Clustering of Schools in the hope of quality education An experiment in Maharashtra at implementing the National Education Policy, 2020

Mangaon is a hamlet of forty households on the Sahyadri Mountains, along the backwaters of the Panshet reservoir in the Pune District of Maharashtra. As mandated by the Right to Education Act, 2009, Pune’s Zilha Parishad operates the primary school in the hamlet, though the enrolment is just 20 students from standards 1st to 5th and two teachers teach them. Sayee is a student of Class 3 in the school but studies the curriculum and participates in activities for Classes 1 and 2 as well, because just one teacher teaches all of them, simultaneously. In Pune District, each village has over two schools. 2964 schools have less than 60 students in all 5 primary classes and are taught by only 2 teachers. According to U-DISE data from 2016 – 17, nearly 28% of India’s public primary schools and 14.8% of India’s upper primary schools have fewer than 30 students. There are 1,08,317 single-teacher schools in India, a majority of which are primary schools.

?When schools reopen after the Diwali vacations, Sayee and her schoolmates from Mangoan would board new school buses to travel to Panshet to study in a Cluster School that is being set up by Pune’s Zilha Parishad by enrolling students 249 students from 16 public schools from habitations that are within a road distance of 10 kilometers from the new school.?

Quality Education – Infrastructure, Academics & Governance

?Clause 7 of National Education Policy 2020 has correctly identified the judicious clustering of small schools into larger schools as a necessary condition to achieve the goal of quality education. An analysis of the National Education Policy, the school accreditation systems of various boards and the policies of state governments shows that a public school is expected to have up to 18 pieces of infrastructure to deliver the expected academic and extracurricular lessons. Pune Zilla Parishad operates 3638 primary schools, of which 403 schools have an enrolment of 150 or more students each. Cumulatively they teach 50% of its 2.30 Lakh students studying in Pune Zilha Parishad’s Schools. A scheme announced for ensuring all requisite infrastructure in these 403 Zilha Parishad schools is estimated to cost Rs. 96 Crores, the cost per child is Rs. 90,000/-; while for smaller schools, the rough estimated cost per child would be Rs. 6.4 Lakh; for example, the cost for television to deliver eLearning remains the same regardless of the number of students in a classroom. Lower costs per child would mean that public finances would suffice any institution recognized as a school would not be just in name but would guarantee the requisite infrastructure as per the National Education Policy for each child. The School Accreditation Authority, proposed in the National Education Policy, would regularly evaluate schools and accredit them – it is, therefore, necessary for state governments and local bodies to rapidly invest public finances to upgrade schools and for its judiciousness of the expenditure, it is imperative to form cluster schools.

Children studying in schools with low enrolments are at a disadvantage in attaining requisite learning outcomes and in the development of their personalities. Peer learning is important to attain both. In villages, children also carry their social identities with them to school, making it difficult for them to carve out their individuality and perpetuating social evils for the next generation. ?Teachers frequently teach all subjects to multiple grades, including subjects in which they may not have any educational qualification or training. The National Education Policy & the Curriculum Framework makes it mandatory to teach subjects such as computer programming, arts, sports etc. which would require specialised teachers that are difficult to provide to schools with few students. Several experts from around the world have reported that leadership in schools is an important determinant of its success. ?Given the staffing rules, schools with low enrolments do not have a full-time Principal affecting school governance and leadership.?

Despite several advantages, a national policy, a central sector scheme under Samgra Siksha Abhiyan that grants Rs. 6000 per student every year to travel to a school beyond two kilometers, and financial incentives to weaker sections of the society to attend schools from the Government of Maharashtra, cluster schools have been a non-starter as every proposal has always been met with protests forcing authorities to abandon them. A false rumor that has been making rounds since mid-September that schools with less than 20 enrolled students would be shut by the Government of Maharashtra has evoked sharp protests from political parties and social activists, forcing senior ministers and officers to repeatedly deny any such decision. The decision of Pune Zilla Parishad to implement the National Education Policy 2020 by establishing a cluster school in Panshet, a region with mountainous terrain with heavy rainfall, has been a courageous move that has taken nearly One and half years of persistent and determined efforts to earn the support of all stakeholders.?

The Midday Meal Program has helped in improving the nutrition levels of children and has helped encourage enrolment in school & regular attendance. The grains are provided by the Government and meals are cooked by locals who typically oppose shutting schools fearing a loss of livelihood. Similarly, School Management Committees stand to lose social status when their schools are shut, and grants for repairs, payments of utility bills, purchase of school uniforms etc. They usually encourage the local political leaders to lead protests against establishing cluster schools. When the proposal was establishing a cluster school was conceived, Ayush Prasad, Chief Executive Officer of Pune’s Zilha Parishad and his team roped in local leaders who had been regularly complaining about teacher absenteeism in remote schools and discussed with them the possibility of a school that can impart high-quality education. Since there could be other possible sites for this school, they encouraged the local leaders to demand the project in their constituency by demonstrating public support. The leaders met with and discussed with school management committees. Seeing the potential for a better quality of education, parents readily gave letters of intent of sending children to the cluster school.

Simultaneously, Zilla Parishad roped in the Janki Devi Bajaj Foundation, an organisation with a reputation for improving the quality of infrastructure in several public schools in the district, to build the school under Corporate Social Responsibility. Their participation in the project added to its credibility. Most teachers travel to the schools every day. Since they were getting a chance to work at a centrally located place, they readily agreed. Currently, 37 teachers are teaching at 16 schools, after the schools would be clustered into one school, there would be eleven teachers and one headmaster. The teachers could specialise and be trained to teach different classes and different subjects. Teacher’s Unions fear that if clustering of schools is implemented on a large scale, many teachers may lose convenient places of postings or may be forced into early retirement. The National Education Policy requires teachers to teach specialised subjects such as computer programming or teach children with special needs– teachers could be trained by District Institutes of Education & Training under the National Council of Teacher Training.

The yellow school bus has been emblematic of belonging to a good school due to the advent of private schools that brand themselves. Children aspire to travel by a yellow school bus to reach school and are excited at the possibility. Pune Zilla Parishad roped in Force Motors to provide two buses. The company would experiment with two models in the school- one bus would be owned by Pune Zilha Parishad and the other by a local entrepreneur who shall own the bus & provide services. The payment to the operator would involve the number of children being transported to school – thereby supporting the punctual & day-long attendance of students.

Though Pune’s Zilla Parishad has micro-planned the initiative and has successfully managed to bring in all stakeholders. There is a risk of external activists infiltrating the region and encouraging protests to force their ideas. Bureaucratic tenures are short and they would be transferred soon for their next assignment thereby changing the organizational priorities. ?Nonetheless, the project has the potential of delivering better education for Sayee and her friends and giving wings to her dreams in a remote area of the district. The outcomes of the project would set the tone for the implementation of the National Education Policy 2020.?