Education quality and Gender Equality

[priti]

why get stuck?

I dont know if you all will agree but I dont think we need very heavy response and again devise a general purpose of this thread. We are not doing a scientific enquiry here that we need to define everything. What we needed were meaningful responses (am i right raj?) and we got some if not enough. we should not be complaining...

From this thread the most useful suggestion i have found for the change-makers (and i am assuming it is the government) is the TARGETED INTERVENTION ON 'PANCHVI FAILS' SUGGESTED BY SUJATA-This is section towards which all other suggested interventions should be made.

The finale of this thread might be to be to conclude it with coherent ideas produced here and let the change-makers benefit from it if they find these ideas compelling and practical enough. Sitting far away, we are anyway not in a position to know the constraints and environment in which these suggestions are to be implemented.

 

[raj_rathee]

Sujata/Priti:

Thanks. I'll be happy to continue coordinating this discussion
if there is active interest and ideas flowing. I am hoping for
lot of constructive criticism as regards to whatever is said.
No egos. No nothing. Just crunching each other's ideas to see
if we can come up with some worthwile suggestions. I just request
that everyone try to stay within the scope of the discussion.

It would be nicer and easier to coordinate this if we can tackle
this bit by bit. If we have suggestions as to how to deal with teacher
accountability, bring them on.

 

[spdeshwal]

Dear Raj,

Nirash hone ki jarurat nahi hai. Kisi bhi achhe kam ke suru hone mai samay bhi lagata hai aur adchane bhi aati hnai.

Many members have contributed positively and brought out some valid points. You are probably dispointed for not getting the concrete suggestions you were expecting.

My observation is that this lacked a clear GOAL and DIRECTION.

Your Opening sentence was" I think now could be a good time to come up with some concrete suggestions that can be pursued at the government level. We have Deepender..... And from here itself this discussion lost direction. Not many people would expect much help from politicians and did not take part in the discussion. This is my view and this may not be true.

I agree with Sujataji view on furthering the scope of Panchvi fails to Middle and high school with poor grades. Because, i have some first hand experience in my family. Three granddaughters of my tauji were very bright students at the primary school level but did poorly at middle and high school level due to lack of encouragement from their father and old mind set of dominan grandparents. Whatever little help they received was from their Middle pass mother who wanted her daughters to go for college education. Unfortunately all of them ended with geting married and had kids before they were 18. Here noteworthy realty is that my tauji and his son could afford their college education.
My first suggestion is that we must concentrate most on changing the old mind set and attitude towards women.
Secondly, i would like to ask you to involve our more experieced members like Sh. Ram S Arya, Col. Jagmohan Malik, Col Virender Tavethia, Sh. RK Sehrawatji, Dr Birbal ji, Ch. Lakshman BadakJi, Ch. Baljeetji, Shailender Hoodaji, Sh. Kapoor Singh and all others who you think could be contacted for this. Some of these gentlemen may not be following this thread for some reason.

Thirdly, have some flexibility about the Location of our Model Village 'Harya'
It can be based on feasibilty and convenient for the plan to be implemented.
This can be in any of the states of Jat heartland. I have some suggestion on this.
It can be located near Sh. Aryaji's School so that any help and guidance from the staff is readily available. or

Any village near Samli or Meerut. Rajenderji is moving to Samli early next year and can lead this project along with his hospital project. If i remeber correctly Col Jagmohan has planned to move over to Meerut and he had also offered to work with RajenderJi. I am confident that these two gentlemen have everything we need for implementation of such projects; experience, strenth of the character and willingness.

Lastly comes the Finance to fund the project. The Projected sum of Rs.300,000 is not too big a amout for the members of this site for the nobblest cause for our community. As Col. Jagmohan always says, charity begins at home. So let us start at our home'Jatland'

I am willing to cotribute for this project NZ$500( Rs.15000). At this stage i can do this much only. I assure the members to cotribute more after i settle some outstanding commitments in a year or two. This amount i can send as and when required.

My personal appeal to Aryaji, Rajenderji and Col Jagmohanji to accept the responsibility if the members collectively ask them to do so.

I hope, Raj and his think tank can make a fresh begining!

With lots of best wishes for the success of this project!


Sateypal

NB: PLEASE ALSO GO THROUGH THESE LIKNKS
http://www.tribuneindia.com/2005/20051122/haryana.htm#3
http://www.tribuneindia.com/2005/20051122/haryana.htm#7

 

[singhkapoor]

Keep Your Spirits High!!

I think Raj’s concept of “Harya” (an ideal village) has a lot of promise and I am sure if tackled with care can go a long way; it is all a matter of believing in yourself. Well begun is half done; so, Raj, take your time and send individual emails to people, who you think will lend credibility to the program. It will be quite some time before the project will be able to deliver palpable positive results; so, you might need to set up an NGO not only to keep the enthusiasm/dream alive but also to keep the govt. machinery on its toes.

Excuse me for setting off on a tangent here because I know you have mentioned that you are not a great fan of NGOs. BTW, I have a diametrically opposite opinion about the role NGOs can play in making positive difference in people’s lives. As opposed to a signed petition, I think an NGO stands a better chance of forcing/convincing the govt. to implement this idea in “Harya”. Setting up an NGO will give the idea a formal name and a “face” which in turn will make the Haryana govt. consider the idea more seriously. OK…OK…..you can call it a “lobbying group” if you hate the term NGO.

You will need a healthy mix of at least four kinds of people to cover all of the important bases:
a. People who can devote time or at least find people who can devote time.
b. People who have had a lot of exposure to world and can give you ideas.
c. People who have a fairly high social standing by virtue of their noble deeds (their presence on the team translates to credibility)
d. People who can afford to donate some moolah (even though eventually the program will run on the govt. machinery, it will incur some expenses such as travel and administrative cost even if the NGO is run by volunteers).

I have seen so many such threads die a quick death on this forum because ……. well, we all know the reasons!!! Gathering signatures from people who don’t even know where and what they are signing on will neither have any credibility nor will you get anything worthwhile accomplished. My suggestion would be to privately contact “only” the most sincere people on this site and get them to commit to the cause (In my opinion there are plenty of such people here but they resist posting because they have seen the trend in the past. Most of the times the response or attitude is more of a “bhed chaal” than a serious commitment based on sound judgment. A typical response is - “tell me if there is anything I can do”, “count me in for this noble cause”, “bhai mera bhi naam likh liye”, etc. etc.

So keeping the typical jatland spirit alive, my response to this thread is – mere layak koi kaam ho to bataana . Jokes apart, you know that I MEAN it.

To begin, I will mention a few points that readily come to mind:

Deciding upon that lucky “Village” itself will be no easy task. Because of obvious reasons, everyone involved in the project (including you, me, and the politician) will wish his/her village to be selected. But, I think you can make it clear up front that “Harya” will be chosen/picked by a random draw from all interested/short-listed candidate villages.

You might have to convince the govt. to make slight changes in the curriculum to include projects for students that we think will be beneficial to the students’ all around development.

