From Preschool to PhD: How PEN Will Transform Indian Education

Permanent Education Number, also known as PEN is a distinctive identification number allocated to students by the Union Ministry of Education. PEN is used to streamline the academic records and progress of the students throughout their education.Through PEN, managing and tracking the students' academic standing becomes smooth despite changes in their schools or programmes.

The School Education Department in Madhya Pradesh has mandated the use of Permanent Education Number (PEN) from the academic year 2024-25. PEN is assigned to students through the Unified District Information System for Education Plus (UDISE) portal. This portal covers more than 14.89 lakh schools, 95 lakh teachers and almost 26.5 crore students.

The Commissioner, Andhra Pradesh School Education, S. Suresh Kumar said that “The implementation of PEN would pave the way for streamlining and simplifying the process of the students’ transition from one school to the other in the new academic year.” In addition to this, Uttar Pradesh Board (UP Board) has made it compulsory for Class 9 and Class 11 students to provide their Permanent Education Number for the academic year 2025 and onwards.

Benefits and Importance of Permanent Education Number (PEN)

It is crucial for each student to have a PEN number as it makes it hassle-free for them to centralise and streamline their academic records. Some of the perks and benefits of having a PEN permanent number are as follows:

• Permanent Education Number or PEN is unique to each student.
• Permanent PEN helps students streamline their academic records throughout their life.
• PEN follows the students through different schools, boards, colleges and even universities.
• It makes maintaining academic records of each student hassle-free, smooth, accurate and consistent.
• Permanent Education Number reduces paperwork and duplication.

How is APAAR different from PEN?

Permanent Education Number (PEN) is a component of APAAR (Automated Permanent Academic Account Registry). While Permanent Education Number is a student ID number, APAAR is a student's academic passport which contains the academic records, certifications, scholarships and student’s unique PEN number as one digital account.

In addition to this, APAAR is issued by the Ministry of Education, Government of India, while PEN is generated as a part of the APAAR process. Interestingly, Automated Permanent Academic Account Registry is a part of National Education Policy and DigiLocker, however, Permanent Education Number is a component of APAAR itself.