Aarti Mohan
An open hall session bringing together educators, lawyers, journalists and concerned citizens threw open some interesting questions on the right to education bill and its ramifications.
“All of us certainly believe in the right to education for all. What we need to discuss is how it should be implemented.” This set the tone for the Sunday morning session organized by PRS Legislative Research and Engaged Citizen’s Forum on the “Right to Education Bill of 2008.”
Free education for all
The Bill seeks to provide the right to “free and compulsory elementary education to all children between the ages of 6 and 14 in a neighbourhood school.” Introduced in the Rajya Sabha in Dec 2008 and referred to a Standing Committee, the bill is now in the process of receiving public feedback before it goes on to become a law. Some of the highlights of the Bill include its bid to stop “screening interviews”, “performance-based admission” and the exorbitant “capitation fees” charged by schools. Clauses in the Bill also talk of a 25% reservation in unaided schools for economically disadvantaged children.
Implementation a big challenge
“Passing the law is just the beginning, co-ordination between Centre and State for implementation of such laws, fund disbursement, enforcement etc has always been a huge challenge,” P.R. Dasgupta, (ex) Education Secretary, HRD,
What should be taught?
The Indian education system has always been accused of encouraging rote-learning owing to a rigid curriculum taught by teachers focussed on examination results. This system has no place for the “learn at your own pace” method recommended by the Bill where under-performers need to be coached specially and can continue in elementary school until they pass. Venkatesh Murthy of Youth For Sewa pointed out that about 70% of students drop out in Xth grade from village schools after failing, rendering them useless for semi-urban/urban jobs as well as too old to pick up the native profession of farming. “Tuning the curriculum to suit the vastly different needs of urban and rural education is a challenge. We need to universalize the education and not the curriculum,” he said.
Syed Ahmed of EduMedia also brought up the importance of using innovative and experiential methods of teaching to keep the children engaged and not “wait for the bell” as he put it!
Education only as good as its teacher
“We surveyed over 1000 teachers who do career-counselling, and not one of them discusses teaching as a prospective career among their wards.” said Vishnu Agnihotri of Educational Initiatives.
Other subtle questions like how to treat children who are differently abled, whether the medium of instruction should be English or the native tongue, would it be detrimental for the economically weak students to study in a class of affluent children and so on need to be investigated.
The Bill hopes to make education a level playing field by bringing all institutions, from Govt. schools to International schools, under the purview of this law. In order to achieve the goal of “Every child learning well” and not just “Every child going to school”, the Govt has to focus on implementation, enforcement and accountability. And citizen forums like these offer a platform for healthy discussion and debate, involving both the stakeholders and authorities.
This session was held on June 21st at Purva
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