2. 58% of children do not complete primary education in India
According to the Annual Status of Education Report (ASER) 2012,
10 crore children in India are two or more years below their grade level
As of 2012, only 30% of standard three students could read a
standard 1 text a drop from 50% in 2009
The ASER report also estimates that only 50% of rural children enrolled
in standard five can fluently read a standard two text book
40% of standard five students in rural India cannot solve simple two-
digit subtractions.
Q
U
I
C
K
F
A
C
T
S
3. Hurdles are STEPPING STONES to success
• Lack of Infrastructure.
• Lack of the number of teachers. Currently the ratio is 59 kids/teacher
• Private interests of teacher especially in places where tuitions are prominent
• Lack of qualified teachers: Over 99 percent of the 7.95 lakh teachers who appeared for the
latest Central Teacher Eligibility Test, a benchmark for teacher eligibility, failed to clear the
exam.
• Social challenges: Preference to get child employed over education
• Even the children going to school are not able to perform as per the standard that they are
in; Using ASER figures, we estimate that over 100 million children in India are two or more
years below their grade level
• Insufficient leverage of RTE Act
4. Steps so Far
• Right of Children to Free and Compulsory Education Act 2009
• National Programme for Nutritional Support (Mid-day Meal)
• Mahila Samakhya – In line with National Policy on Education, 1986
• National Programme for Education of Girls at Elementary Level (NPEGEL)
• Sarva shikshya abhiyaan – Education for all
• Scheme to Provide Quality Education in Madrasas
• District Primary Education Programme
• Scheme for Infrastructure Development in Minority Institutes (IDMI)
5. Public versus private education
Observations
• Illustrates the wretched condition of public education in rural areas
• The gap has just widened with years
Possible reasons
• Even rural people prefer private schools than government schools
• Unwillingness to teach, for government teachers
• Deep rooted job security factor
• Children going to school only for mid-day meal
6. Solutions
Special training for government teachers, especially rural postings
NREGA only for those parents who send their kids to school
Interactive lessons taught through video classrooms
Monetary benefits for rural postings, to motivate teachers
Biometric attendance of teachers on hourly basis, to avoid absenteeism
7. Public Private Partnership
Private companies can extend their hand for educating students in both rural as well as
urban areas
Private players have the skill set and possibly the motives to educate children to create
future employees and potential customers.
Government can provide them cheap land and infrastructure, which can be used to
provide the technical know-how with sufficient proficiency in Verbal and Quantitative
Abilities to serve as employees in lower cadre jobs of these firms.
8. CSR Initiatives
• Vidyadhanam – CSR initiative of Tata Motors:
Provides Scholarship programme, Extra-coaching classes for weak students,
Infrastructure development
• Maitree – CSR initiative of TCS (the Asian CSR award)
Adoption of various schools like Immadahalli school, Bangalore
• Distribution of Study materials – Cognizant
• Infosys foundation
• Women of Wipro (WOW)
• Services related to CSR sector from E-choupal, ITC
9. Role of NGOs
• Teach For India (TFI) is an Indian non-profit organization, which is a part of the Teach For All global
movement.
• Through its Fellowship program, TFI recruits qualified Indian college graduates and working professionals
to serve as full-time teachers in low-income schools for two years.
• Through the 'Teaching as Leadership' framework, Teach For India staff provides training and support to
Fellows so that they can employ innovative teaching strategies to maximize their effectiveness in the
classroom.
• Largest NGO working to provide quality education to the underprivileged children of India.
• Pratham was established in 1994 to provide pre-school education to the children in the slums of Mumbai
city. Since then, the organization has grown both in scope and geographical coverage.
• Today, they reach out to millions of children living in both rural and urban areas.
• Teach India is a Corporate Social Responsibility initiative by Bennett Coleman & Co Ltd.
• The main objective of the program is to improve employability of youth from underprivileged background
by training them in spoken English.
10. Timeline
Automatic
enrollment in
schools as soon as
a birth certificate
is registered
Primary School in
every village with
a population of
more than 2000
people.
Digitization of all
the schools in
urban area and
technological shift
in the mode of
education provided
in rural area2015
2017
2020
12. References
• Towards a Knowledge Society, National Knowledge Commission India, 2008
• Skill Development in India, Vocational Education and Training System , Human
• Development Unit, World Bank 2006
• ASER 2012 (Rural) Findings
• The eighth Annual Status of Education Report (ASER 2O12)
• Enrollment and Learning Report Card, ASER 2012
• Teach for India. (2012). India’s Education Crisis
• Kumar, Pramod G.: Why the State of India’s Primary Education is Shocking?
• Index Mundi. (2013). India demographics profile
• Financial Express. (2012, May 12). Education’s Primary Problems
• Balasubramanian, Sriram (2013, May 27). Primary Education in India needs a fix. Forbes India