Info-sessions/guest talks delivered by well placed and successful people can come quite handy in changing people’s attitude. Topics such as:

Engineering and Medical degrees are not the be all and end all.
Opportunities available in today’s Indian job market as well as in the rest of the world
Personality development
People skills
Public Speaking
Importance of command over a language (English or Hindi) in jobs like journalism, media etc or even in day to day life
Commercial Farming
Importance of Networking with people to advance in any career
Technology and the job market
Vocations such carpentry, seamstress, fashion-design etc. are viable career options if you have the right connections.
Professional Sports as a career option (it is relatively “easy” to get a job through sports quota)

I think inviting the parents to such sessions will make it easier for them to believe in the project as well as in their child’s ability esp. if the guest speaker has had a village connection/background and has risen to the top through his/her sheer perseverance. They need just one circuit-breaker kind of event to realize that – “If this guest speaker who is standing right in front of me and talking to me can do IT, so can my son or daughter” I will give my own example and I am sure that others feel the same way:

When I was in grade 7, I started dreaming of becoming a national champion athlete; but it was still a dream. Then Geeta Zutshi (Asian Gold Medalist, 1978) joined our school as sports director and I had a chance to be near her, talk to her, run with her mano a mano, and hold her track-suit that had “INDIA” written at the back. Suddenly, the dream started to seem like a possibility…..the myth that champions are made of “gold” was broken because I realized that they were normal human being, it is just that they work harder than most people. Meeting Ms. Zutshi and later on with other international stars made me realize that even the “superstars had feet of clay” which gave me the confidence to do one better. It is human nature that once you have had a chance to spend some time with your “hero”, although you still respect them for their accomplishments, you no longer are in awe of his/her personality. Most people would draw inspiration from such meetings and would find it easier to emulate their hero than if they never had a chance to meet these successful people. That’s why it is very important to keep company of successful people; they are a constant source of inspiration.

Someone had brought up the point whether the idea of choosing 20 villages for incremental changes or the idea of choosing 1 village for a total systemic overhaul would be more practical. IMHO neither idea would be a cakewalk to implement but the second one (Harya) has a better chance of success than the first; mainly because:

a. It is easier to work with 1 set of people than 20 (read panchayats)
b. It will be easier to monitor / manage i.e. fewer people (administrators) required.
c. Less financial resources needed.
d. If you can show positive change in one village, other villages will notice it themselves and would want to embrace the model. Ideal situation would be the neighboring villages approaching the govt. to implement the scheme on a larger scale. The panchayats will become bolder and demand accountability from teachers in their own schools.
e. It will be a lot easier (comparatively) to convince the govt. /politician to let you try the experiment in one village than to give you a free hand in 20 villages.

You have to remember that every child in “Harya” will not be Noble Laureate material; so, you will have to make at least two groups in each grade i.e. the “bright bulbs” and the “Average Joes”. There is sure to be political pressure to include student “X” in spite of the fact that “X” did not make the cut to be included in the “Einstein Group”. Exams that will identify the “bright bulbs” will have to be closely supervised to maintain the integrity of the system.

My below-mentioned idea might sound like a far-fetched one but I will still put it forward just for the sake of doing it. You never know!!

Although, every teacher in Harya school will be hand picked (I hope that’s possible), you still might want to offer special incentives/rewards for the best of the best – For the teachers who produce results in the “wow” range; how about a round trip ticket to Singapore or some other fancy reward….I don’t think it will be difficult to find sponsors for these rewards/trips (zyada lambe supney to nahi dikha diye kahin)?

Raj, in spirit I am wholeheartedly behind your idea but I also believe that adopting the “Sign-A-Petition” approach may not have enough momentum to galvanize the govt.; hence the suggestion of a formal organization taking up the gauntlet. What do you think?? Anyways, you got my support.

And, Yes!! There will be detractors, cynics, and habitually negative people who will say what they are best at saying……but, if you believe in your idea, you should first sell it to a handful of “heavy-weights” (even to non-jats and jats, who may not be members of this site) and then hope for a dominos effect before buckling down for a bumpy but fulfilling ride.

Cheers

 

[raj_rathee]

Goals and Directions....Lets reiterate...

My observation is that this lacked a clear GOAL and DIRECTION.

Deshwal Chacha [or in this case Mama...my Ma is a Deswal...]:

(Good to see your picture. Pardon me for previously assuming you were
my age.)

Your response is very much appreciated and thanks for bringing
out some valuable suggestions.

----------------------------------------------------------------
Deshwal Chacha's Key Points:

o Lack of clear goal and direction
-- Lack of faith in politicians is an issue
o Agreement to focus on the "Paanchvi Fails"
o Concentrate on changing the old mind set and attitude toward
women.
o Involvement of experienced members
-- Some of them may not be following the thread
o Flexibility in terms of location of "Harya"
-- Location near Arya Chacha's school
-- Location near Samli (Rajender Chacha)
-- Meerut (Col Jagmohan)
o Finance and Donations
----------------------------------------------------------------

My Comments:

Lack of clear goal and direction

Well, perhaps the original stated goal could be made concrete. My
original intention was that too was up for discussion.
But I felt that subsequent posts narrowed it down. Here
it is as it stands now:

Goal:


Our goal is to clearly define a set of actions/steps/proposals as well
detailed implementation guidelines to help improve the quality of education,
with special focus on the education and success of the girl child,
of an existing senior secondary government owned and run rural school,
without any new substantial financial resources, and without any new
manpower.

While the goal is as above we are allowing ourselves some leeway in that
we do have the following additional resources:

-- An able administrator to implement
-- Choice of two additional employees
-- Rs 3 Lakh additional per annum. (some "pocket money")
-- Some freedom in accountability enforcement (such as the ability
to transfer non performing teachers)

General Guidelines:

1. We are assuming a favorable government (which one it is does not
matter..though initial motivation was that Deepender
Hooda would be sympathetic to the cause) who will listen and implement
our suggestions by assigning a model village (fictitious name "Harya")
in which the suggestions would be implemented faithfully.

2. Failure of get such a village would not be seen as failure of this
effort. Our purpose is that of a think tank. Anything we come
up with can provide ANY educator some good ideas to improve the quality
of education with limited resources. At the very least it will have given
all of us a good framework to think about such issues in very realistic
terms like an able administrator would have to do. In no way would
this be a wasted excercise.

3. The end output will be a concrete set of steps to be implemented
in a "brain dead" way...we should already have done the thinking
and nothing is left out to "figure out". Our proposal has to be a
"What to do" and "How to do".

4. We will NOT depend on outside funding. We must depend on the current
resources allocated to the village (with the aforementioned "leeways").
Our goal is to come up with sustainable ideas that can be, if successful,
applied to other villages. Therefore it is important that we work
within the resource constraints. We can't willy nilly ask for anything.

Directions:

1. Discover and define specific issues that hamper the delivery
of quality education (e.g. non-performance of teachers).

2. Brainstorm for solutions within the constraints we have set for ourselves
(ie. we are not going to ask for overhead projectors, and laptops
and satellite t.v.). All we got is what we currently have in a typical
village as already set out.

3. Define concrete steps to implement the solutions...to as much detail
as possible. For instance if we are going to say parents need to
oversee the teachers...then we need to define the setup, procedures etc.

