Education is one of the essentials for the holistic development of a nation. It is education which determines the status of nations in the world. In fact education revolutionizes our outlook, behavior and vision. It leads us to enlightenment and empowerment. The Indian constitution proclaims education as a fundamental right but unfortunately the cherished goals of education have not been crystallized as yet. A large chunk of population is still out of schools. Thus, this problem of dropout rates has impeded our way to empowerment and enlightenment. The drop out menace is posing enormous challenges to achieve satisfactory Gross Enrollment Ratio, both at State and National level. It is estimated that at least 1% annual decline is observed in the national enrollment ratio. This is a grave and alarming situation which needs our immediate attention and necessary steps have to be taken to curtail the dropout rates so that access to education at all levels is facilitated.
Challenges/ Issues in JK Context
So far as the challenges and issues with regard to dropout phenomenon vis-à-vis J&K are concerned they are diverse. Some of the major challenges and issues are:
Infrastructure: Inadequate school facilities like accommodation, unavailability of clean drinking water, proper toilet facilities, especially for girl students, lack of proper health check up.
Access: The problem of easy access to schools, especially for girls, is quite visible in so many cases.
Human resource: Lack of trained teachers, lack of sufficient human resource, and non availability of subject specific teachers.
Examination: Less emphasis on critical thinking in science among young learners.
Socio-cultural and Economic factors:
- Low Scio-Economic status of families of the drop outs.
- Less exposure to modernity.
- Low educational and occupational attainment of parents.
- Household engagement of girl students.
- Lack of proper guidance and motivation of drop outs.
- Taking care of younger siblings especially in the case of girl dropouts.
- Child labor.
- Problems of stagnation and non enrollment.
Personal Causes:
- Poor academic performance in the class.
- Single parent families.
- Early marriage.
- Wrong company.
- Family conflicts.
Migration of Nomads: It has been observed that the children of nomadic families are worst sufferers and prone to dropout phenomenon as they have to move periodically in search of green pastures to feed their cattle; in the process their children do not get adequate opportunities to enroll in the schools. This has added to the drop out phenomenon in such communities.
Prevailing uncertainty: The UT of J&K has been witnessing socio- political uncertainty for many decades which has resulted in frequent closure of educational institutions, making students uninterested in academic activities. This too has resulted in the dropouts rates.
Lack of Psychological Support: There is no psychological support in schools for vulnerable students. Educational councilors could have been of great help for such students.
No Active community mobilization: There is not any active community mobilization to lure the parents of drop outs to readmit their wards back to schools.
As we are beset with issues regarding dropout rates, in order to mitigate the problem we have to devise an efficient mechanism face these issues.
Recommendations:
The need of the hour is to have a thorough and scientific study of dropout phenomena and seek suggestions from all stakeholders. In the light of NEP – 2020, following recommendations can be made:
- Providing effective and sufficient infrastructure so that students have access to safe and engaging school education at all levels from pre primary schools to grade 12, providing trained subject specific teachers. There should be provision for conduct of extra curricular activities. All the schools should be provided with science/math/language labs, besides well equipped ICT labs. There should be separate toilets for boys and girls. Spacious playgrounds have to be provided to all schools. Regular and vibrant accountability system should be in place. Students should be provided with necessary medical assistance and regular health check up. Safe and practical conveyances, and hostels, especially for girls. Setting up of alternative and innovative education centers.
- Universal participation: We have to achieve universal participation in schools by carefully tracking students as well as their learning levels. We have to create suitable opportunities to catch up such dropouts. Councilors, and well trained social workers connected to schools must be involved to ensure that school children are attending schools.
- Encouraging multiple entries learning to the children of migrant workers.
- Establishments of schools for nomadic communities (Bakarwal).
- Opening up of evening schools for the children involved in labor due to very poor economic conditions.
- Open and Distance Learning (ODL) Programmers offered by the National Institute of Open Schooling (NIOS) and State Open Schools should be encouraged and strengthened for meeting the learning needs of young people in JK UT.
- Appointment of local teachers for teaching in local language in areas with language barriers.
- Constant reviewing of curriculum to make it competitive, engaging and dynamic to meet all the emerging challenges and make the students confident, self-reliant and skillful,
- Vocational education should be imparted to the students for sustainable life style.
- Strong emphasis should be on digital learning.
- Facilitating students with hassle free scholarships.
- Developing leadership qualities among the teachers working in the department in different capacities.
- Encouraging teachers who work professionally with zeal, dedication and hard work enhancing the quality of education.
CONCLUSION:
It is an established fact that the holistic development of a nation solely depends on the quality of education. The transformation of societies can be brought through education. Sustainable development can be achieved only when every citizen has access to education at all levels. The Right to Education is a step to achieve this purpose. As such curtailing the dropout rates becomes inevitable to achieve this cherished goal.
Nasir Hussain Peerzadah, Senior Research Officer, DIET Ganderbal Kashmir