The Hindu : Karnataka / Bangalore News : One step forward, two steps back?

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Tuesday, Aug 14, 2007
ePaper

Karnataka

Karnataka - Bangalore

One step forward, two steps back?

A.R. Vasavi

Bangalore: A mixed record of innovative programmes contained within a complex system of administrative structures and institutions characterises elementary education in Karnataka. Although the State holds the promise of emerging as a model for the rest of the nation, yet several unaddressed issues and structures retain the State in conditions of mediocrity.

The literacy rate in the State increased from 46 per cent in 1981 to 67 per cent in 2001 (Dakshina Kannada is the leader with 88 per cent literacy and Raichur at the other end with just 48 per cent literacy).

Problems

Overcoming the laxity of the 1980s, elementary education has made gains in terms of infrastructure development, access to schools within one km of any settlement, and the introduction of several innovative programmes. But these gains have not made for overcoming the entrenched problems of regional imbalances in ensuring total enrolment and lack of quality in the teaching-learning programmes.

Most of these problems are reflected in the fact that large numbers of children in the north-eastern districts (Raichur, Gulbarga, Bidar, Bijapur), tribal or Adivasi areas, and in the urban poverty areas are out of school, thereby making themselves available as child labour.

Of the total of school-going age children (6-14 years) in the State, 11 per cent are out of school.

The establishment of a separate directorate for the north-eastern districts has not resolved the problems of adequate administrative support and monitoring.

In the Adivasi areas, the ashramshalas are run by the Department of Tribal Welfare. With classes only up to fifth standard in the ashramshalas, many children are unable to attend higher classes and are, therefore, out of school.

Review and assessments conducted by the Government of Karnataka and by private organisations indicate children’s learning levels to be below average with serious inadequacies in the basic academic competencies of children in all classes.

The absence of an elementary education policy largely accounts for the haphazard ways in which programmes are developed and implemented.

Several of the institutions of the department such as the State Department of Education Research and Training (DSERT), the District Institutes of Education and Training (DIETs), and the block and cluster resource centres need to be revamped to enable them to emerge as synergetic academic centres that can cater to State and district specific requirements.

Textbooks have been developed and revised periodically by the department, yet remain of poor quality.

Recent trends indicate the engagement of the DSERT with several private foundations and groups, and yet there is limited transparency in the impact of the programmes of these public-private partnerships, and how they are integrated into the system.

Elementary education receives significant attention by the State Government, yet the requisite processes of constant review and monitoring is inadequate. The failure of the State to sustain the School Development and Monitoring Committees, set up as structures of decentralised administration, has led to weakening the contributions of the community to schooling. Although the State has a specialised cadre of education administrators (Karnataka Education Service), their contributions and potential remain largely untapped and their work is continuously marginalised with the dominance of Centre-led programmes and activities.

Addressing these multiple problems of policy, administrative and institutional orientation and performance will enable the State to emerge as a front-runner in education development and services. For a State that claims to be on the cutting edge of a globalised economy and society, the least that it can do is assure its child citizens an adequate and holistic elementary education programme.

(A.R.Vasavi is a sociologist, and professor at the National Institute of Advanced Studies, Bangalore)

Printer friendly page
Send this article to Friends by E-Mail

Karnataka