End Output

A document that details 1, 2 and 3 under "Directions"

Essentially we need to put ourselves in the shoes of an able administrator
who has severe constraints of resources but who is honest and wants
to create a system that is workable and sustainable even when he is not
there.

After all isn't that the real challenge ?


Agreement to focus on Paanchvi fails

Yes. We have agreed that this is a good idea. Biggest bang for the
buck. But these again fall within the overall scope of quality
education within the government school system. SO we will be attacking this
as part of that.

Concentrate on changing the mindset towards women

Strong agreement here ! Big question is how does the "administrator"
go about doing that ? One suggestion that I will repeatedly throw
out here is that use our most valuable resources...our students.

Involvement of Experienced Members

Well of course. I'm just waiting for them to knock on the
door. I did not want to make anyone feel obligated since it is more
fruitful if people take interest on their own accord.

But if you insist that anyone needs personal invitation, I'll
happy to send emails to seek their input...and I am desperate for it.

Flexibility in terms of location of "Harya"

We ARE completely flexible. But we are assuming everything
on some government involvement as can be seen by the above assumptions.
If the same can be achieved in Rajasthan, UP, Delhi, Haryana, or any
of "our" areas, is just as well.

Regarding Chacha Arya's school. I assume that is a private school and
Chacha Arya has complete freedom in ensuring how it run and that
quality of education is maintained. If he or any private educator finds
some useful suggestions in all of this it would be wonderful. Of course
their guidance and criticism would be highly appreciated

But our specific goal is to focus on government schools. Those are
the ones with the severe problems.

Finance and Donations

As mentioned, for the specific purpose of this brain storming we do not
want to rely on external donations. We just can't if we want to
provide realistic solutions for a model village that we would hope
to be later replicated to other villages.

We need to do with what we got. Hence the brain storming is our
real donation here. Are we good enough to think beyond the
ordinary ?

 

[sukhda]

Accountability Of Teachers

ACCOUNTABILTY OF TEACHERS

Hi, its good to see the soaring spirits again….. …..after pondering over the accountability issue and going thru some texts in this regard, have come up with certain suggestions……The concept of accountability needs careful consideration. At first blush, the notion that teachers should be held accountable for their jobs seems perfectly straightforward and reasonable. What could be more sensible than to expect teachers to do their best, and to make appropriate changes in their jobs as their success is assessed?
Clearly, the desire of govt. to more closely tie teacher accountability to student performance measures is both a reasonable and a feasible goal. Teachers can significantly impact student learning outcomes, regardless of other influences, and those teachers who don’t have much impact, or whose impact is negative, are simply not doing their job.

Setting up an adequate TEACHER-EVALUATION SYSTEM based upon student performance can help in producing substantial results. For that following measures if taken wont go waste for sure:

• A vehicle or protocol that reasonably measures student learning gains on state education standards
• A method of collecting and analyzing data that can generate a confident, “value-added” correlation between individual teachers and student learning gains over time, independent of other factors known to affect student performance, including the impact of previous teachers
• Appropriate appraisal of the data that emphasizes patterns of performance by individual teachers’ students, not anomalies
• An initial corrective, rather than punitive, approach toward teachers whose students show a pattern of poor learning gains in recognition that additional teacher education, re-training, or re-assignment may alleviate the problem
• A buy-in from teachers and parents so that the evaluation will truly impact teacher performance, and that support for the proper use of evaluation data and for teacher remediation efforts will be forthcoming.

Finally, the responsibility of school and district administrative leaders should not be overlooked. Particularly when there is a pattern of poor student performance throughout an entire school or in many schools within a district, problems clearly go beyond the abilities of specific teachers. The school or district environment must be changed to increase the effectiveness of all teachers. If school and district leaders cannot be held responsible for the problem they should be held responsible for crafting a solution that makes their teachers and their schools more effective in promoting student learning. Here, we shdn’t forget the significance of “RIGHT OF INFORMATION ACT.” I still wont feel shy affirming the same thing again……there is just a need of using the resources in the right manner coz everything exist but we need to unravel it.
Hope this would be of some help.

REGARDS
SUKHDA

 

[singhkapoor]

Well, it seems that Raj is not very keen on the NGO idea.

So, I will try to stick within the scope he has defined for this thread i.e. to provide suggestions to policy makers and ask them to implement these suggestions in a model village “Harya”.

To begin with, I will explore the “how to improve quality of education” issue: To make sure that everyone is on the same page, let’s lay out as to how we would measure success of this project.

What is our benchmark for measuring quality of education?

I am sorry if this has been addressed in some earlier post.
a. Would a 100% pass rate in each grade/class be considered a success?

b. Or the project will be considered to have improved quality of education in Harya only if at least 35% students scored over 90% marks?

c. Or opening their eyes to the rest of the world is defined as success? By this I mean making them aware of the numerous possible career paths they could choose from after grade 10 or 12; hence concentrating on providing them with the educational tools to get started in these vocations.

d. Or inculcating/instilling good civic sense, responsibility towards society etc. would be considered as raising quality of education.

e. or is it all of the above?

If it’s the first scenario (academic mediocrity) that we are targeting then it does not seem to be a very uphill task.

But, for the second scenario to occur (producing academically excellent students by the dozen), I think Harya might not find enough suitable teachers. If there are such teachers available, we might have to give them LOT of extra incentives. Most good teachers impart private tuitions after school hours so they may not be willing /motivated enough to put the required “extra” effort even during school hours. Teachers will consider this posting as a punishment rather than a reward, unless a teacher is a morally upright soul and is bound by ethics of his profession. Teachers will pull political strings to avoid posting at Harya.

The classrooms may have to be re-equipped and teachers re-trained if we are talking about bringing Harya students at par with the private-school students.

For the above solutions (teacher incentives, re-training, or re-equipping of the class rooms) Rupees 3 lakh does not seem to be an adequate amount. But, I think if we are able to sell the idea to the govt. and it decides to go ahead with this experiment in Harya, another 5-10 lakhs should not be a problem.

It is also possible that with the help of even 2-3 good & dedicated teachers, students can form their own study groups and do wonderfully well academically. Sometime back I read about a Bihar/Orissa village where one alumnus of the village school, who had gotten admission in IIT, started a study/help group in the village “chaupal” and within a few years it so happened that every single year there were 6/7 students from this village who got admission in to IITs.

Cheers

 

[devdahiya]

I Will Agree with you more

Deshwal Chacha [or in this case Mama...my Ma is a Deswal...]:

(Good to see your picture. Pardon me for previously assuming you were
my age.)

Your response is very much appreciated and thanks for bringing
out some valuable suggestions.

----------------------------------------------------------------
Deshwal Chacha's Key Points:

o Lack of clear goal and direction
-- Lack of faith in politicians is an issue
o Agreement to focus on the "Paanchvi Fails"
o Concentrate on changing the old mind set and attitude toward
women.
o Involvement of experienced members
-- Some of them may not be following the thread
o Flexibility in terms of location of "Harya"
-- Location near Arya Chacha's school
-- Location near Samli (Rajender Chacha)
-- Meerut (Col Jagmohan)
o Finance and Donations
----------------------------------------------------------------

My Comments:

Lack of clear goal and direction

Well, perhaps the original stated goal could be made concrete. My
original intention was that too was up for discussion.
But I felt that subsequent posts narrowed it down. Here
it is as it stands now:

Goal:


Our goal is to clearly define a set of actions/steps/proposals as well
detailed implementation guidelines to help improve the quality of education,
with special focus on the education and success of the girl child,
of an existing senior secondary government owned and run rural school,
without any new substantial financial resources, and without any new
manpower.

