Annual Status of Education Report 2018 Presents Shocking Statistics

Education is a very basic need of each and every individual. Education teaches us the way of life, the way to meaningful living and makes us self-dependent.

The government in India has been making continuous efforts in order to impart quality education to the vast population of India. New government as well as private schools are opening up every now and then. The real and one of the most important question is that are these efforts sufficient or all the efforts are being done in vain? Indeed no. As per the Annual Status of the Education Report (ASER) 2018, by NGO Pratham, there has hardly been any improvement with respect to learning in the last few years. The statistics reveal that around 56% students of Class VIII are unable to divide a three digit number with a single digit one; 72% students cannot perform any division at all; 70% of class 3 students fail to perform subtraction at all. Despite so many efforts by the government, the situation is turning from bad to worse day by day. In the year 2008, 37% of students enrolled in class 5 could do basic mathematics, and presently less than 28% can. This situation is not just restricted to mathematics only. The students are equally performing poor in English also. The reading skills are very poor. Nearly, 84.8% students of class 8 could not read class 2 level texts in the year 2008 and approximately 72.8% students cannot read these texts in the present year. It clearly means that one out of four children are leaving class 8 without the basic reading skills. According to these statistics, girls are way behind boys in terms of basic arithmetic knowledge. Only about 44% girls could solve the division problems as compared with 50% of the boys. On the contrary, girls are doing better than boys in some states such as Himachal Pradesh, Kerela, Karnataka, Tamil Nadu. The report has been prepared after gathering data from about 596 rural districts in nearly 28 states. The survey was conducted on over 3.5 lakh households and 5.5 lakh children in the age group of 3- 16 years. Indeed some big steps need to be taken by the government in order to ensure that the education that is imparted is quality education and that the students do not just pass one exam after the other just for the sake of formality.

By: Anuja Arora

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