NCERT School Survey: A must know for UPSC current affairs

Indian Express

17 hours ago

Take a look at the essential concepts, terms, quotes, or phenomena every day and brush up on your knowledge. Here's your knowledge nugget for today on an important school survey.
(Relevance: The Education sector is crucial for the government to attain the goal of Vikshit Bharat. This survey provides an assessment report on the initiatives taken by the government and identifies areas that require further attention. The data provided in the article can be used for value addition in your UPSC Mains. Importantly, questions have been asked on this sector in the UPSC exam. )
Learning levels are yet to bounce back to pre-Covid levels in the primary stage, with students in Class 3 still not having caught up with the performance recorded in 2017, reveals Parakh Rashtriya Sarvekshan 2024, a survey conducted by the National Council of Educational Research and Training (NCERT).
The PARAKH Rashtriya Sarvekshan, which was called the National Achievement Survey (NAS) in previous iterations, assessed 21.15 lakh students in Classes 3, 6, and 9 across 74,229 schools in December 2024.
1. Class 3 students assessed in language and Mathematics fared better compared to 2021, when learning levels were captured in the wake of the pandemic and the resultant disruptions in education, but their scores remained lower than the pre-Covid level in 2017.
2. Notably, the scores of only Class 3 can be compared with 2017 and 2021 since it is the only common class in all three rounds of assessment. The 2017 NAS was held for Classes 3, 5 and 8, while the 2021 NAS was for Classes 3, 5, 8, and 10.
3. Significantly, the 2024 survey was aligned with the stages of the National Education Policy 2020, under which Class 3 marks the end of the foundational stage of school education, Class 6 the end of the preparatory stage, and Class 9 the end of the middle stage. The objective of this survey is to evaluate the effectiveness of India's school education system by assessing competencies at various educational stages.
4. According to its findings, Class 3 students recorded an average national score of 64% in language in 2024 — a two-percentage-point increase from 62% in 2021, but lower than the 2017 score of 66.7%. Similarly, in Maths, the national average score in 2024 was 60% — above the 57% recorded in 2021, but below 63% scored in 2017.
5. In terms of the language competencies they were assessed on, Class 3 students scored the lowest (60%) in reading short stories and comprehending their meaning, while they fared best (67%) in knowing and using words to carry out day-to-day interactions.
6. In Maths, Class 3 students fared poorly in geometric shapes and simple money transactions, scoring an average of 50% in both. They performed best (69%) in identifying simple patterns, shapes, and numbers.
7. PARAKH (Performance Assessment, Review and Analysis of Knowledge for Holistic Development) was set up in 2023 as the National Assessment Centre, with one of its mandates being to organise these achievement surveys.
8. The survey, spearheaded by the NCERT and the CBSE, assesses school students' learning achievements. A sample of school students from government, government-aided and private schools from each district in the country take the assessment.
Along with the Parakh survey, there are two other education assessments to gauge learning levels among children. Each tool offers a different lens to India's current education system.
Annual Status of Education Report (ASER) 2024
1. Since 2005, the NGO Pratham has released the Annual Status of Education Report (Rural) to measure basic reading and arithmetic levels among school children, attendance in school, and other indicators.
2. The 2024 survey, which was released in January this year, recorded major gains in the share of children of the pre-primary age group (3 to 5 years) enrolled in some kind of institution (LKG/UKG/Anganwadi/others).
3. There were substantial increases in reading and arithmetic levels – an encouraging development after the learning losses during the Covid-19 pandemic. This was also the first full-length ASER survey to record digital literacy among older children (15 and 16 years). Keeping with recent trends, the percentage of children in this age group not enrolled in school has gone down (around 7% today).
4. This year's survey also showed that in terms of digital access, more than 90% of rural adolescents have access to a smartphone. Children were also evaluated on their ability to do tasks such as searching for information online or setting an alarm. In terms of both accessibility and skills, there were some gender gaps. For instance, 80.1% of boys (ages 14 to 16) could browse for information, against 78.6% of girls. In some southern states, girls either outperformed boys or were at the same level as them.
5. According to the report, the basic reading levels for Class 3 children enrolled in government schools have been the highest since the survey began 20 years ago.
Reading level: The number of Class 3 children who can read a Class 2 textbook in government schools stands at 23.4%, up from 16.3% in 2022 and 20.9% in the pre-pandemic year of 2018. Overall reading levels, across both government and private schools, too improved from 20.5% in 2022 to 27.1% in 2024, almost touching the pre-pandemic level of 27.3%.
Arithmetic levels, too, improved across both government and private schools. The percentage of Class 5 students who can read a Class 2 textbook has gone up from 42.8% in 2022 to 48.7% in 2024.
6. FLS was a one-time nationwide exercise conducted by NCERT in 2022 to assess the Foundational Literacy and Numeracy (FLN) after the launch of the National Initiative for Proficiency in Reading with Understanding and Numeracy (NIPUN) Bharat in July 2021.
7. NIPUN is a national mission that aims to enable all children at the end of Grade 3 to attain foundational skills by the year 2026-2027.
8. The FLS Study is a school-based performance assessment where a selected sample of children from grade 3 were assessed by a test administrator in a one-on-one setting where each child responded to a set of questions administered orally.
9. It found that 37 per cent of students enrolled in Class III have 'limited' foundational numeracy skills, such as identifying numbers, while 11 per cent 'lack the most basic knowledge and skills'.
10. It also assessed the literacy skills of students in 20 languages, including English. While 15 per cent lacked 'basic skills' in English, 30 per cent were found to have 'limited skills'.
Consider the following statements:
1. Parakh Rashtriya Sarvekshan 2024, released by NITI Aayog, has revealed that the enrollment of students in class III has increased.
2. NIPUN mission aims to enable all children at the end of Grade 3 to attain foundational skills by the year 2026-2027.
Which of the following statements is/are correct?
(a) 1 only
(b) 2 only
(c) Both 1 and 2
(d) Neither 1 nor 2
(Source: Class 3 learning still lower than pre-Covid level: Govt survey, ASER 2024, National survey of students soon: What is it, how it has changed from previous years)
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Khushboo Kumari is a Deputy Copy Editor with The Indian Express. She has done her graduation and post-graduation in History from the University of Delhi. At The Indian Express, she writes for the UPSC section. She holds experience in UPSC-related content development. You can contact her via email: [e-mail] ... Read More