Thoughts on RightTo Education

7/28/2019 Thoughts on RightTo Education

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Right of Children to Free andCompulsory Education Act-India

Date commenced1 April 2010

SummaryProvides for free andcompulsoryeducation to all childrenof theage of six to fourteenyears


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UNESCO welcomed the historic Right of Children to

Free and Compulsory Education Act, 2009 which

came into force on April 1. Apart from legalizing

the right to education, the act places the onus on

governments and local authorities to provideschools and sets out standards and norms

covering numbers of teachers, training and

curricula. It includes a plan to train more than onemillion new teachers in the next five years and

retrain existing teachers.


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there are an estimated eight million Indian children and young

people between the ages of six to 14 out-of-school, themajority of them girls.

Between 2000 and 2005, primary school enrolment in Indiaincreased by 22.5 per cent overall, and by 31 per cent for girls

alone but despite this leap some 25 per cent of children in2005 left school before reaching Grade 5, and almost halfbefore reaching Grade 8.

Bringing these children, who often belong to disadvantagedgroups such as migrants, child labourers or children with

special needs, into school and retaining them and providingtrained teachers and relevant curricula, will be a major

challenge.

According to UNESCO's 2010 Education forAll Global Monitoring Report


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UNESCO Director-General applauded RTE_A

UNESCO Director-General, Irina Bokova

visited India in January.In her lecture at the Silver Jubilee celebrationsof the Indira Gandhi National Open

University in New Delhi, she applauded the

Government of India's dedication:"Your commitment was recently reinforcedwith the Right of Children to Free and

Compulsory Education Act passed by theparliament last August. This marks ahistoric step that makes education a

fundamental right of every child betweensix and 14."


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Bihar needs 27,000 cr to implement Right toEducation Act: Chief minister Nitish

12 April 2010

Bihar requires Rs 27,000 crore, muchbeyond the states internal resources, toimplement the Right to Education Act in

the first year itself, Chief Minister NitishKumar said on Monday.

The state will require Rs 27,000 croreto implement the Act in Bihar, which isfar beyond its capacity, he told a pressconference in Patna.


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Bihar

Look at the figure, the budgetaryoutlay for Bihar for 2010-11 is Rs53,000 crore Can it be possible tospare Rs 27,000 crore from it, he

said. Nitish Kumar said the Centre owed the

entire responsibility for implementationof the Right to Education Act in thestates.


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Centre should bear financial burden in

implementing Right to Education Act:Mayawati

LUCKNOW: PTI, Apr 3, 2010,

Accusing the Centre of overlookingpractical aspects of implementing the

Right to Education Act, Uttar Pradeshchief minister Mayawati sought fundsfrom the UPA government to enforce

the law.


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Centre should bear financial burden in

implementing Right to Education Act:Mayawati

She said that to implement the Act inUttar Pradesh, Rs 18,000 crore wouldbe needed in one year, of which45%--Rs 8,000 crore--have to bearranged by the state. It would bedifficult for the state to arrange Rs8,000 crore considering its presentfinancial condition, she said.


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The Right to Education Act promises to change the

future of India, but implementing it seems to be ahuge challenge for India.

Consider the situation in Uttar Pradesh, for instance.

The Department of school education and literacy,ministry of human resource development (MHRD)says that UP needs more than 4,596 new primary and2,349 new upper primary schools while over 90,000new classrooms are needed at the infrastructural

front. In terms of teachers, the state needs 3.25 lakh

additional primary teachers while over lakh teachersfor the upper primary level will be needed for thecause. Also, the uphill task involves a recurring grantof around Rs 13,000 crore per annum for five yearsbesides a non-recurring grant of Rs 4,000 crore.


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Kapil Sibal hits back at statesopposing RTE

Education is primarily a state subject and the states

should take more responsibility in providing education tothe children, Sibal said.

"This is a central scheme through which we are trying to

be part of a national endeavour in education. I think the

states will decide what to do on this," Sibal said. The HRD Ministry is pushing for a fund sharing pattern of

55-45 between the Centre and the states for

implementing the Act.

The Finance Commission has already provided Rs 25,000

crore as assistance to the states for the next five years

for meeting requirements of the Act.


