More dismal education news

More evidence that student learning level deficiencies should count as among our most worrying governance failures comes from ASER 2011.

The lag in learning levels is truly staggering. The graphic below shows how children in Class V lag behind in reading and basic math.



Worse still, this learning level lag has been increasing over the years in both languages and math. This lag has been increasing steadily over the past four years in both government and private schools. There also exists a considerable, 10-20 percentage points, differential in learning deficiency between private and government schools.




Attendance continues to be a major problem in the traditional BIMARU states. Further, private school penetration remains weak in Bihar, Orissa, Chattisgarh, Jharkhand, and MP.