Time to repair the education system

Tue, 22 Apr Pre-Open

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Education is the pillar of any nation's success. Technological advancements and scientific inventions depend on it. Also, quality education lays the foundation of an individual. It creates technical skill sets required for employment. But when it comes to assessing the quality of education in India the results are expectedly not so good.

No doubt, with the Right to Education (RTE) in place the number of enrolments has gone up in the recent past. But when it comes to quality, challenges continue to persist. Fathom this. As per research by one agency, 53% of the class 5 students in India are not able to read even a class 2 text! This depicts the failure of our education system. Just filling benches for the sake of increasing enrolments is creating a false sense of belief that we are educating the youth of India. The truth is that a poor Indian citizen has remained aloof from good quality education since ages.

As such, there is a strong need to revamp the education system in India. As per an article in Mint, this can be done by offering quality education to masses. Quality education can come through teacher education reforms. Thus, we need to have large teacher training facilities across the country to improve their teaching quality. Setting up institutes across states can help as well.

Another area which needs focus is integration of the syllabus. Currently, the Indian syllabus does not focus on employable skills at the schooling level. However, in the long run this matters the most. Further, bringing in the private public partnership (PPP) model is also required. We all know that the quality of education in government school is poor. And since most people cannot afford expensive education offered in private schools, the government needs to take steps and rope in private expertise in public schools. Agreed this would increase the burden on the government.

However, we believe such expenditure to build a nation is worth it. We know that the government is already buried under the subsidy burden. And a higher education cost would further increase the government's burden. However, it may be noted that expenditure on subsidies makes people dependent (poor know they shall receive external support) while the one on education will help the individual to fend for himself. Quality education to poor will help them change their lives for themselves. This shall automatically reduce government's burden.

While very few political parties have stressed the need of quality education in their manifestos, we believe it is a big risk facing the Indian economy currently. If the education system in India is not overhauled, India's dream to become a world super power may not materialize in the future.