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Carving a niche in the knowledge era
The elitist, tiny tip of the Indian education pyramid can compare with the best anywhere in the world. The endeavour now is to make more slices of the growing pie affordable to all.
- By Rajendar Menen, Gulf News Report
- Published: 00:00 November 23, 2006
- In its bid to modernise the education process, the HRD ministry in India has pioneered a one-stop education portal for 500 million users. Called Sakshat, it gives broadband connectivity to nearly 500,000 college teachers of central and state universities.
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With more than a billion people and still growing rapidly in numbers and diversity, India places great importance on education.
India has an ancient tradition of education starting with the Gurukul system, one of the oldest on earth, and then leading on to the prestigious centres of learning at Nalanda, Takshila, Ujjain and several others.
By the 18th century, schools of indigenous learning had spread all over India. One hundred years later, the British laid the foundation of today's modern education system.
In addition to the Indian Institutes of Technology (IIT) and the Indian Institutes of Management (IIM), there are innumerable hubs of excellence in science, engineering, medicine and the liberal arts, producing manpower capable of managing global corporations and providing intellectual leadership to a nation that is fast carving a niche for itself in the global knowledge-based economy.
The Indian education system is constantly evolving and rivals the best in the world in parts. But a lot remains to be done if the excellence has to spill out evenly and democratically across innumerable cultural and economic subtexts.
IT and BT
A ferocious tiger economy today, India is harnessing its skills in information technology (IT) and biotechnology (BT) in its global economic thrust. It has a large higher education sector, the third largest in the world in student numbers after China and the United States; uses English as a primary language of higher education and research; and has a rich ethos of knowledge and learning.
But its main competitors, especially China, Singapore, Taiwan and South Korea, have an edge as they are investing in large and differentiated higher education systems.
They are providing access to a large number of students at the bottom of the academic system while at the same time building some research-based universities that are able to compete with the world's best.
According to Philip G. Altbach, Director of the Centre for International Higher Education at Boston College, India educates approximately 10 per cent of its young people in higher education compared with more than half in the major industrialised countries and 15 per cent in China. And that's the rub. The government knows it and all efforts are being made to make quality education accessible to all.
Mandatory education
After officially banning child labour from October 10, the Indian government is stridently mooting the case for mandatory primary education. But education has to generate visible and quick employment and unless that happens quickly the case for mandatory education remains weak for large sections of the population still relying on numbers for some sort of economic deliverance.
While subsidised government schools with free meals and textbooks perform a valuable function, think tanks confirm that private schools have the edge in several parts of India.
Two-thirds of the children in urban Maharashtra, Uttar Pradesh and Tamil Nadu, three of India's largest states, are now in private schools. According to National Sample Surveys, spending on education has risen from 1.2 per cent of per capita expenditure in 1983 to close to five per cent today.
In urban areas it's risen even faster from 2.1 per cent to more than six per cent. Apparently, private schools are spearheading the new thrust for literacy.
According to Professor James Tooley of the University of Newcastle, even unrecognised schools in Hyderabad's slums delivered mean scores in mathematics that were 22 percentage points higher than public schools.
A national study led by the education NGO Pratham confirmed that even in villages 16 per cent of the kids are now enrolled in private primary schools and their reading and math scores were 10 points higher.
Educating millions of young people, more in numbers than the entire population of the US, and then bringing them within the reach of higher education is no easy task even for the most efficient systems. India has its work cut out.
Education portal
In its bid to modernise and streamline the education process, the Human Resources Development (HRD) ministry has now pioneered a one-stop education portal for 500 million users.
Called Sakshat (be a lamp unto yourself), it was formally launched as a pilot scheme by President Kalam. In this scheme, the University Grants Commission (UGC) will give broadband connectivity to nearly 500,000 college teachers of central and state universities.
They are to be plugged into new education methodologies that are expected to percolate to their wards across the length and breadth of India. According to Education Secretary Sudeep Banerjee, this is a first-of-its-kind initiative.
Joint Secretary N. K. Sinha adds that Sakshat is aimed at tapping the country's talent and will address all education and learning-related needs of students, scholars, teachers and lifelong learners. By 2007 the portal is expected to reach out to students in 700 cities.
With content developed by UGC, AICTE, IGNOU, NCERT, KVS, NVS, CBSE, IITs and IISc, Sakshat will provide links to vast knowledge resources, educational news, examination alerts, sample papers and other useful links available on the web.
It has an in-built repository of educational resources, online testing facilities and five functional modules, from accessing educational resources and scholarship to knowledge tests, links to various Olympiads and faculty interaction through e-mail, weblogging, webcasting, online chat and discussion forums. The portal will also have an in-built virtual class system.
Other players
Beckoned by the Indian potential, several other players are also chipping in. IBM's ‘Re-inventing Education' programme in Chennai, which gets critical early next year, for example, focuses on professional development and training for teachers in the middle and secondary school sectors through the synergy of new curriculum and teaching methods.
The programme, initially in Tamil Nadu and Andhra Pradesh before it ventures to other parts of India, will involve more than 30 schools and reach out to more than 7,000 students in Grades VI to X over a two-year period.
The elitist, tiny tip of the Indian education pyramid can compare with the best anywhere in the world. The endeavour now is to make more slices of the growing pie affordable to all. If the current initiatives pan out as planned, India may well seize the knowledge era with greater profit.
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