1. STEPPING STONES
ENHANCING THE QUALITY OF PRIMARY EDUCATION IN INDIA
CITIZENS FOR ACCOUNTABLE GOVERNANCE (CAG)
TEAM COORDINATOR:
NITISH KUMAR
TEAM MEMBERS:
ADARSH POTTI, KUMAR ABHISHEK, SAMIR SANTOSH & SHUBHAM SAURABH
COLLEGE:
SIR PADAMPAT SINGHNIA UNIVERSITY, UDAIPUR
2. Four years of basic
education result in
8% increase in farm
production (low
income countries).
Every extra year of
primary education
increases a person’s
productivity by 10 to
30%.
10% increase in girl’s
primary enrolment
decrease infant
mortality by 4.1
deaths/ 1000.
In Latin America during
1980s, the average
duration for completing
one grade was 1.7 years, 32
million repeated grades
causing a wastage of $5.2
billion.
PSEUDO WASTAGE
Only 40% of the teachers
are provided with in-
service Teacher
Education once over a
period of four to five
years
To meet its target of increasing enrolment levels to 15
per cent in 2012, the Eleventh Plan estimates that
India needs to invest ₹ 2,26,410 crore. Yet it has set
aside only ₹ 77,933 crore-just a fourth of the total
needed.
Almost half of the country’s population is
below 25 years. Almost 10 per cent of
them or 12 crore are between the ages of
18 and 23. If they are equipped with both
knowledge and skills, they could drive
India’s entrepreneurial and Competitive
spirit and make it into global power.
Sixty-five out of 100 schools have common
toilets in India; however only one out of
four schools in Arunachal Pradesh, Assam,
Chandigarh, Delhi, Jammu & Kashmir,
Jharkhand, Orissa and Rajasthan have this
facility.
A study found that 65% of
schoolchildren in
Hyderabad slums attend
private schools. This
proves the fact that even
the poorest in India go to
private schools in spite of
the free education in
government schools.
4. • The pupil to teacher ratio in primary school stands for 40.2 and ranked 27th in the world (higher the ratio
lower the rank), fairing lower than countries like China, Iraq, Iran, Sri Lanka, France
• Nearly 25% of primary teachers skip their work with only 50% of teachers are actually engaged in the act
of teaching while at work.
Lack in quantity and quality of teachers for elementary and primary schools
• The total expenditure on primary education by the government stands for USD 57,233,500,000 which
turns out to be 3.2% of the total GNI, which below the countries like France, China, Brazil and Russia.
• Only 68.43% of schools received school development grants (SDG) which accounts for about 10 percent of
the total Sarva Siksha Abhiyaan budget.
Poor policies implementation and less importance given to primary education
• Outdated teaching methodology and lack of proper motivation for students lead to dropout rates as high
as 28.86%.
• Only 68.88% of Teaching Learning Material (TLM) Grant reaches to the teacher in primary education
sector.
Negligence towards teaching methodology and curriculum.
• Only 51.5% of total primary schools registered has conducted a routine medical check-up for the students.
• Various cases of cast based discrimination arises while distribution of mid day meal.
Less importance given to social and mental aspect in the education system
6. Quality we need.Knowledge Imparters
•Whole and sole we require quantity of teachers with quality.
•Quantity because the pupil to teacher ratio need to be brought down to near 30:1, from whopping 40:1 (all over India), the situation is
more worse in rural India (around 60:1).
•Quality because what they impart is what children are going to learn.
An essential.Infrastructure
•As better the infrastructure will be, convenient and lucrative the education.
•Concentration should be more on rural infrastructure for schools as 70% of total population resides in rural area.
•In urban areas there is availability of large number of schools which are run by private organization but they show less interest in rural
India.
A Hawk’s eye.Monitoring
•To check whether the projects initiated, funds released or programme launched by the Government is being implemented in a proper
manner or not.
•It will be responsible to check and prevent any corrupt or illegal activities taking place under the cover.
•Team should be made on District level, so that a good and efficient functioning can take place.
•A common database with daily or weekly update by the concerned official should be made for better tracking of activities and events,
based on which the Annual or Bi- Annual Action Plan can be recommended.
