Why are 21st-Century Skills Important for K-12 Education in India?

In a first that is a radical shift in the landscape of Indian education, Get Set Learn has partnered with Harvard Business Publishing Education (HBP Education) for the launch of leadership development and 21st-century skill development in K-12 schools. It is India's first to offer students an opportunity to build future-proof skills with a blended learning model that fuses digital platforms with live facilitation.

The curriculum is designed to foster the basic skills that the World Economic Forum's Education 4.0 report has listed as required for future workers—problem-solving, creativity, critical thinking, leadership, and emotional intelligence. As technological innovation and automation continue to revolutionize industries, students must not only be well-informed but also attitude and resilience to thrive in uncertain working environments.

At its center is a mixed learning design that combines interactive web-based modules, scenario simulation, and synchronous facilitator guidance. This allows the balance between self-learning and guided mentorship, maintaining students' motivation, focus, and needed guidance. Students are encouraged to relate learning to practice, mimicking real problem conditions and decision-making contexts. This mixed method of experiential learning achieves greater understanding of content and creates teamwork-based problem-solving and innovation.

One of the most significant elements of this collaboration is access to HBP Education's large library of over 400 carefully curated resources specifically designed for use by K-12 students. They include interactive case studies, leadership models, digital proficiency resources, and emotional intelligence software. All such materials are aligned to particular skills and micro-skills, so it is a well-organized but flexible learning process that is compliant with the National Education Policy (NEP). Learners thus acquire corresponding competencies while strengthening their current curriculum.

In addition to acquiring skills, the program aims to bridge the age-old gap between "hard" and "soft" skills in Indian education. Technical competence has so far been given priority over people and leadership skills. The program emphasizes both equally, redefining success in education as a spin-off of overall development.

In conversation with ETNOW.in, Ameet Zaverii, CEO and Co-founder of Get Set Learn, emphasized that the program’s long-term goal is to integrate these resources into school curricula across the country. “We’re not just teaching students to learn—we’re teaching them to lead,” he stated. The partnership aims to reach a broad network of schools, laying the foundation for a scalable model that can be replicated both nationally and globally.

The program's key performance indicators will be student engagement levels, analysis and leadership skill development, educator feedback, and practice skill development through projects and competitions. Ease of integration into existing curricula will also be a success measure.

In the years to come, the program can transform Indian school education from plain rote memorization to active skill-based learning. With more schools implementing this template, it can serve as a model for educational reform that makes Indian students not only educated, but future-ready.