While the goal is as above we are allowing ourselves some leeway in that
we do have the following additional resources:

-- An able administrator to implement
-- Choice of two additional employees
-- Rs 3 Lakh additional per annum. (some "pocket money")
-- Some freedom in accountability enforcement (such as the ability
to transfer non performing teachers)

General Guidelines:

1. We are assuming a favorable government (which one it is does not
matter..though initial motivation was that Deepender
Hooda would be sympathetic to the cause) who will listen and implement
our suggestions by assigning a model village (fictitious name "Harya")
in which the suggestions would be implemented faithfully.

2. Failure of get such a village would not be seen as failure of this
effort. Our purpose is that of a think tank. Anything we come
up with can provide ANY educator some good ideas to improve the quality
of education with limited resources. At the very least it will have given
all of us a good framework to think about such issues in very realistic
terms like an able administrator would have to do. In no way would
this be a wasted excercise.

3. The end output will be a concrete set of steps to be implemented
in a "brain dead" way...we should already have done the thinking
and nothing is left out to "figure out". Our proposal has to be a
"What to do" and "How to do".

4. We will NOT depend on outside funding. We must depend on the current
resources allocated to the village (with the aforementioned "leeways").
Our goal is to come up with sustainable ideas that can be, if successful,
applied to other villages. Therefore it is important that we work
within the resource constraints. We can't willy nilly ask for anything.

Directions:

1. Discover and define specific issues that hamper the delivery
of quality education (e.g. non-performance of teachers).

2. Brainstorm for solutions within the constraints we have set for ourselves
(ie. we are not going to ask for overhead projectors, and laptops
and satellite t.v.). All we got is what we currently have in a typical
village as already set out.

3. Define concrete steps to implement the solutions...to as much detail
as possible. For instance if we are going to say parents need to
oversee the teachers...then we need to define the setup, procedures etc.

End Output

A document that details 1, 2 and 3 under "Directions"

Essentially we need to put ourselves in the shoes of an able administrator
who has severe constraints of resources but who is honest and wants
to create a system that is workable and sustainable even when he is not
there.

After all isn't that the real challenge ?


Agreement to focus on Paanchvi fails

Yes. We have agreed that this is a good idea. Biggest bang for the
buck. But these again fall within the overall scope of quality
education within the government school system. SO we will be attacking this
as part of that.

Concentrate on changing the mindset towards women

Strong agreement here ! Big question is how does the "administrator"
go about doing that ? One suggestion that I will repeatedly throw
out here is that use our most valuable resources...our students.

Involvement of Experienced Members

Well of course. I'm just waiting for them to knock on the
door. I did not want to make anyone feel obligated since it is more
fruitful if people take interest on their own accord.

But if you insist that anyone needs personal invitation, I'll
happy to send emails to seek their input...and I am desperate for it.

Flexibility in terms of location of "Harya"

We ARE completely flexible. But we are assuming everything
on some government involvement as can be seen by the above assumptions.
If the same can be achieved in Rajasthan, UP, Delhi, Haryana, or any
of "our" areas, is just as well.

Regarding Chacha Arya's school. I assume that is a private school and
Chacha Arya has complete freedom in ensuring how it run and that
quality of education is maintained. If he or any private educator finds
some useful suggestions in all of this it would be wonderful. Of course
their guidance and criticism would be highly appreciated

But our specific goal is to focus on government schools. Those are
the ones with the severe problems.

Finance and Donations

As mentioned, for the specific purpose of this brain storming we do not
want to rely on external donations. We just can't if we want to
provide realistic solutions for a model village that we would hope
to be later replicated to other villages.

We need to do with what we got. Hence the brain storming is our
real donation here. Are we good enough to think beyond the
ordinary ?

My dear Raj,

It makes lots of sense. Initially those who think deeply involved [mentally] will be eager to share the initial financial burden which i suppose a few of us can menage. Subsequently a modest contribution [as we progress] will automaticaly forthcoming from the people when they find the people involved sencere enough. This way the venture will look pure and chaste. Thereafter it has to be nurtured and maintained with lots of love and care with great amount of selfless inputs and hardwork. The dream of an ideal village is realisable if a few of us have the passion. No village will be averse to such an adopition. subsequently this village can become the torch bearer for other villages. Yes an able and selfless administrator[full time] along with a few of work hand will be needed. Absolutely sensible and getable. My best wishes!

 

[priti]

Accountability Of Govt. School Teachers

ACCOUNTABILITY OF GOVT. SCHOOL TEACHERS

Both my mother and my sister in law are govt school teachers in Delhi. Delhi government has been awarded for introducing new methods and systems in its schools to increase accountability and quality of education. FRom this post, I am hoping to draw parallels and generate learning. My mother is nearing retirement and my sister-in-law is the new blood so i had some diverse opinions. I asked them about practices in Delhi govt. schools and their opinions about accountability of teachers. The following are their descriptions and observations:

· Computers have been introduced at most stages of school administration and education:
§ student data: students have ID numbers and their results data and all other information.
§ teacher attendance: if they come after assigned time, it is automatically recorded in the online register. So there is no scope of manipulation like it used to be before- principal’s use of red marks to practice favouritism among teachers. The principal is held accountable if the attendance (teacher) arrives late at the zonal office.
§ confidential reports (CRs): on teacher performance are all dealt with online and sent to the zonal offices. These reports have a section to be filled by teachers themselves on how they have done in a particular period of time and rest of the form is filled by the principal on how a particular teacher has performed on:
o class results
o subject results
o punctuality
o parent-teacher relationship
o how have they encouraged weak students
o moral education
o discipline of the class
o counselling on other social and emotional issues
§
§ Computer Aided Learning (CAL): CDs and softwares: At present it is used for selective subjects like Mathematics and English for some classes. It is also used as Bridge Classes for students who have either dropped out or to advance students to classes appropriate for their age. The schools have computer labs and teachers too.
§ Other interactive learning methods- used of cartoons to create interest and provoke curiosity among students (most of the students in both the schools come from JJ colonies and other poorer sections of delhi and hence are bogged down by many other issues in their lives).
· Increasing discipline for teachers: My mother observed that in last 3 or 4 years the discipline for teachers has become increasingly strict and less easier to escape. She said that most structures for accountability existed before too but the methods of implementation and strictness of higher offices (zonal offices) along with use of technology has improved the situation. With the computer attendance, its just not possible for the teachers to be lax and escape the ‘red mark’. Below are some points:
§ Class teachers are accountable for:
o Appointing class monitors
o Student attendance
o Timetable, Syllabus, periods: the class teacher is accountable that every student should know these three, timetable are pasted in every class.
§ Introduction of UNIT TESTS: these tests are held every Monday on different subjects to encourage students to be vigilant and attentive throughout the year. The results are reported to the offices and these results count 20% in the final assessment, 20% weightage is given to terminal exams (held three times in a year) and 60% to final examination.
§ All question papers for classes 8th, 9th and 10th come from external teachers and the checking of papers is also done by external teachers (schools exchange these papers with each other).
§ If the teachers are not working properly, the principals gives initial warnings and then there could be written action which could stop increments in the salary and position. Not too sure if schools could fire absolutely inefficient teachers or not….dont think so…
· Education on Rights and Self defence: In the morning assemblies, students are made aware of their rights like children below 14yrs should not be working by law and have claim to education aid. The children are also taught some methods of self defence in case somebody is approaching them with hitting intentions.
· Student Aid: A lot of students in these two schools come from minorities like muslim kids and SC/ST. There are special monetary aid for muslim and sc/ST children to incentivise studying rather than working like money for uniform and books, money when students pass their exams.