“Imparting
knowledge to a
new generation is
not just a job, it’s
a responsibility.”
7. Need to be revivedCurriculum
•It should be made more and more student centered.
•Emphasis should be given on “Learning by applying.”
•Life skills and peace education should be introduced as a non- evaluating subject.
•Should be designed in such a way that it inculcates the numeracy skills, along with literacy.
A changeoverEvaluation Process
•A strong assessment and grading system need to be developed.
•Under this teacher/ evaluator’s job will not be limited to giving the marks.
•It will be extended to telling what they have done wrong and it’s correct procedure.
•“Graphical Grading Analysis” should be introduced, in which every student’s performance is not marks based but it will be shown in terms
of graph.
Rise above allSocial Structure
•There has been instances where student in primary schools often become the victim of discrimination either on basis of caste, religion or
sex.
•Stringent action should be taken against the officials involved in such activities, on the other hand student should be given “Value
education” to rise above all.
•Concerned higher authority should take care that feeling of discrimination should not get spread among students.
Literacy is the
ability to read and
write one's own
name and further
for knowledge
write coherently,
and think critically
about the written
word.
“Don’t tell they
have done it
wrong, tell them
why & what is
wrong.”
“Roots should
not be fed with
poison of
discrimination.”
8. Everyone respire.Awareness
•Government has taken some really good initiative by launching programmes like ‘Sarv Shiksha Abhiyan’, ‘Mid- Day Meal’ and the
recent one ‘Right to Education’. But the problem that occurred in most of the plans that it didn’t went straight to people for whom it
was meant.
•Hence instead of only restricting up to advertisements on television and banners in cities, there exists a more cost effective and
better way.
•Involve the parents , not only for Parent teacher meeting but also to take part in decisions of local development and action plans.
Agenda for ages.Health & Facilities
•According to UNICEF, India is in the list of those countries which are unable to develop a strong nexus between health and
education.
•Health and education are directly proportional to each other.
•Every school should have a clean environment to study, a regular health check up system.
•The nutrition value of the Mid Day Meal should be as per the minimum value required to develop a healthy child.
•Separate toilets for girls and boys should be made; this will allow girl child to come up and pursue primary education at least.
•Development of good health facilities in schools at primary level will give satisfaction to parent, hence they will be more willing to
send their children.
“There can never be a
better advertiser than
parents. ”
“A healthy mind always
ready to find. ”
10. CLUSTER SYSTEM OF EDUCATION
PROLEMS ADDRESSED
BY THE SYSTEM
•Need of infrastructure
to be developed at a
fast rate.
•Lack of proper
monitoring system
causing a lot of
wastage/
concentration in hands
of few.
•Lack of Community
Development
Programme.
•Lack of proper
distribution of human
resource.
ABOUT THE SYSTEM
•Group of schools that
are geographically as
close and accessible to
each other as possible.
•Consisting of between
five and seven schools.
•One school in each
group is selected to
serve as the cluster
centre.
•Cluster centre should
be as central and
accessible as possible
to its satellite schools,
it should have
adequate facilities and
ideally be situated at a
development centre
where other social and
commercial services
are available.
ADVANTAGES OF THE
SYSTEM
•Greater equity are
achieved between
schools.
•Better channeling of
inputs from advisory
board to teachers.
•All learners will be
exposed to similar
level of testing.
•Teacher absenteeism is
reduced.
•Stationery and
textbook distribution
needn’t follow a long
route.
•Easy collection of
statistics.
•Access to schools for
every child.
•Each cluster school can
work for community
development.
1 Head Office
6 to 8 Regional
Offices
5 to 8 Circuits
per region
5 to 7
Clusters per
circuit
5 to 7
Schools per
cluster
“Schools are
managed more as
networks rather
than as individual
empires’.”
11. Quality Teachers & Trainers
(Knowledge Imparters)
•To develop teaching as one of the main stream career goal, world class institutions has to be made where ‘Teaching’ is
a core subject/ branch.
•Young unemployed/willing students should be given internship opportunity to teach at various cluster school and
share their ideas/ culture with new generation.
