Quality of Education needs to be improved in Rural India Says ASER

Oleh Edosy

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The Annual status of Education Report (ASER) 2010 has conducted an annual survey of children in Rural India and the Report was released by Vice President Hamid Ansari in the Capital.ASER praised Bihar for Student enrollment and the percentage of out of school boys and girls has been declining since 2005.

Among its key findings, 5.9 percent girls in the age group of 11-14 were out of school in 2010 nationwide. This percentage has come down compared to 6.8 percent in 2009.More girls in the 11-14 age group joined school in rural India in 2010 and more five-year-olds too, but the quality of education, especially in reading and maths, remained low. The percentage of Class 1 children who can recognize numbers 1-9 has decreased.

The Annual Status of Education Report (ASER)

Earlier in 2006, 12.3 percent boys and 17.6 percent girls in the age group of 11-14 were out of school. But the number came down sharply. By 2010, the number dipped to 4.4 percent for boys and 4.6 percent for girls in Bihar. It also found an increase in the enrolment of five year olds in school. It increased from 54.9 percent in 2009 to 62.8 percent in 2010.

There has also been an increase in enrolment in private schools – from 21.8 percent in 2009 to 24.3 percent in 2010.However, as far as the quality of education is concerned, reading and math ability of children have hardly shown any improvement.ASER report also said, “Even after five years in school, close to half of all children are not even at the level expected of them after two years in school. Only 53.4 percent children in Class 5 could read a Class 2 level text.”

Similarly, on average there has been a decrease in children’s ability to do simple maths. The proportion of Class 1 children who could recognize numbers from 1-9 declined from 69.3 percent in 2009 to 65.8 percent in 2010.and the report also found that over 60 percent of 13,000 schools visited had satisfying infrastructure as specified by the Right to Education Act.

“For rural India as a whole, children’s attendance shows no change over the period 2007-2010. Attendance remained at around 73 percent during this period. But there is considerable variation across states”. “The focus is still on enrolment, not retention and quality learning. No number of ASER reports can make a difference without policy backing to improve the quality of education.