The focus of the curriculum will be informing the students about the special features and potentiality of their area. Educating children in the fields on which are local governments have potential can largely contribute in the long run as we strive to achieve prosperity,” said Hom Narayan Shrestha, chairman of Jugal Rural Municipality.

Shrestha, who also leads the Federation of Rural Government Nepal, said his municipality has been working using the local experts for over a month to prepare the curriculum with the target to accomplish the task by next month. The rural municipality is all set to adopt the new curriculum from the new session that begins in April, Shrestha said. “There are many other local governments working along this line.”

According to him, the curriculum will be based on the national framework prepared by the centre. The revision by the respective local governments will be done keeping in mind that the foundation of children from across the nation remains the same.

Like Jugal Rural Municipality, the Kathmandu Metropolitan City is also adopting its own syllabus in both public and private schools.

Sita Ram Koirala, head of the metropolis’ education department, told the Post that they are working to give the final shape to the curriculum. The text of the localised curriculum will carry 100 full marks of the total 600 in a particular grade, he said.

Schedule 8 of the Constitution of Nepal gives the local governments explicit authority to manage school education. This means local governments are free to hire and fire teachers, develop curriculum and hold examinations till 12th grade. The present move of the local governments is based on the constitutional authority.

Education experts say though having own localised curriculum is the ultimate goal, the focus of the local governments at present should be improving the quality of education in their areas. According to them,

local governments should wait for the formation of a mechanism at the provincial level to have uniformity in the curriculum and ensure equivalency.

Binay Kusiyat, a university professor who has done many researches on school education, said improvement in the school management, governance and increasing investment should be the priority of local governments at present. “Intervention in the curriculum could be done once the ongoing problems are sorted out,” he told

the Post.