A Nationwide Survey Maps Educational Landscape in India’s Villages

Newsreel Asia Insight #107
Jan. 18, 2024

The findings of a nationwide survey, focusing on the educational landscape of youths aged 14-18 in rural India, reveal several critical issues. These include a high dropout rate, a significant deficiency in foundational skills, a noticeable gender gap in educational attainment and a stark scarcity of vocational training opportunities. These revelations are consequential, as a substantial 65% of India’s population resides in rural areas.

The Annual Status of Education Report (ASER) 2023, titled “Beyond Basics” and released by a Delhi-based NGO, ASER Centre, on Jan. 17, delves into the lives of 14-18-year-old youths because it’s a critical transitional phase from childhood to adulthood. This age group, just four years after the completion of the education guaranteed by the Right to Education Act at age 14, faces the onset of adult responsibilities.

The NGO says that previous ASER data highlighted a concerning trend: many students, despite completing eight years of elementary education, lacked foundational skills. Furthermore, there was limited understanding of their activities and preparedness for future challenges during this interim period.

The ASER 2017 survey had already shed light on these issues, revealing that 14.4% of youths in this age group were not enrolled in formal education, only 5% were engaged in vocational training, and a significant proportion lacked basic academic and general knowledge skills. These findings underscored the urgency for India to take action to realise its potential “demographic dividend” by equipping young people with essential knowledge and skills.

Six years later, the survey reveals that 13.2% of youths in this age group are still not enrolled in formal education. A closer look uncovers a concerning age-related disparity: while only 3.9% of 14-year-olds are not enrolled, this figure escalates to 32.6% for 18-year-olds. This trend suggests a significant dropout rate as students age, potentially due to economic pressures or cultural factors.

While the dropout rate among females has thankfully dropped and is now roughly equivalent to that of the boys, the report remarks, “Girls are staying in school longer, but this does not imply that they are gaining the knowledge, skills, or confidence needed to successfully negotiate their lives as adults.”

In terms of educational streams, a majority (55.7%) opt for Arts/Humanities, followed by STEM, or Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics (31.7%), and Commerce (9.4%). The preference for Arts/Humanities could reflect the perceived accessibility or relevance of this stream in rural contexts.

Notably, there’s a gender gap in STEM enrolment, with fewer females (28.1%) than males (36.3%), highlighting a gender disparity in access to or interest in STEM fields.

Further, only a small fraction (5.6%) of surveyed youth are engaged in vocational training, predominantly in short-term courses. This low percentage points to a potential gap in skill-based education, which is crucial for employability. This situation is alarming, as agriculture is increasingly becoming economically unsustainable for households. Consequently, generating income from alternative sources has become essential for their financial wellbeing.

Another glaring challenge emerges in the domain of foundational skills. Roughly 25% of the surveyed youths cannot fluently read a Standard II level text in their regional language, and over half struggle with basic division problems. This deficiency in fundamental literacy and numeracy skills is alarming, as it forms the bedrock of further educational and vocational success.

And there are notable gender disparities. Females outperform males in regional language reading, while males do better in arithmetic and English. This difference could be attributed to societal roles and expectations influencing educational focus and opportunities.

In the digital domain, nearly 90% of youths have access to a smartphone, but only 9% have a computer at home. Digital literacy is skewed towards males, both in terms of ownership and skill proficiency. This digital divide is critical in the context of the increasing importance of technology in education and the workforce.

The survey included a task where the youth were required to use Google Maps to estimate the travel time from their location to the district bus stand, either by a two-wheeler or a four-wheeler. Among those who attempted this digital task, less than 40% (37%) could accurately determine the travel time, marking it as the task with the lowest success rate. While nearly half of the male participants (49%) successfully used the app to calculate the travel duration to the bus stand, only a quarter (25%) of the female participants managed to accomplish this task.

Suman Bhattacharjea, Director of Research at ASER Centre, remarked, “The expectation that girls should conform to social and family expectations and refrain from independent action clearly structures the lives and thoughts of many of them. How then can young women develop curiosity, critical thinking, and the courage to take risks? In the ASER 2017 report I wrote an article (‘No Response’) on the fact that sampled females were not only doing worse on every single assessment item than sampled males, they were also refusing to even attempt the questions far more often than their male counterparts. In that article I used the example of Rita, a young woman I met during ASER fieldwork in Gujarat, whose attitude screamed an absolute rejection of all things academic – even though she herself had completed eight years of schooling – and who refused to even engage with the tasks, let alone try to do them.

“It is unfortunate that six years later, ASER 2023 data shows exactly the same pattern. On every single one of the 17 assessment tasks spanning applied arithmetic, applied reading, financial calculations, and digital tasks, far more females failed to attempt the task than males. Averaged across all these tasks, the no-response rate was 8.7% among males and 13.3% among females.”