Basic reading ability pathetic though enrolment in schools shows rise in india

Updated on: Monday, January 21, 2013

According to Pratham Foundation's Annual Status of Education Report 2012, Although enrolment in schools across the country is increasing, a bigger crisis in India's education system seems to be persisting, as only very few children of Class V are able to read Class II texts and work out simple math sums.

In 2012, 96.5% of children from rural areas in this age group were enrolled in school. This is the fourth consecutive year that the country has experienced enrolment levels 96% or more.

For the fourth consecutive year, eenrolment levels for the 6-14 age group continues to be high in rural areas across India.

Ironically, 46% of Class V students are not able to solve simple maths problems across the nation.

Across the country, the number of Class V students who could not read a Class II level text or solve a simple arithmetic problem has increased. In 2010, 46.3% of kids in this category failed to cross the mark and this shot up to 51.8% in 2011 and 53.2% in 2012.
The number of 6-14 year-olds enrolled in private schools has jumped from 18.7% in 2006 to 28.3% in 2012 and is estimated to reach 50% in the next 10 years.

According to the survey, more children in rural India are getting enrolled in private schools equipped with better infrastructure like toilets, drinking water facilities and mid-day meals than their government-run counterparts.

The findings seem to confirm a growing lag between even modest private schools and government-run institutions often hamstrung by neglect and low teacher proficiency.

Accepting the fact that private schooling was making it's way, HRD minister M M Pallam Raju said that he will not grudge this current trend. the foremost thing that our kids need to get educated. If it is in private schools, so be it. The government run schools will try and match up to those conditions.

He also added that the focus of the 12th plan was on raising standards of quality in teaching and faculty.

The state of Tamil Nadu is getting closer to attaining 100% enrolment, but the reading and arithmetic skills of students continue to remain pathetic, the report stated.

In rural areas, children are joining school much earlier than they ought to with nearly 25% of three year-olds in the state attend kindergarten, while 54% of four year-olds go to LKG or UKG. In 2011, only 14.3% of five-year-old children were attending kindergarten.

Tamil Nadu revealed further improvement in student enrolment compared to last year, with the percentage of children not in school decreasing from 0.9% in 2011 to 0.6% in 2012.

Basic reading ability pathetic though enrolment in schools shows rise in india

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