•To set up proper channel to provide in-service training to teachers periodically to update them with current scenario.
•Common portal or webinars, where teachers from all over the country should come together to discuss and share
their problems and experience
Curriculum
•An advisory board should be set up and the entire curriculum will be given a changeover. In this emphasis will be given
on displaying data in graphical way, introduction of quotes regarding morals and values in header and footer of the
book page.
•A good space of time will be made available for sports, life skills, value and peace education.
•For making student aware about day to day happenings and building an interest in it, student newspaper will be
brought in role.
•Introduction of modern tools and teaching aids such as small scale models and animation/ videos, accordingly fund
should be released.
•Subjects till 3rd grade should be at most 3 i.e. Elementary Science, one language, Elementary Mathematics.
13. ● Increase in national literacy rate.
● Decrease in the number of dropouts.
● Quality students with strong roots,
leading to improvement in quality of
human resource.
● Decrease in child labor.
● Decrease in amount of crime.
● Decrease in poverty.
● Decrease in infant mortality rate,
yielding better life expectancy.
● Increase in national income and
GDP.
15. • The very first challenge will be the
participation of parents.
• One of the major problem (social) which
lead to many potential children being
underdeveloped.
• What stops them?
• Economic condition of family.
• Old family tradition/ custom
especially in case of girl child.
• Lack of awareness about
importance of education in life.
• From economic point of view the
problem is about sharing the pie.
• It’s not that India is “SUFFERING”
with only problem of Quality
Primary Education, it has many
other un developed sectors.
• The question arises to develop
such a large amount of
infrastructure at a quick rate, How
much share should be given?
• Finally it all come downs to politics
and politicians, as they are the
decision makers.
• It’s a high time that they should think
critically and take some bold step in
regard of this.
• As this is something which creates
base of every thing, whether it’s
corruption, poverty, crime, child
labour, etc.
The ultimate onus lies on ‘We the
people of India’. Things are
simple as follows:
Bring in power by electing the
one who work for betterment of
all not yours.
An able leader, will understand
the need, act and bring changes
accordingly and to everyone’s
surprise the situation will be
much better to speak off.
17. • A healthy, well nourished and free from exploitation violence.
• Awareness about their rights and equal opportunity to realize.
• Being able to protect themselves and develop to their full potential.
• Respect diversity, practice equality and resolve differences with non- violence.
• Learn what they need to learn – for learning throughout life.
“Support them, they will support you.”
18. REFERENCES & ANNEXURES
1. http://www.indianexpress.com/news/report-says-caste-gender-discrimination-rampant/1036207/
2. http://www.unicef.org/india/education.html
3. http://knowledge.wharton.upenn.edu/india/article.cfm?articleid=4438
4. http://forbesindia.com/article/briefing/primary-education-in-india-needs-a-fix/35287/1
5. http://articles.timesofindia.indiatimes.com/keyword/primary-education
6. http://www.thehindu.com/features/education/college-and-university/an-indian-education/article4683622.ece
7. http://targetstudy.com/articles/education-problems-in-india.html
8. http://www.firstpost.com/india/why-the-state-of-indias-primary-education-is-shocking-598011.html
9. http://articles.timesofindia.indiatimes.com/2011-10-11/nagpur/30266261_1_student-enrolment-cluster-schools-schools-and-students
10. http://censusindia.gov.in/Census_And_You/literacy_and_level_of_education.aspx
11. Report of UNICEF on Quality of Primary Education(Global): The Potential to Transform Society into Single Generation.
12. Farm productivity and efficiency in rural Bangladesh: The role of education revisited* by M Niaz Asadullah.
13. School Clusters in the Third World: Making Them Work – UNESCO, UNICEF Co-operative Programme Paris 1987.
14. School Clusters and Teachers Resource Centres by Elizabeth A. Giordano.
15. Primary Education in India by Ajay Deshpande & Sayan Mitra.
16. DISE Analytical Table 2010-’11 by Arun C Kumar.
17. Annual Status of Education Report-Rural 2012 by Pratham.
18. Human Development Report 2010 by United Nations Development Programme.
19. Chapter 2, India Infrastructure Report 2012.
