They say education is not preparation of life but is life in itself. Nelson Mandela aptly said, “Education is the most powerful we can use to change the world”.
Children in schools must be taught how to think and not what to think. Teachers and schools play a very important role in moulding children and educating them for a better future. Thus it is necessary for a state and a country to invest in education and schools, after all children are the future of the country. You will reap what you’ll sow
Rajasthan state government has taken several steps in strengthening the education system in the state. During 2015-16 budget announcements, Chief Minister of Rajasthan, Vasundhara Raje announced that one school, (preferably from class I-X/XII) will be developed in every gram panchayat of the state. These schools be called as Adarsh School and will be developed in a phased manner. Adarsh schools shall work as mentor schools and resource centres for other schools located in the Gram Panchayat. 9895 Government schools have been identified to be developed as Adarsh School
- 1340 by 31.03.2016
- 3097 by 31.03.2017
- 5458 by 31.03.2018
Talking about the same, the state education minister, Vasudev Devnani said, “We want to have 10,000 such Adarsh schools, where classes 1 to 12 will be under one roof. Earlier we used to have separate primary, secondary and senior secondary schools. Students had to take a certificate to migrate to another level of education or school. This was causing difficulties for teachers, students and parents. The dropout rate was also high. So we have decided to set up one Adarsh school in each gram panchayat on the pattern of private schools.”
These Adarsh schools will be large integrated schools with adequate number of highly qualified teachers as per the norms. These schools will include smart infrastructural facilities like adequate number of class rooms, boundary wall, playground, computer labs, library, and separate toilets for boys and girls etc. These schools so far so have been able to bring a significant change in the education system in the state of Rajasthan. Enrolment for these schools has increased by 21% in the current session.
The Rajasthan government has been constantly moving towards improving the quality of education in the state. With such efforts Rajasthan soon will come up with schools that will set as a role model for other private schools in the state and the country as well. State Education Minister said, “To improve education standards, we decided to run some schools on a PPP (Public-Private-Partnership) basis. This is a limited experiment with the aim of providing quality education to children at costs matching those of government schools. We want to have schools that will become role models for others in the state.”
According to this policy more than 13000 schools in the state will be merged, aiming at pooling in resources at one place, further ensuring availability of teachers and bringing education to the same level. We believe, this policy will gain high support in the state and the reasons are obvious. The private schools in the state aren’t affordable by everyone, so what about the poor residents? Rajasthan government has answers to all such questions. The poor children are being provided with bicycles to travel to the schools if they live within 5 km from the school. The children who need to travel more than 5 km every day to reach their school are being provided with a transport voucher of Rs. 20 everyday.
PPP policy allows the government schools to be run privately. The state education minister says that this is a trial for only 10 schools in the state. If the privately run government schools will turn out to be a success, the government will implement the policy on other schools, and if not, the contract (that is for 10 years) will cancelled. Private schools here are getting a tough completion from the government schools and adarsh schools. The Rajasthan state government is taking necessary steps in improving the education quality in the state and putting an end to myths like ‘private schools have better facilities than government schools’ or ‘private schools provide better education than government school’.
Where on one hand the government says that the comparison between the government/Adarsh schools is unjustified because private schools only admit students who score more than 60 per cent marks, whereas the government admit those who get even 33 per cent, what do you think? Will the Adarsh Schools turn out to be a big competition and threat to the private schools? Or will private schools continue to fool people on the name of quality education and better services?