Other points:

Parents counselling of students who have flunked their unit tests
No report books at home- parents have to come and sign them at school
A tiered system of accountability- schools divided into zones, principals reporting to zonal officers (two- deputy director and education officer), zonal officers reporting to Director at old secreteriate and the director reporting to the education minister.

Education officer- inspections, rounds of schools to ensure proper systems are in place and are being implemented effectively.

This is the story if Delhi Govt. schools which have been awarded. I am yet to get information on haryana schools and what happening there. This write up on delhi schools is just to give an idea of the education system and what are the good points. These points (if new) could be picked up for ‘Harya’s’ school.

In haryana, the information I have is that to increase girl child education and to stabilise the gender ration, the government is offering aid for girl child education and money for the family where a girl is born. I don’t know how correct and effective that is. Main problem in haryana as I see it is absence of higher secondary schools. Most villages have schools only upto 5th standard and if somebody wants to pursue further education than they have to travel. In case if girl child, this is a big impediment.


Hope my primary research helps in anyway J

 

[hamendra]

ACCOUNTABILITY OF GOVT. SCHOOL TEACHERS

Both my mother and my sister in law are govt school teachers in Delhi. Delhi government has been awarded for introducing new methods and systems in its schools to increase accountability and quality of education. I am hoping to draw parallels and generate learning. My mother is nearing retirement and my sister-in-law is the new blood. I asked them about practices in Delhi govt. schools and their opinions about accountability of teachers. The following are their descriptions and observations:

· Computers have been introduced at most stages of school administration and education:
§ student data: students have ID numbers and their results data and all other information.
§ teacher attendance: if they come after assigned time, it is automatically recorded in the online register. So there is no scope of manipulation like it used to be before- principal’s use of red marks to practice favouritism among teachers. The principal is held accountable if the attendance (teacher) arrives late at the zonal office.
§ confidential reports (CRs): on teacher performance are all dealt with online and sent to the zonal offices. These reports have a section to be filled by teachers themselves on how they have done in a particular period of time and rest of the form is filled by the principal on how a particular teacher has performed on:
o class results
o subject results
o punctuality
o parent-teacher relationship
o how have they encouraged weak students
o moral education
o discipline of the class
o counselling on other social and emotional issues
§
§ Computer Aided Learning (CAL): CDs and softwares: At present it is used for selective subjects like Mathematics and English for some classes. It is also used as Bridge Classes for students who have either dropped out or to advance students to classes appropriate for their age. The schools have computer labs and teachers too.
§ Other interactive learning methods- used of cartoons to create interest and provoke curiosity among students (most of the students in both the schools come from JJ colonies and other poorer sections of delhi and hence are bogged down by many other issues in their lives).
· Increasing discipline for teachers: My mother observed that in last 3 or 4 years the discipline for teachers has become increasingly stricter and less easier to escaped. She said that most of the structures for accountability existed before too but the methods of implementation and strictness of higher offices (zonal offices) have improved. With the computer attendance, its just not possible for the teachers to be lax and escape the ‘red mark’. Below are some points:
§ Class teachers are accountable for:
o Appointing class monitors
o Student attendance
o Timetable, Syllabus, periods: the class teacher is accountable that every student should know these three, timetable are pasted in every class.
§ Introduction of UNIT TESTS: these tests are held every Monday on different subjects to encourage students to be vigilant and attentive throughout the year. The results are reported to the offices and these results count 20% in the final assessment, 20% weightage is given to terminal exams (held three times in a year) and 60% to final examination.
§ All question papers for classes 8th, 9th and 10th come from external teachers and the checking of papers is also done by external teachers (schools exchange these papers with each other).
§ If the teachers are not working properly, the principals gives initial warnings and then there could be written action which could stop increments in the salary and position. Not too sure if schools could fire absolutely inefficient teachers or not….dont think so…
· Education on Rights and Self defence: In the morning assemblies, students are made aware of their rights like children below 14yrs should not be working by law and have claim to education aid. The children are also taught some methods of self defence in case somebody is approaching them with hitting intentions.
· Student Aid: A lot of students in these two schools come from minorities like muslim kids and SC/ST. There are special monetary aid for muslim and sc/ST children to incentivise studying rather than working like money for uniform and books, money when students pass their exams.

Other points:

Parents counselling of students who have flunked their unit tests
No report books at home- parents have to come and sign them at school
A tiered system of accountability- schools divided into zones, principals reporting to zonal officers (two- deputy director and education officer), zonal officers reporting to Director at old secreteriate and the director reporting to the education minister.

Education officer- inspections, rounds of schools to ensure proper systems are in place and are being implemented effectively.

This is the story if Delhi Govt. schools which have been awarded. I am yet to get information on haryana schools and what happening there. This write up on delhi schools is just to give an idea of the education system and what are the good points. These points (if new) could be picked up for ‘Harya’s’ school.

In haryana, the information I have is that to increase girl child education and to stabilise the gender ration, the government is offering aid for girl child education and money for the family where a girl is born. I don’t know how correct and effective that is. Main problem in haryana as I see it is absence of higher secondary schools. Most villages have schools only upto 5th standard and if somebody wants to pursue further education than they have to travel. In case if girl child, this is a big impediment.


Hope my primary research helps in anyway J

It is and will be happening only on papers. In reality, it is not going to execute on ground level.
If we talk about 5 or 7 years back, Delhi govt school used to have morning and evening shifts due to the less number of students in govt schools now in most of the schools, evening shift is closed.

Why are the number of students getting low in govt schools?

Due to our quality of education and infrastructure in schools.

 

[priti]

Addition and correction

I forgot to add that Training(mainly in the form of seminars) has been made compulsory for the tearchers in delhi government schools on their subjects. In these seminars they are made aware of any changes and/or new additions every year.

Hamendra, my mother works in an evening shift school and my sister in law in the morning shift school (so that one of them is at home at one time...what a cool arrangement!). So I can definitely say that evening schools have not been closed.

I am not sure about student population getting lesser in govt. schools, so cant answer your question about why it is decreasing (if it is).

