In the past few years, students enrolling in Arts and Humanities stream have increased in number. There are many factors behind it. The stream which was considered worthless by most of the Indian parents for some years ago now is producing toppers. So what made the stream which received many negative perceptions in the past have come in front with a changed and better perspective? The toppers of CBSE 2019, Hansika Shukla and Karishma Arora are both from the Arts stream. In Delhi, Akriti Kiran scored 496 out of 500 who was also from arts stream in Amity International School.
Even the toppers from the Delhi Government Schools in CBSE 2019, all the toppers belonged from the humanities stream. To be specific, the stream was the last priority of study when the other two options of Science and Commerce did not work. Many experts believe it is only the meritious students who broke away from the societal cliches and took up arts stream. And as they come up with successfully changing the marking demographics of the Arts subjects, the whole perception of the arts stream made a positive change.
Yukti Yadav who scored 98.4% from the Blue Bells School in Delhi from Arts stream accepted that her students initially suggested her not to take up the stream. She informed that she felt very comfortable studying arts as she feels the subjects of the art stream helps one to stay connected to the world rather than staying inside an academic cocoon. She is the example that Arts can also be a mark scoring subject and is not for only academically backward students.
The recent reforms and changes in marking systems, question patterns, and assessment process have also helped the stream see a huge hike in terms of marking matrix in recent times. Monica Sagar, the Principal of Shiv Nadar School, Gurugram, has said that the incorporation of keyword-based marking system had made the path easier for students for scoring good marks. She added that with the new system, students can score 99% in subjects like psychology which was unheard of even 2 years ago.
The choices in the subjects under arts and humanities have also increased recently. The schools are now determined to come up with the new and improved infrastructures for Arts subjects. Kusum Kapoor, the teacher of Amity international school has informed that the students who come to study humanities subjects often show extraordinary focus and emotional intelligence to study their subjects.
However, despite the above-mentioned facts, the increase in the number of humanities students in India is largely a contribution of the Tier 1 cities like Delhi, Mumbai, Bangalore, Chennai, Kolkata, etc. The numbers have not improved in tier 2 and 3 cities. The prime reason for this can be the fewer specialisations available in those areas.
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Another problem that is emerging up for the arts and humanities streams is the feminisation of the course. It has been seen statistically that the students in the Arts stream in Co-ed schools held more than 70% female students. This shows the existence of the misconception that the Arts stream is for girls only. Yukti Yadav informed that there was only one boy in her class.
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