Do not portray low scorers as unsuccessful students or failures: ASCI

Advertising industry's self-regulatory body ASCI on Tuesday announced tweaks in its guidelines for educational bodies' campaigns, asking them to refrain from stereotyping low scoring students as unsuccessful or failures.

"While fierce pressure in education is a reality, advertising must not perpetuate this problem, normalise it or exploit student and parental vulnerability," Advertising Standards Council of India (ASCI) secretary general and chief executive Manisha Kapoor said.

The body said it has made the changes following a consultative process, and the guidelines seek to focus on students' mental health and physical well-being.

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Educational institutions, including universities, colleges and schools, coaching classes and edtech platforms need to comply with the revised guidelines, as per an official statement.

In FY23, classical education ranked second among the top violative categories with 13.8 per cent of total ads that did not adhere to ASCI's guidelines.

Education sector advertisers should not "stereotype students based on their gender, or appearance, nor portray those who score low as unsuccessful or failures", body has suggested.

"While an advertisement may show disappointment with low scores, it must not portray an average or poor scorer as an unsuccessful student or a failure, or show him/ her/them as demotivated, depressed or unhappy, or receiving less love or appreciation from parents, teachers or peers," the body has said.

Also, they should not show school students compromising on sleep or meals to study as this normalises unhealthy habits which are detrimental to student health, the revised guidelines say.

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Campaigns must not create a false sense of urgency or fear of missing out that could accentuate anxieties amongst school students, or their parents, it said.

They should not suggest that certain subjects are associated with particular genders alone, or that students with high scores are always associated with stereotypical characteristics such as wearing thick glasses, ASCI said.

"The ASCI guidelines address the various issues that plague the sector and we hope that the industry will follow these in letter and spirit," secretary in the Ministry of Consumer Affairs Rohit Kumar Singh said.