This is as described by the two govt. school teachers themselves (both jatnis- no defensive attitude) who are working with these provisions everyday. I would not doubt their word and will believe that these provisions have actually been implemented in the least. How much it benefits the students and quality of education also depends on the teaching style and work attitude of individual teachers. Depends what your benchmarks are for quality of education. Atleast the laidback attitude is being tackled.

Also, if you read the purpose and description of this thread as defined by Raj Rathee, the point here is to get ideas and discuss them to arrive at best solutions. We are not discussing whats happening in delhi schools for the sake of appreciating their measures but discussing the merits so that we get some ideas for our topic.

Best wishes
Priti

 

[raj_rathee]

It will be quite some time before the project will be able to deliver palpable positive results; so, you might need to set up an NGO not only to keep the enthusiasm/dream alive but also to keep the govt. machinery on its toes.

Kapoor:

Some really good suggestions here !

---------------------------------------------------------------
Kapoor's key points (reference post #44)

o NGOs can be effective and should not be summarily dismissed
-- Another name for them : "lobbying group"
o Need for a good collection of people
o Petition approach bad. Contact people privately.
-- sincere people on Jatland already turned off
o Deciding on the village itself will be a challenge
o Might need to convince govt. for changes in curriculum
o Info session/guest talks by well placed people can be
useful in changing people's attitude
-- Involve parents ---> just need to light the bulb
o A bunch of areas to be addressed
o Some good reasons to focus on 1 village rather than N villages
o Separation of average kids from bright kids
o Rewarding excellence in teaching...
o Formal organisation is necessary!!!! Not the signed petition
approach.
o Sell the idea to heavy weights...Jats/Non Jats alike...
----------------------------------------------------------------

My comments:

NGOs can be effective

Point well taken ! My knowledge of these and their practicality/usefulness
is limited (non existent). So I am listening ! I appreciate now that these
can be effectively used for "lobbying" and will help to form a structure
around which we can formalise our approaching government, companies,
private indididuals etc.

Thanks Kapoor. I'll keep that in mind as we go forward. When we have
something more concrete in terms of action item we can revisit this
and I'll seek more feedback of what is involved.
[Of course, don't wait till then. Please continue guiding.]

Need for a good collection of people

Absolutely. I am sure there are many here itself. So Jatland and
its members can serve as the initial platform. If we need to
look beyond, we will. This isn't about one community or another.
It is entirely about rural children. Anyhting narrower than that
is not acceptable.

If there are private individuals who would take an interest...
I would love to hear about them and will be happy to follow up
with them...so keep me posted (my email: raj_rathee@yahoo.com).

My initial focus is some good ideas. Can't sell anything to anyone
if we don't know what to sell. So we can scope out people at a later
stage in the effort. First we need some solid ideas.

Petition approach bad. Contact Jatland people privately.

Okay. Will do. Initial request is to solicit input and ideas.
Subsequent to that we can further pursue interested people as
mentioned above.

Deciding on the village itself will be a challenge

Yes. We'll ponder on that when we come closer to needing
to nail that down. There will be many "who" "what" "when"
"where" issues at that point in time. When these variables
become more concrete we'll take that up. [ACTION ITEM NOTED]

Might need convincing govt. of some change in curriculum

Yes. That will likely happen. As we progress further
and discuss the curriculum issues we'll need to tackle this.
[ACTION ITEM NOTED]

Info Sessions/Education of Parents

Yes. Will need to lay this out in implementation details.
[ACTION ITEM NOTED]

Separation of average kids from bright kids

Yes. How we do that will depend on our precise definition
of "quality" goals.

The way I would look at this is not so much as placing kids
into "bright" and "average" groups but rather into two (or more)
X and Y groups where the educational requirements of the groups
are different. The teachers would be the ones who will determine
what group would most effectively help meet the learning requirements
of each child. When needs change the groups can change too.

Parents should have no say in where their child goes, and the system
should not be set up such that anyone gets the impression
that the bright kids and the average kids are being separated
out. We would not suggest use of "bright", "average" terminology.
This would be counter productive in not only that it introduces
bickering and parent "lobbying" (as you suggested), but it would
also negatively effect the mind and enthusiasm of a child
who gets placed in the so called "average" group.

So while the suggestion would be to effectively group students in terms
of ability, the terminology and precedures used would not make that
explicit...but would rather need to be "neutrally" worded in terms
of "individual requirements". [TOPIC TO BE REVISITED]


Rewarding Excellence in teaching

Yes. We need suggestions to do that within the scope of
of discussion. While private schools can do what Kapoor suggested
(singapore trip), these approached might be difficult in our
"Harya" approach.

So we need suggestions here as well.

On second thoughts, for the purposes of the model school "Harya",
maybe Kapoor's suggestion of a trip to Singapore or Goa or ...
might not be far fetched. The government can do it !

In fact if I am not correct the central government already has
something of that nature of central govt. employees where they
can take an all expenses vacation anywhere in India !!!!!!

Lets hear more ideas on this !!!

Sell the idea to heavy weights..Jats/Non Jats alike

Yes absolutely. But lets wait untill we have some good ideas.
[ACTION ITEM NOTED]

 

[raj_rathee]

Benchmarks for quality....

To begin with, I will explore the “how to improve quality of education” issue: To make sure that everyone is on the same page, let’s lay out as to how we would measure success of this project.

What is our benchmark for measuring quality of education?

Kapoor:

----------------------------------------------------------------
Kapoor's comments under post #47

o What is the benchmark in measuring quality of education ?
-- number of approaches listed
-- Academic excellence would be difficult on large
scale. Need good teachers. Hard to come by.
-- More resources would be needed if we want to raise Harya
to private school levels
o If idea is sellable to govt. additional 5-10Lakhs should be
no big deal.
o Students co-operatively studying for mutual gain...
---------------------------------------------------------------

My comments:

What is the benchmark in measuring quality of education ?

What I would say here is that entrance to IITs and
AIIMS would *NOT* be the primary goal. Such goals can be
pursued via other avenues.

We would want to:

1) Raise the overall pass percentage for the school
at each level. From 30% to 45% to 60 % ....

2) Increase the student averages in each subject.

3) Ensure that female students are on par with males (or better)
..both in terms of enrollment and performance.

4) Ensure that students become socially conscious citizens
who are *capable of thinking themselves* and applying analytical
reasoning to the world around them. The key thing is they
should be able to *think* and *reason* and *argue*.

5) Good civic sense, responsibility towards society
-- ability to formulate the issues
-- ability to suggest potential solutions

Since *issues of gender equality* is one our key goals here,
the curriculum has to lay strong emphasis on this. Maybe one
approach is to closely tie *gender equality* to each of the social
issues that are taught/learnt/discussed.

Basically the idea here is these students and future parents are
the ones who will bring real change. So we need to "catch them
while they are young".

6) Have a strong sense of what is out there beyond the village
boundaries...the limitless opportunities outside the traditional
fields of engineering and medicine.

7) In additional to analytical ability, have developed strong
language skills. These to are key to everything !!!! *Strong emphasis
here*. The child needs to be able to melt into the urban metro
environment and feel comfortable taking onthe world. He should be able
to market himself no matter where he goes.

8) Be fully prepared for a college education (not necessarily
engineering or medicine). When when it comes to BA there are
people who "did" BA and then there are those who "earned" the BA.
We wanted the "earners" not the "degree holders".

