Education in India

Parliamentary Roundup - Teacher shortage, NOC for CBSE schools, Data on GER & edu expenditure as % of GDP

A round up of recent answers by the Minstry of Human Resource Development (MHRD) to questions raised in the Lok Sabha, relating to education.

 

Details on the shortage of school teachers in India (state-wise)

Out of 19.84 lakh sanctioned teacher posts under SSA, 14.8 lakh teachers have been recruited and another 5.04 lakh are yet to be recruited as on Sep, 30, 2013.  Bihar (1.75 lakh to be recruited) and U.P (1.24 lakh) are the farthest behind.

(Source: Lok Sabha Starred Question No. 188 Answered on 18.12.2013)

 

On use of NCERT vs private publishers' textbooks in CBSE schools

"The Central Board of Secondary Education (CBSE) has, since 2005-06, directed all its affiliated schools to refrain from recommending the books of private publishers in different subjects at the senior secondary level. The CBSE now prescribes only the National Council of Educational Research and Training (NCERT) published books for classes IX to XII."

(Source: Lok Sabha UnStarred Question No. 2101 Answered on 18.12.2013

 

On the requirement of an NOC from the State Government concerned for affiliation of a private school with CBSE NOC from the State Government concerned for affiliation of a private school with CBSE.

"The Central Board of Secondary Education (CBSE) no longer requires an NOC from the State Government. CBSE has amended its Affiliation Bye-Laws which state that the school seeking provisional affiliation with the Board must have prior recognition of the State/UT Government. The applicant School has to also produce evidence to this effect that they had intimated the concerned Education Department of the State/UT about the application made to the CBSE for seeking affiliation with the Board. In case of receipt of any objection during the process of application of the school, the Board may ask the concerned school to produce the No Objection Certificate from the State/UT Government. Otherwise it would be assumed that concerned State/UT Government has no objection.

The newly amended provision ensures authentication of the facts and credentials of the private school as the applicant school is required to seek recognition from the State/UT Government prior to submitting its application for seeking affiliation from the Board. The Board also physically inspects the applicant school to assess its suitability before the grant of affiliation." 

(Source: Lok Sabha UnStarred Question No. 2140 Answered on 18.12.2013)

 

On the proposal to open Kendriya Vidyalayas (KVs) under the Public-Private Partnership (PPP) mode; the norms laid down for opening of KVs in the country; the number of KVs functioning in the country along with the students enrolled in these KVs, State/ UT-wise

"The Board of Governors of Kendriya Vidyalaya Sangathan (KVS) in its 91st meeting held on 19.01.2012 has taken a policy decision that the scheme of opening of new Kendriya Vidyalayas under the Public Private Parternership (PPP mode) is not in line with the mandate of the KVS." 

(Source: Lok Sabha UnStarred Question No. 2199 Answered on 18.12.2013)

"Presently 1091 KVs are functioning in the country." -  State/UT-wise details along with enrollment data and norms for opening new KVs.

(Source: Lok Sabha UnStarred Question No. 1115 Answered on 11.12.2013)

 

Detailed data on the gross-enrolment rate* (GER) of children in primary, upper-primary, secondary and senior secondary levels in the country during 2008-09 to 2010-11, state-wise, year-wise and gender-wise.

For India as a whole, GER is

• 116.7 at the Primary level (Class I-V);
• 83.1 at the Upper Primary level (Class VI-VIII);
• 60.8 at the Secondary level (Class IX-X) and
• 36.1 at the Senior Secondary Level (Class XI-XII)

(Source: Lok Sabha UnStarred Question No. 2296 Answered on 18.12.2013)

 

On the overall government expenditure on Education (Centre + States) as a percentage of Gross Domestic Product (GDP) during last three years, comparison with the same figures for other countries and why the goal of spending at least 6% of GDP hasn't been achieved.

Overall government expenditure on Education (Centre + States) as a percentage of Gross Domestic Product (GDP)

• 3.95%  -  2009-10
• 4.20%  -  2010-11 (Revised Estimate)
• 4.17%  -  2011-12 (Budget Estimate)

"As per the figures published by the UNESCO Institute of Statistics (UIS) in its publication titled, “Global Education Digest 2012”, the share of education in Gross Domestic Product in some other countries were U.S.A.(5.4%), U.K.(5.6%), Japan (3.8%), Australia (5.1%), Russian Federation (4.1%), Egypt (3.8%), Azerbaijan (3.2%), Georgia (3.2%), Tajikistan (4.0%), Hong Kong SAR of China (3.6 %), Thailand (3.8%), Peru (2.7%), Jamaica (6.1%), Pakistan (2.4%), Bangladesh (2.2%), Ethiopia (4.7%), United Republic of Tanzania (6.2%) and Zambia (1.3%) during 2010.