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A critique of the Right To Education

Act

The Act is excessively input-focused rather

than outcomes-oriented. Even though better school facilities, books,

uniforms and better qualified teachers are

important, their significance in the Act hasbeen overestimated.

This is in the light of inefficient, corrupt

and unaccountable institutions of educationprovision.


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School Recognition The Act unfairly penalizes private

unrecognized schools for their paymentof market wages for teachers ratherthan elevated civil service wages.

It also penalizes private schools forlacking the infrastructural facilitiesdefined under a Schedule under the Act.

These schools, which are extremely cost

efficient, operate mostly in rural areasor urban slums, and provide essentialeducational services to the poor.


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School Recognition

Independent studies by Geeta

Kingdon, James Tooley and ASER

2009 suggest that these schools

provide similar if not betterteaching services when compared

to government schools, while

spending a much smaller amount.


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School Recognition

However, the Act requires government

action to shut down these schools over thecoming three years. A better alternative would have been to

find mechanisms through which public

resources could have been infused intothese schools. The exemption from these same

recognition requirements for government

schools is the case of double standards with the public sector being exempted fromthe same `requirements.


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School Management Committees (SMCs)

By the Act, SMCs are to comprise of mostly

parents, and are to be responsible forplanning and managing the operations ofgovernment and aided schools.

SMCs will help increase the accountabilityof government schools, but SMCs forgovernment schools need to be givengreater powers over evaluation of teachercompetencies and students learningassessment.


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School Management Committees (SMCs)

Members of SMCs are required to volunteer

their time and effort. This is an onerousburden for the poor. Payment of somecompensation to members of SMCs could

help increase the time and focus uponthese.

Turning to private but `aided schools, thenew role of SMCs for private `aidedschools will lead to a breakdown of theexisting management structures.


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Teachers

A better mechanism would have

involved schools being allowed todesign their own teacher salarypackages and having autonomy to

manage teachers. A major problem in India is the lack of

incentive faced by teachers either interms of carrot or stick. In the RTE Act,proper disciplinary channels forteachers have not been defined.


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Teachers

Such disciplinary action is a must

given that an average of 25 percentteachers are absent from schools atany given point and almost half ofthose who are present are not engaged

in teaching activity. School Management Committees need to

be given this power to allow speedydisciplinary action at the local level.

Performance based pay scales need to beconsidered as a way to improve teaching.


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25% reservation in private schools

The Act and the Rules require all private

schools (whether aided or not) to reserveat least 25% of their seats for economicallyweaker and socially disadvantaged sections

in the entry level class. These students willnot pay tuition fees. Private schools willreceive reimbursements from thegovernment calculated on the basis of per-

child expenditure in government schools.


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Greater clarity for successfulimplementation is needed on:

How will `weaker and disadvantaged

sections be defined and verified? How will the government select these

students for entry level class?

Would the admission lottery beconducted by neighbourhood or byentire village/town/city? How would

the supply-demand gaps in eachneighbourhood be addressed?


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clarity for implementation

What will be the mechanism for

reimbursement to private schools? How will the government monitor the

whole process? What type of external

vigilance/social audit would beallowed / encouraged on the process?

What would happen if some of these

students need to change school inhigher classes?


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Moreover, the method for calculation of per-childreimbursement expenditure (which is to exclude

capital cost estimates) will yield an inadequateresource flow to private schools.

It will be tantamount to a tax on private schools.

Private schools will end up charging more to the75% of students who are paying tuitions tomake space for the 25% of students they are

forced to take.This will drive up tuition fees for private schools

(while government schools continue to betaxpayer funded and essentially free).

Reimbursement calculations should include capitalas well recurring costs incurred by thegovernment.


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Terms for private unaided schools

By dictating the terms of payment, the

government has reserved the right to fix itsown price, which makes private unaidedschools resent this imposition of a flat price.

A graded system for reimbursement wouldwork better, where schools are grouped based on infrastructure, academicoutcomes and other quality indicators into different categories, which would thendetermine their reimbursement.


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What is to be done?

The RTE Act has been passed; the

Model Rules have been released;financial closure appears in hand.

Does this mean the policy process isnow impervious to change?

Even today, much can be achieved

through a sustained engagement withthis problem

Thoughts on RightTo Education

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