“It would take three years to bring the learning standards of these kids to the pre-pandemic levels” laments the middle-School teacher as she abruptly stops explaining the concept of LCM and HCM to the non-responsive sixth grade class. Exasperated, she then resorts to writing down on the blackboard the step-by-step method of dividing a three digit number by a single digit one, the arithmetic that was taught to them three years back. If the children has lost the understanding of division during the long years of school closure, their lack of multiplication skills now also cannot be far behind. And the teacher, hence, decides to pull out exercises on rudimentary multiplication from the class three textbook for the students to complete them as homework!

The loss of learning for children in the absence of physical schooling was, till now, merely discussed among a few teachers and academicians, that too in passing and in lighter vein. But the scale and the magnitude of this education regression in India is dawning upon the nation only now, with the recent publication of the National Assessment Survey that poignantly captures the extent of the damage. In all the parameters of mathematical and language skills and in the conceptual understanding of environmental science on which the children were tested across the country, the exposed learning gap is astonishingly wide and disturbingly deep and is alarmingly way below the national average as recorded in the year 2017. This loss in learning is found even in states that are traditionally better off in school education and the rot seems to be spread nearly evenly across the nation with the surprising exception of Punjab and Rajasthan. Though both these states scored above the national average, it’s Punjab that tops the list, outdoing all other states in eleven of the fifteen subject areas that the children were assessed and also by bettering its previous performance of the year 2017 by miles!

This strikingly phenomenal performance of one state in education cannot have come without the underlying and compelling socio-economic conditions and it is not hard to seek those factors that play out in Punjab. The singular ambition of an overwhelming majority of the Punjabi young population today is to immigrate and study abroad and eventually settle there. And to secure an admission in universities located in countries like Canada, Australia or New Zealand an impressive academic record is an essential prerequisite. To add to that, a decent score in IELTS, that mandatory test in English language aptitude for university admissions abroad drives almost the entire young population in the state to take up their studies seriously, pandemic or no pandemic. This is vouched by the fact that when the entire nation is gripped by the onslaught of the Corona bringing to halt every activity, the number of students appearing for and clearing IELTS in Punjab did not abate. Thus ambition, when channelised at the right direction has the power to buck the negative trend and bring in impressive results which could turn out to be a role model and inspire others to emulate.

But mere ambition of the population to study well without a robust support system in place would just remain a pipe dream and it is here the role and commitment of the schools and the teaching fraternity of Punjab needs special mention. The state opened its schools last year much before the neighbouring states did and once the schools began functioning physically, the entire teaching community drew up a comprehensive plan to cover the lost syllabus. Many schools added extra days to the academic calendar and bridge programs initiated to do the catching up. The internet penetration being very extensive and the digital divide somewhat blurred in the state, the participation in online classes were much more in Punjab. With teachers enthusiastically lapping up the myriad digital tools available for teaching, the online classes proved decently effective in accomplishing the learning objectives and also did prevent any major slide back in retention. While all these may have also tried out in other states, it is the scale and the commitment of the vast majority of the stakeholders to roll out these initiatives that made the critical difference! 

The findings of the National Assessment Survey though would be a shocker for many, also affords us the opportunity to approach the problem with a fresh perspective, and the experiment and success in Punjab could act as a guidepost in this effort. As suggested in another report, this time by the ADB, the learning loss if not corrected soon could adversely impact the GDP of the nation in the medium run.  It is upon all associated with the school education to take note of the enormity of the task in hand to reverse the trend and there isn’t a day to delay this process. The need of the hour is to be on a mission mode and the time to act is NOW! 

 Chad De, which in Punjabi means “Go for It”!

Yours

Narayanan