During the XII Five Year Plan, the Ministry of Human Resource Development have been allocated a sum of Rs.4,53,728 crore (Rs.3,43,028 crore for the Department of School Education & Literacy and Rs.1,10,700 crore for the Department of Higher Education) as compared to actual expenditure in XI Five Year Plan which was Rs.1,77,566.86 crore (Rs.1,37,920.04 crore for the Department of School Education & Literacy and Rs.39,646.82 crore for Department of Higher Education). This increase in central plan outlay for education represents a very substantial effort on the part of the Central Government for raising public spending on education towards the national goal of spending 6% of GDP for education. Overall progress towards this goal, would however, also depend on the efforts made by the States and the private sector.

This increase in central plan outlay for education represents a very substantial effort on the part of the Central Government for raising public spending on education towards the national goal of spending 6% of GDP for education. Overall progress towards this goal, would however, also depend on the efforts made by the States and the private sector."

(Source: Lok Sabha UnStarred Question No. 1085 Answered on 11.12.2013)

Competition between different levels of government in education

With private school enrollments increasing over the years, government schools are in effect in competition with private schools for students. But there is another kind of competition in play in the education sector - the competition between the local governments, the state government and the central government.

T.R. Raghunandan's recent piece at Accountability Initiative helps put this kind of competition in context. Here is what Raghunandan wrote:

In a landmark book, named Competitive Governments, Albert Breton turned the concept of decentralization on its head.

The classical idea of decentralization is that different levels of government ought to be given clear and exclusive responsibilities. It is hypothesized that this will drive people to hold each level of government accountable for what they ought to do and consequently, service delivery will improve.

Breton, came up with an alternative hypothesis. He proposed that governments could be competitive in their relations with each other and in their relations with other institutions in society, such as private providers of services, in supplying consuming households with goods and services. He contended that such competition between government levels and private service providers would enable households to make efficient choices as they would individually make the links between the services that they pick from each provider, based upon the tax prices that they pay for these goods and services.

...

This is a really chastening thought for pro-decentralisers like me!

Let me illustrate whether the thoughts of Albert Breton and Jack Weldon are relevant in the real world. One does not need to go far to seek out examples. In India now, we have a significant number of people who have obtained the ‘Aadhaar’, which is a unique identification number. Earlier, identification was a local activity. If an individual moved from one place to another, she needed to cancel her ration card in one location and obtain a new ration card in another. This was terribly inconvenient and corruption prone. Now, the Aadhaar number is universally accepted all over India. Seen in the light of theory, the Aadhar number is thus a mechanism by which the central government has managed the ‘externality’ of identification. However, this leads to some interesting spinoffs. With a relatively more reliable identification process in its hand, it is possible for the central government to centralize the delivery of pro-poor services through a direct cash transfer. For instance, using the Aadhaar number, the centre could send pensions directly to all senior citizens, with little work for the State or the local government to do, because the externality of identification has been managed at the top through the UID.

So how would this apply in the education sector? Govt funded schools in India have been run by different levels of government including panchayats, zilla parishads, municipal corporations, state governments and the central government (Kendriya Vidyalayas, Navodaya Vidyalayas, Sainik Schools etc..). The state governments also have indirect control over all government-aided schools under private management. I don't know if anyone has studied how competition between these various levels of governments in running schools has been playing out, right from the pre-independence era.

One example is the Kendriya Vidyalayas (KVs). In the early 1960s, the Central Government set up the KVs to address the problems faced by the children of transferable central government employees who have to move across the country. Transferring from one state board curriculum to another, at possibly different levels and, with a different set of languages would have been a nightmare for children of such employees. The KVs are present across all states and provide uniformity in the curriculum as well as continutity in the school year across all schools. They are entirely under the purview of the Kendriya Vidyalaya Sanghatan, a central government body, and the state governments have no say in how they are funded or run.

