Poor quality of Education in

Government schools- an analysis

Dhirendra Mishra- dhir.world@yahoo.co.in
Poornima Institute of Engineering and
Technology, Jaipur

Quality of Education involves a whole set of issues which need to be addressed:

what is the expectation of a student, of a parent and of a nation, of its young ones? What do
we expect our children to be as they grow up? What kind of learning should they embrace?
Should learning continue to be a one way process, where the teachers provide the answers,
and the children merely absorb the answers; or, should the process of learning be more
interactive, participatory and experiential? It is the high time for us to think about the quality
of learning that lays the foundation for minds that are free of prejudice. We need to lay the
foundations of children’s minds that like to fly, to dream and mind of a genius that needs to
flower. Are we allowing our school education system to move in that direction, where the
minds of our young ones are free to question, free to take a flight, free to seek answers and
perhaps to provide them? And if our education structure in sync with those goals, we need to
ask ourselves whether the education system that is prevalent today, is the best way of
imparting education to our child?

The story of India’s educational achievements is one of mixed success. On the down side,
India has 22 per cent of the world’s population but 46 per cent of the world’s illiterates, and
is home to a high proportion of the world’s out of school children and youth. On the positive
side, it has made encouraging recent progress in raising schooling participation, while the
base of India’s education pyramid may be weak. The government have realized that to
achieve the goal of literacy missions, it is important to mobilize and motivate people in
rural areas. Under the Sarva Siksha Abhiyan, the government have opened 2.88 lakh schools
and that 98 per cent of our habitations have primary schools within a distance of one
kilometre. But, what happens as the children move up? What about the drop-out rates? Why
the dropouts? Is it enough to have primary schools in our 98 per cent habitations? Every
child, even if born and brought up on the streets, learns to walk on his own, feel, and to
speak. Is that our government’s goal, or, is education much more than that?

If children are bored of learning in schools and feel like abandoning their studies, it
should make us look at the formal education system more critically. Although, it is not easy
to convince teachers to give up old styles of functioning. To cultivate an atmosphere where
teachers implement new teaching styles, the original training will need to be followed up with
‘boosters’. Their experiences will need to be recognised and their doubts and problems
addressed. Examinations will have to be redesigned to support these curricular changes. The
root cause for the declining interest of students for education in government school is
traditionally followed pattern of learning. The absence of qualified and regular school
teachers; who neither motivates students in the right direction of their prosperity nor they
seek their duty with full dedication. The load of non-teaching work and administrative
demands that de-motivate government school teachers should be re-examined seriously.
These challenges are well worth overcoming if we
want to provide a more lively and critical education
to our children.
The role of information technology in each
and every field is being reflected by their increased
output and marginal input of efforts. This applies
here also; the knowledge with computer and
internet will make students of happenings across the
world.

A set of strategies and techniques can be used that

includes the use of pictures, maps and diagrams,
original historical evidences and structured
discussions for imparting education in government
schools. The motive behind all these is to make
learning ahead of mere gaining of information
towards the acquisition of skills. The textbooks
must be redesigned so that questions inserted in the
text evokes curiosity and at the same time invite reflection and analysis. The language must
be simple and readable. The use of many interesting pictures, ranging from imperial Mughal
paintings to contemporary photographs, is an important aspect of learning materials, and
provides a new dimension to learning resources in the social sciences. These efforts will
construct new knowledge and actively relate to it.

The need of the time is dependent on the efficient execution of ideas and concepts of
government as well as the non-government educational bodies, which are directly or indirectly laying
their hands for common cause. The involvement of the public sector would contribute towards
standardisation of the level of education in each institution. If a certain community or government
schools have more funds at its disposal than the others, and hence is the most coveted institution, the
Government could correct the discrepancy by investing more funds in the other institutions. Like all
businesses, the business will try to cater to the needs of the customers, i.e. the parents (the ones who
make the purchase decision) and the children (the users of the product). This will ensure that students
who find school boring have a chance to explain why, and what changes they would like in the
classroom. Such a model would ensure that a collective effort is made to make education more
purposeful and interactive.
“If it’s about the future of a small kid, then every question must be answered”