9) *FEEL FREE TO ADD*

I believe that by the time a student graduates from 12 th grade
she/he should be able to what we are doing under this thread !

 

[raj_rathee]

...Teacher Evaluation...

ACCOUNTABILTY OF TEACHERS
Clearly, the desire of govt. to more closely tie teacher accountability to student performance measures is both a reasonable and a feasible goal. Teachers can significantly impact student learning outcomes, regardless of other influences, and those teachers who don’t have much impact, or whose impact is negative, are simply not doing their job.

Sukhda:

Wow ! You are actually hitting the texts for us. Great
legal minds at work ! Thanks. Couldn't have asked for more.

----------------------------------------------------------------
Sukhda's key points under post #46

o Teacher accountability reasonable and feasible
o An effective teacher evaluation system
-- For specific approaches see above post
o School and District administrators have to be responsible
when problems are systematic.
o Right of Information act should not be overlooked.
----------------------------------------------------------------

An effective teacher evaluation system

The five points raised for this are indeed desirable.
But all of these are very loaded in that to understand
how these are put into practice some serious understanding
and depth in the field of education as well as psychology
is necessary.

These would mean a design of a comprehensive evaluation
system...which I think would be outside our scope
on this site.

So here is what I am thinking and some things that come to
mind:

o As you mentioned, policies etc are already on paper. That
is not the issue. So next question is where can we find this
information ? We got some idea about Delhi from Priti. But how
about Haryana or some other state ?

o Has any of these states defined a comprehensive and detailed
teacher evaluation system as you mentioned. I would assume that
if that is the case than teacher feedback forms, metrics for
evaluation, etc at each grade level would have been detailed. If
so where would that information be available. We would only
need to study it and try to get implemented in "Harya"...or at
least get some subset of it implemented.


So does anyone have information about all this. Information on any
of the state governments would be fine. All we want is to either
take the existing teacher evaluation framework and get that implemented
or pick and choose from it what would be reasonably doable. Devising
this from scratch is not going to be possible for us.

The key thing for us would be to ensure that it gets *implemented*
and we can tailor that according to what is realistic in "Harya".

School and District Admins have to be responsible

Yes that is true if we are looking at the larger scope of the state.
For our limited scope maybe we won't put emphasis on this since the
assumption is that we do have an able administrator.

Right of Information act should not be overlooked

Yes agree in principle. But what exactly do you mean here in the
scope of our current scope ? Can you please expand on that ?
Somethings that come to my mind are:

-- Teacher performance and results should be open
-- Parents should have complete access to all aspects of education of
their children.
-- What else ??

Perhaps you can explain what exactly the "right to information act"
lays out, what are the ground realities regarding it, what can a
parent or community actually do if this right is denied? What are some
of the things that it would apply to in context of "Harya" and how
can we effectively put it to favorable use.

Also, alluding to Kapoor's post, how can NGOs play a role in ensuring
that the act is enforced ?

Also while you are at it, is an "act" different from a legally enforceable
"law" or is it just a statement of principle that doesn't carry much
bite to it ?

If it does carry a lot of bite to it is there a reason we don't see
it in everyday life ? Why are the working of our governments such
a black hole ? For instance can a village citizen ask the village
sarpanch to account for all the funds ?


How can an NGO play a role in this regard ?

-----------------------------------------------

The right to information act:

http://persmin.nic.in/RTI/WebActRTI.htm

 

[hamendra]

Sukhda:

Wow ! You are actually hitting the texts for us. Great
legal minds at work ! Thanks. Couldn't have asked for more.

----------------------------------------------------------------
Sukhda's key points under post #46

o Teacher accountability reasonable and feasible
o An effective teacher evaluation system
-- For specific approaches see above post
o School and District administrators have to be responsible
when problems are systematic.
o Right of Information act should not be overlooked.
----------------------------------------------------------------

An effective teacher evaluation system

The five points raised for this are indeed desirable.
But all of these are very loaded in that to understand
how these are put into practice some serious understanding
and depth in the field of education as well as psychology
is necessary.

These would mean a design of a comprehensive evaluation
system...which I think would be outside our scope
on this site.

So here is what I am thinking and some things that come to
mind:

o As you mentioned, policies etc are already on paper. That
is not the issue. So next question is where can we find this
information ? We got some idea about Delhi from Priti. But how
about Haryana or some other state ?

o Has any of these states defined a comprehensive and detailed
teacher evaluation system as you mentioned. I would assume that
if that is the case than teacher feedback forms, metrics for
evaluation, etc at each grade level would have been detailed. If
so where would that information be available. We would only
need to study it and try to get implemented in "Harya"...or at
least get some subset of it implemented.


So does anyone have information about all this. Information on any
of the state governments would be fine. All we want is to either
take the existing teacher evaluation framework and get that implemented
or pick and choose from it what would be reasonably doable. Devising
this from scratch is not going to be possible for us.

The key thing for us would be to ensure that it gets *implemented*
and we can tailor that according to what is realistic in "Harya".

School and District Admins have to be responsible

Yes that is true if we are looking at the larger scope of the state.
For our limited scope maybe we won't put emphasis on this since the
assumption is that we do have an able administrator.

Right of Information act should not be overlooked

Yes agree in principle. But what exactly do you mean here in the
scope of our current scope ? Can you please expand on that ?
Somethings that come to my mind are:

-- Teacher performance and results should be open
-- Parents should have complete access to all aspects of education of
their children.
-- What else ??

Perhaps you can explain what exactly the "right to information act"
lays out, what are the ground realities regarding it, what can a
parent or community actually do if this right is denied? What are some
of the things that it would apply to in context of "Harya" and how
can we effectively put it to favorable use.

Also, alluding to Kapoor's post, how can NGOs play a role in ensuring
that the act is enforced ?

Also while you are at it, is an "act" different from a legally enforceable
"law" or is it just a statement of principle that doesn't carry much
bite to it ?

If it does carry a lot of bite to it is there a reason we don't see
it in everyday life ? Why are the working of our governments such
a black hole ? For instance can a village citizen ask the village
sarpanch to account for all the funds ?


How can an NGO play a role in this regard ?

Raj,
If you are talking about the schools of the villages of any of the state of INDIA then the situation is as follows.

1. There is no feedback form for the teachers.
2. Most of the population of the students in the govt schools are of the very poor people or those don't want educate their kids.
3. Most of the teachers(80%) don't go inside the class rooms. They call the students under neem ka darkhat(Tree) in the playground, it doesn't matter even the period of maths or science.
4. Teachers are not updated with the latest news.
5. Most of the teachers talk about teree makka kaisee hai, meree to tubel kee raat motor jal gayee hai, Mera transformer kharab pada hai, Mere gaon mai xyz pradhan ban gaya hai(It is about the male teachers)
5. Lady teachers aake apna sweter buntee hai.
6. SC/ST students are comming only for bajifa (Amount of money, which is given for SC/ST condidate).
7. In priamry schools, in most of the schools, you will find only one teacher to handle 5 classes( From 1st to 5th Class)

Or many more ......................

