Quality of primary education needs to be enhanced

When can primary education be called successful? There are multiple answers, but the easiest answer is, it can be called successful when it teaches children basic literacy and numeracy.

If that is so, our primary is far from success. Various studies indicate that half of the students who complete primary education, cannot read nor write nor solve simple math. They enter secondary school with this incomplete knowledge. Some of them drop out and some manage to overcome somehow.

A World Bank report published recently found this sorry state of education. The report says a child’s four and half years out of 11 years of school life are wasted. They learn lessons equivalent to curricula of six and half years in that 11 years. Three students out of four of fifth grade cannot solve common maths equivalent to their class. Around 35 per cent third grade students cannot read properly while 43 per cent of them cannot give complete answers to any question. Those students will not be able to deliver properly when they grow and join the workforce.

Despite realising this, it has not been possible to educate the children properly. This suggests there is weakness in the educational system. The WB indentified four main reasons of this. These are weak programmes for enhancing quality of childhood, substandard teaching, weak school management system and little investment by the government. These problems have to be addressed. The quality of primary education has not improved though many surveys were carried out, many commissions formed and the textbooks changed. Instead of making the textbooks lucid, those are being made more complex every year.

Students should become interested in studying in their childhood. The environment at school and home plays a vital role in their development. Enhancing teaching quality is a must. And schooling begins at home too. Children are being burdened with the books, but the result is a big failure, which is not acceptable at all.

There are debates about what the quality education means or how the quality can be measured. Another related question is, is education for creating better human beings or good grades for a better job? The debate will go on but there is no debate about ensuring minimum quality. This minimum quality is to be able to read, write and do common maths. The problem is, this minimum quality is not being ensured.

The process of evaluation will come to the fore while discussing quality. As a child should not be kept confined to a place for not being able to learn something, in the same way, they should not be promoted to the next level without teaching anything. Appropriate steps should be taken to address enable the students to overcome their failures and work towards success.