Ludhiana: The initiative to introduce four streams under the Schools of Applied Learning (SoAL), a pilot project of the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) govt in Punjab , has come to a screeching halt. Senior officials have informed the school authorities that the project would now be implemented in the next academic session 2025-26. The SoAL project, based on the motto of ‘School to Work’, introduced four new streams — banking, financial services and insurance (BFSI); beauty and wellness; healthcare sciences and services (HSS); and digital designing and development (DDD) — for the students of Classes XI and XII, as a part of vocational education .
In Ludhiana, each of the four schools: GSSS PAU, GSSS Hambran, GSSS Dhandhari Khurd and GSSS Sahnewal, which were selected for the project offered two streams. Around 182 students had registered for these new streams this year, but all in vain. At GSS PAU, 27 students had registered for DDD course and 21 for BSFI.
At GSSS Hambran, 31 students had registered for BSFI and 11 for HSS. Meanwhile, at GSSS Sahnewal, 30 students wanted to go with HSS and 22 students hoped to learn BSFI. At GSSS Dhandari Khurd, 20 opted for DDD and 20 students opted for beauty and wellness stream.
Notably, 40 schools in the state were selected under the pilot project and around 2,000 students were expected to be admitted in the first batch. A training camp was held for 40 principals of selected schools in Jan and orientation training workshops were held for 73.