 

[raj_rathee]

ACCOUNTABILITY OF GOVT. SCHOOL TEACHERS
Delhi government has been awarded for introducing new methods and systems in its schools to increase accountability and quality of education. FRom this post, I am hoping to draw parallels and generate learning. My mother is nearing retirement and my sister-in-law is the new blood so i had some diverse opinions. I asked them about practices in Delhi govt. schools and their opinions about accountability of teachers. The following are their descriptions and observations:[/FONT][/SIZE]

Priti:

This is excellent information and comes as a big surprise
to me. My knowledge of Delhi schools is quite outdated and
at that time the situtation wasn't all that great..though
a lot better than a rural school in another state.

If this is indeed being implemented and being put
into practice than I must say that Sheila Dixit has been
doing a remarkable job.

I'm not going to summarise all the info you brought
about since that post is loaded with good stuff.

But here are some comments on some specific things:

o The usage of computers in Haryana/Rajasthan/UP etc could
be a challenge. Very few know what to do with them. They collect
dust or either are stolen or stripped for their parts. That is
what has happened in Haryana from what I gathered.

Also I am not sure about internet connectivity. I assume that
if the computers are being maintained for accountability
purposes (attendance and so on) they they must be sending that
information to some central repository. So that could be a
problem.

However, maybe for the pusposes of "Harya" maybe we can assume
that we do have some sort of sort of computerised system.
Perhaps that is not far fetched ????? (Anyone know any better
here).

o Regarding teacher attendance and relying of a computer for this.
It seems to me that what happens is that a teacher is required to
sign-in. I feel that that again is no assurance here. If the
system is on the net than a teacher could sign in from anywhere.
If the system is not on the net then signing in is no different
than before. Teachers share each others id and passwords and sign
in for each other ! So I am not clear how this sytem stops them from
beating the system. It is as much open to abuse than the previous
sign in paper register.

Again that is why I think the students + parents should be the
ones who should have the leading role here.

o I was not under the impression that most schools in Haryana are
only upto 5th grade. I thought most are upto 10th grade and many are
upto 12th now.

But for purposes of "Harya" we are assuming that it is upto
12th grade.

o Most other points that you brought up are indeed very good and
implementable. We'll keep track of them.

For our purposes the context of district level administration etc
would be skipped since we just want to focus on "Harya" and
accountability at "Harya"s level.


BTW: I found the Delhi Education web site as:

http://delhigovt.nic.in/education.asp

I haven't gone through it yet to see what wll is there. I did see that
there was a link for employee attendance.

If others have time they might want to navigate this site to
search for pertinent information for "Harya".

 

[raj_rathee]

My dear Raj,

The dream of an ideal village is realisable if a few of us have the passion. No village will be averse to such an adopition. subsequently this village can become the torch bearer for other villages. Yes an able and selfless administrator[full time] along with a few of work hand will be needed. Absolutely sensible and getable. My best wishes!

Thanks Dev Chacha for your continued interest.

I was wondering that since you live in Bombay and if I am not
wrong Maharashtra govt. is usally one of the more efficient and
proactive ones, perhaps we might find something
to learn from them ?

Would you happen to know any specifics about what goes on
in *rural* schools in that state ? Perhaps if you have time
you might want to browse for any Mahrashtra site for education
related policies and implementation details.

That information could come in real handy as we try to look into
details of imlementation...like Sukhda and Priti brought out
issues of teacher evaluation and accountability.

Do share with us any info you have or able to find out.

 

[raj_rathee]

I forgot to add that Training(mainly in the form of seminars) has been made compulsory for the tearchers in delhi government schools on their subjects. In these seminars they are made aware of any changes and/or new additions every year.

Also, if you read the purpose and description of this thread as defined by Raj Rathee, the point here is to get ideas and discuss them to arrive at best solutions. We are not discussing whats happening in delhi schools for the sake of appreciating their measures but discussing the merits so that we get some ideas for our topic.

Best wishes
Priti

Good points Priti.

The training aspects are important. If anyone here knows what Haryana
(or UP, Rajasthan ) has in place for teacher training please share that as
well. This is an important point. But we need to know the ground reality
as well. We cannot expect "teacher training" to be setup just for "Harya".
So if this is already non existent then it might be tough.

However that is what this "think tank" is supposed to figure out.
If there is no such training framework already setup, maybe it could
be possible to have a deal whereby "Harya" teachers can get
additional training via existing infrastructure (eg. via Delhi system, or via
B.Ed courses that are already in place etc.).

In the face of no existing framework we need to find workarounds !What other ideas would people have ?

 

[raj_rathee]

Raj,
If you are talking about the schools of the villages of any of the state of INDIA then the situation is as follows.

1. There is no feedback form for the teachers.
2. Most of the population of the students in the govt schools are of the very poor people or those don't want educate their kids.
3. Most of the teachers(80%) don't go inside the class rooms. They call the students under neem ka darkhat(Tree) in the playground, it doesn't matter even the period of maths or science.
4. Teachers are not updated with the latest news.
5. Most of the teachers talk about teree makka kaisee hai, meree to tubel kee raat motor jal gayee hai, Mera transformer kharab pada hai, Mere gaon mai xyz pradhan ban gaya hai(It is about the male teachers)
5. Lady teachers aake apna sweter buntee hai.
6. SC/ST students are comming only for bajifa (Amount of money, which is given for SC/ST condidate).
7. In priamry schools, in most of the schools, you will find only one teacher to handle 5 classes( From 1st to 5th Class)

Or many more ......................

Points well taken Hamendra. The overall situation is bad. When I made
refernce to "any" state what I am trying to avoid is specific
reference to Haryana. As mentioned in previous posts "Harya" can be in
any of "our" states...Haryana, Rajasthan, UP. The only caveat
is that of the assumptions already laid out for Harya.

So for the purposes of "Harya" we will continue to assume the
basic infrastructure of a typical "Haryana" 10+2 rural school.

We just want to increase quality for that specific target.

 

[singhkapoor]

Current Policy???

After going through Priti’s post it seems that Delhi govt. has a very comprehensive education policy in place; although it will be interesting to see how much of it is being honestly implemented.

Policy documents are written by senior administrative officials (IAS officers) and it is safe to assume that they have done a good job on paper; so, it is highly likely that Delhi’s neighbor, Haryana, has a “similar” policy in place. The second but more important & difficult part is to get the policy implemented, for this we will need the support of an influential social group and the backing of a sincere politician.

It would save us a lot of energy if we could have access to Haryana’s current policy and see whether it can be further improved, which may not be needed at all. If that's the case, we can concentrate on those portions of the policy that can be easily implemented with the help of the local govt. (panchayat) and the chief minister.

Otherwise, at the end of this exercise, we might end up with a document that in principle is already a part of the current policy but is not being implemented. How about helping the wheel get out of the rut than trying to re-invent it?

Raj’s idea of carrying out the experiment in one village makes a lot of sense because it is more realistic to expect the govt. to take baby steps than to hit the ground running esp. when it has been lying sick in bed since time immemorial. Success of this idea in Harya can act as a catalyst and become a watershed that can forever change people’s attitude towards govt. schools.

Best Wishes