After the R T E Act it is now an enforceable right in India.

1. EDUCATE
THE CHILD
INDIA IS LEADER NOW

2. A Right to Quality Education Act is needed
now
• Ensuring learning is important.
• Efforts be focused back to RTEA core
intent instead of allowing the authorities to
impose extraneous conditions on schools.
• Was it true that the low-fee private
schools produced higher learning
outcomes among children at less than 20
per cent of the per student cost of
government schools?

3. A District Information System for Education (DISE) looks
into several quality related parameters like student-
classroom ratio, teacher-pupil ratio, teachers’ profiles and
examination results.
In addition, Government of India, with the help of NCERT,
has operationalised a quarterly monitoring system in the
form of Quality Monitoring Tools (QMTs) to monitor quality
aspects such as student attendance, teacher availability in
schools, classroom practices, student learning
achievement, academic supervision

4. DISE data show that between 2010 and 2014,
total enrollment in government elementary
schools fell by 1.16 crore students while total
enrollment in private school increased by1.85
crore students.
In 2014-15, there were nearly 97,000
government schools in India with a total
enrolment of 20 or fewer students. Is it true?

6. Ecosystem creation for greater private involvement
needed. Finally, along with ensuring implementation of the
RTE Act which stipulates
 focused reforms in government schools and regulation
for private schools, we need
 to broaden our vision so as to create an ecosystem
conducive to spontaneous private involvement.
 Do the current licensing and regulatory restrictions in
the education sector discourage well-intentioned
`edupreneurs’ from opening more schools?

7. Free and compulsory education to all children is now a
Fundamental Right in India . It is also the focus of the World
Declaration on ‘Education for All’, adopted nearly 25 years
ago. The World Education Forum, in 2000, reiterated the
commitment of the global community and approved a set of
goals in the areas of early childhood care in education,
primary education, gender, youth and adolescent, adult
education. India prepared a National Plan of Education
(2002) delineating various programmes and strategies for
achieving various Education for All (EFA) Goals.

8. India prepared a National Plan of Education (2002) with
programmes and strategies for achieving Education for All
(EFA) Goals. The mid- term assessment of progress of EFA
goals, undertaken in 2005, underscored the concern for
equity and inclusion. India, undoubtedly, has made
substantial progress towards achieving EFA goals during
the last two decades. Adoption of Right of Children to
Free and Compulsory Education Act (RTE), 2009 has given
further impetus to the national efforts for ensuring quality
education for all in a time- bound manner.

9. Universal Elementary Education
• Programme for universalisation of primary
education is the Sarva Shiksha Abhiyan (SSA).
• The overall goals of the SSA are: (i) all children
in schools; (ii) bridging all gender and social
category gaps at primary and upper primary
stages of education (iii) universal retention; and
(iv) elementary education of satisfactory quality.

10. The RTE Act confers a permanent right to free and
compulsory education of equitable quality on the children
of India. It is, therefore, necessary to put in place systems
and mechanisms for a shift from the SSA project-based
approach to RTE. An appropriate governance structure
for RTE must naturally follow from the imperatives of
implementation of the various provisions of the Act and
take into account the strengths and weaknesses of SSA.
All children in the neighborhood, be enrolled and attending
school regularly.

11. Progress towards universal retention: Data relating to
drop-out rates indicate that during the period 2000-01 to
2008-09, the over-all drop-out rate for Classes I-V declined
by 15.8 percentage points. The drop-out rate for Classes I-
VIII has declined by 11.4 percentage points during this
period. There has been a steady decline in dropout rates in
primary education since 2009-10. Between 2009-10 and
2012-13, the annual average drop-out rate in primary
education declined from 9.1 per cent to 4.7 per cent.

12. As per U DISE 2013-14 a total of 2.44 lakhs schools still
do not have toilet facilities. The PM gave a call for
education of girls and made a commitment to the Nation
that every school will have toilet within one year with a
separate girls’ toilet, so that girls are not compelled to
leave the schools mid way. He also gave a call to the
Parliamentarians to use their MPLAD fund for construction
of toilets. He called upon the corporate sector to use their
corporate social responsibility (CSR) funds this National
endeavour.

13. Progress towards universal retention.
• The dropout rate, though declining from year to year,
still remains a major challenge.
• The transition rate (from primary to upper primary
stage) increased from 81.1 per cent in 2007-08 to
89.6 per cent in 2012-13.
• The youth literacy rate has increased from 76.43 per
cent to 86.14 per cent during the period 2001-2011.

14. In keeping with the rights based approach,
to ensure universal access, improve attendance and
reduce dropout existing interventions under SSA are
modified, especially with reference to
 Children belonging to Scheduled castes,
 Scheduled tribes,
 Muslim minority and
 Urban deprived.

15. New interventions are made to
(i) provide pre-school education to ensure school
readiness for all children, and
(ii) reimbursement to private unaided schools for
admission of 25% children from disadvantaged groups
and weaker sections, as also
(iii) provision of textbooks and uniforms to these children
in order to facilitate their participation in the learning
process.

16. After RTE it is mandatory that only those people
may be appointed as teachers who are able to
clear TET. CBSE has conducted six rounds of
Teacher Eligibility Tests (TETs) and 30 States
have also conducted TET. Apart from these
2.43 lakh part-time instructors have also been
sanctioned under Sarva Shiksha Abhiyan
(SSA).

17. There are approximately 45 lakh teacher positions in
government, local body and aided schools across the
country, against which 18.89 lakh are sanctioned under
SSA. This includes --- lakh posts sanctioned under SSA
since RTE Act became operative. However, there are a
large number of posts vacant, including vacancies in the
State sector and the newly sanctioned posts under SSA.
Within states and districts there are large variations, and
the situation of vacancies is particularly acute in Uttar
Pradesh, Bihar, Jharkhand and West Bengal.

18. Education for any person is not only
 a tool to enhance his understanding and
knowledge of everything present and
happening around him but is also
 an avenue for ensuring an all-round growth
and development of his or her personality
in all respects.