Education

What you see in the picture above is not just a classroom. This houses an entire school from first grade to seventh grade with 27 students right in the heart of Mysuru city. A few years back this government school had over 300 students. Since 2005 Pratham’s Annual Survey of Education reports (ASER) have been showing dreadful learning performance of our future generation every year. Every one knows that the emperor has no clothes, but we are not ready to implement the needed reforms. India's education sector, for all practical purposes, has collapsed. Ironically, at a time when we want…

Read more

Ravi, all of five, frowns when he is asked which medium he would opt for in his government school. "English, of course," he says firmly. It is a "wish" echoed by all the small boys and girls near him though it stirs fire and brimstone in high circles far away. The February 2019-20 budget session has announced that 1,000 Karnataka Public Schools will start English-medium sections in Class 1, in addition to the Kannada medium. This is in spite of the angry reactions to the 2018-19 budget pilot project plan that aimed to introduce English medium in 2019 for 1,000 lower primary classes, selected…

Read more

Atishi Marlena's soft smiles belie the steely timbre in her voice when she speaks of issues. She is the point-person for education and has made it a central electoral plank for the fledgeling Aam Aadmi Party governing Delhi. Though she was "dismissed" as advisor to the Education Minister Manish Sisodia by the Centre in April 2018, she had by then spearheaded eight key projects, calling for 120 meetings - almost eight per week - since the beginning of the year. Atishi was christened 'Marlena' as a fusion of 'Marx' and 'Lenin' by her leftist Delhi University professor parents, though she recently dropped…

Read more

On January 13 2019, the President gave his nod and brought into law The Constitution (One Hundred and Twenty Fourth Amendment) Bill 2019. The Act amends Articles 15 and Article 16 of the Constitution, and adds clauses where the government can make special provisions for economically weaker sections (EWS) of citizens and provide them with reservations up to 10 percent in higher educational institutions including private aided or unaided institutions (other than minority education institutions) as well as in initial appointments in government services. In popular parlance, this is being bandied as 'upper-caste reservation.' Reservations or quotas, the dominant mode of…

Read more

Sushil was attending 10th standard at the school in his village, when his parents decided to move to a city. They had found seasonal work in a brick kiln there. Sushil’s only option was to move to the kiln site and work alongside his parents. He had given up hopes of completing high school education, when he realised that other child labourers at the kiln were going to a ‘classroom’ located within the site. This learning centre was set up by Aide et Action, an NGO that works for the education of migrant children. Sushil attended classes there, and later,…

Read more

Priti, a Class VII student at an aided school in Bengaluru, hoists a schoolbag that looks like a ton of bricks on her back. She flares up when told that the central government has recommended reduction in the weight of schoolbags. "Oh, really?" she asks, indignantly. "Then why didn't our teacher tell us about it, and why am I carrying so many textbooks, pencil boxes, art material, sports equipment, bottles and boxes?" A cursory examination of her schoolbag reveals the list that she blurted out. There were not just books, but many extraneous materials that did not appear really useful.…

Read more

Right To Education (RTE) helpline (1800 4253 4567) was launched recently by the  Social Welfare Department of Karnataka, which allows one to lodge complaints and get information on the Act. The Executive Director of the Child Rights Trust, Vasudeva Sharma, spoke to RadioActive about how the helpline could be used effectively. Vasudeva Sharma explained that the RTE Act had been introduced way back in 2009 in Karnataka, and a lot of calls used to be received by the Child Rights Trust members on their personal numbers seeking clarifications. Even though there were no instructions available regarding RTE at that time,…

Read more

Lakshmi works as a domestic help with a few families in Bengaluru. Her daughter during the academic year 2018-2019 had been admitted to LKG in a private school through the Right to Free and Compulsory Education (RTE) Act 2009, section 12(1)(c). The Act promises 25 percent reservation in private unaided schools for weaker sections and disadvantaged groups. Lakshmi chose to avail this choice as she felt that in government schools, children are left to themselves and aren't provided adequate attention. She says that she wants to educate her daughter, and felt private school was the best option. There are several…

Read more

Youth Speak Summit 2018, a collaborative initiative of the U.S. Consulate General, Chennai and NalandaWay Foundation, is a two-day conference that will bring together young people from various spheres in one platform to learn, share, and inspire change. The summit will take place December 1-2, 2018 at the Madras Management Association Centre, Anna Salai, Chennai. The summit will comprise curated talks, panel discussions, workshops, contests, and art by some of the most inspiring minds in the country. The sessions will include talks by youth icons, discussions on issues, storytelling by young change-makers, clinics for counseling, panel discussions, human library, workshops, skill sharing sessions, and much…

Read more

Can you drop an egg three storeys down without breaking it? Eager young children from schools across the Chennai grappled with this challenge as part of a science camp where they were provided a simple kit with which they could use the elements present to prevent the egg from breaking. Twelve-year old Aniket Tadepalli fashioned a contraption out of cardboard that managed to keep the egg intact. “The egg drop challenge is one of the many activities that we have done as part of camps. It was very exciting because we were not provided any instructions. We had to figure…

Read more