User talk:Abdul Raqib Ahmad

Elementary Education in India
Elementary Education:

The national Policy on Education envisages that free and compulsory education of satisfactory quality should be provided to all children up to the age of 14 years before the commencement of 21st century. The target of universalising elementary education has been divided into three broad parameters i.e. universal access, universal retention and universal achievement during the Eighth Five year Plan.

As a result of the efforts made by the Central government and State governments, 94 per cent of country’s rural population have Primary schools within one km and 84 per cent have upper primary schools within three km. This has resulted in: (i) Enrolment of children of 6-14 years of age in primary and upper primary schools has gone up steadily since independence to 87 and 50 per cent respectively; (ii) Significant improvements have taken place in enrolment of girls and SCs/STs; and (iii) number of primary and upper primary schools have gone up from 2.23 lakh in 1950-51 to 7.75 lakh in 1996-97. Accordingly the number of teachers in primary and upper primary schools has also gone up from 6.24 lakh to 30.84 lakh during this period.

The Central and State governments have over a period of time, evolved strategies to check drop-out rates and improve levels of achievements in the schools the key elements of which include : (i) Creating parental awareness and community mobilisation; (ii) involvement of communities and PRls (73rd and 74th Constitutional Amendments); (iii) economic incentives; (iv) improvement in the content and process of schooling Minimum levels of learning); (v) District primary Education Programme initiative; and (vi) national Programme of nutritional Support to Primary Education (Mid-day Meals Scheme.

The 83rd Constitutional Amendment Bill has been introduced in the Rajya Sabha to make the right to elementary education a fundamental right and a fundamental duty. A Group of experts on educational finance set up to examine the requirement of additional resources to make education compulsory for the 6-14 year old children has since submitted its report which is under examination. The national Elementary Education Mission has been set up. A national Committee of State Education Ministers has been set up under the Chairmanship of the Minister of Human Resource Development to develop the structure and outline of implementing Universalisation of Elementary Education in a mission mode.

An attempt at competency-based learning has been made. The Minimum Level of learning (MLL) was introduced in many states over the last six years and this has led to the development of better textbooks cum workbooks, supplementary reading materials, Teachers’ Handbooks and better systems of pupil evaluation. The Government is now trying to extend the MLL approach to the upper primary stage.

The Central Government plays an important role in funding plan expenditure on elementary education, ninety-seven per cent of the expenditure incurred by State governments on Education sector goes towards the payment of teachers’ salaries. The expansion of the school system and the quality initiatives in elementary education have been possible on account of increased resource availability even during a phase of structural adjustment.

India is one of the few developing countries which have not allowed the expenditure on education to shrink during the reform period. The increase in expenditure on elementary education alone over the last three Five Year Plan period has been more than the increase in expenditure on Education as a whole. Forty-eight per cent of the Central Plan was spent on Elementary Education in the Eighth Plan. There are substantial variations between states in terms of per capita expenditure on education. Abdul Raqib Ahmad (talk) 07:53, 27 November 2016 (UTC)