Although admissions to KVs are restricted to children of Central Government employees, what if the central government could set up many more KVs or other such schools across the country (there are around 980 now) and also open up admissions to any child. I wonder if there are any restrictions on the Kendriya Vidyalayas or the Central Government from doing something like this. For instance, Tamil Nadu has not permitted the Central Government to run a Navodaya Vidyalaya in the state.

Currently, control of schools is pretty much concentrated with the state governments. They call the shots for all schools run by lower levels of government. The central government provides some funding to the states, but doesn't have a say in the administration of schools. If, and when, the state governments decide to actively devolve power and control of schools, including financial and administrative autonomy for running schools to the lower levels of governments, some interesting possibilities may emerge. These schools are likely to be more responsive to parents and children and more accountable for learning outcomes. The idea of devolution has been discussed for a long time now, but the political class, the bureaucracy and the teacher community seem to have little incentive to do so. It will probably happen only after sustained bottom-up political pressure is mobilised by the parents at the grassroots level.

Another type of competition between governments that is playing out is at the level of accrediting bodies, the school boards. An ongoing case in the Supreme Court (Special Leave Petition (Civil) 16 of 2013 - Asso. of Management of Pvt. Schools(CBSE) .Vs. State of Tamil Nad & Ors.) highlights this.

The Tamil Nadu Legislature passed the Tamil Nadu Private Schools (Regulation of Collection of Fee) Act, 2009 that allows the Government to determine and specify a ceiling for fees for each school. Private schools in Tamil Nadu affiliated to the CBSE and ICSE went to the Madras High Court arguing that by dint of their affilation to the CBSE/ICSE, they could not be regulated by the State Government. The CBSE's counsel also made the same point in the case arguing that the State Government will not be entitled to regulate the fees by enforcing a rigid fee structure on CBSE schools. But the Madras High Court ruled (Writ Petition 28305 of 2010) in favour of the Government of Tamil Nadu in September 2012.

The case is now in the Supreme Court and it's decision on this is due early next month.

Education in India Podcast with Subir Shukla of IGNUS-ERG

In the first episode of the Education in India podcast, Subir Shukla, Principal Co-ordinator at IGNUS-ERG, talks about a wide range of topics relating to education in India. Subir has worked for over 25 years in school education in India in the areas of quality improvement, curriculum and textbook development and teacher training, amongst many other things. 

• Listen to the audio podcast (~77 minutes), or
• Download the podcast (~18MB; MP3) and listen to it at your convenience.

To download the podcast, right-click on the download link and select "Save Link/Target As".

I will also try to transcribe the audio and link to the text when it is available. You can read the full transcript of the interview.

This chat with Subir covers some of the important projects and programmes in education in India over the past 20-30 years. The topics covered in this podcast are outlined below. The time location of each broad topic within the audio podcast is mentioned below, for those who may want to jump to a specific point in the podcast.

• 00:00:40 - Subir tells us a bit about his background and the work he has done in education. 

• 00:01:30 - Why and how he chose to work in the area of education?
  • His days at Eklavya, an outfit set up by Kishore Bharti and the Hoshangabad Science Teaching Programme.
  • His time at the National Book Trust, setting up the National Centre for Children's Literature.

• 00:08:10 - His time as the Chief Consultant to the Govt of India on Quality Improvement and Teacher Training under the District Primary Education Programme (DPEP).
  • The thinking behind starting the DPEP in 1994 and the goals of the DPEP.
  • The survey of learning levels in India by the NCERT in 1994.
  • How the survey showed that learning levels were very low in Kerala in 1994, even lower than Bihar and how this led Kerala to drastically change their philosophy, systems and processes of teaching and learning, which is one of the reasons why the learning levels in Kerala are high today. 
  • The achievement of the DPEP.

• 00:22:15 - The Sarva Shiksha Abhiyan (SSA).
  • The thinking behind launching SSA, after the DPEP.

• 00:24:28 - Teacher Training
  • What is good teaching?
  • His role in developing ADEPTS - Advancement of Educational Performance through Teacher Support - Teacher performance standards for the MHRD in 2006-07.
  • The role of the Centre and the States in teacher training.

• 00:28:12 - How the philosophy of teaching and learning has changed in India over the years
  • Three broad stages: content-driven, objectives-driven, and process-driven teaching and learning.
  • How and when the shift from content-driven, to objectives-driven, and then to process-driven teaching and learning occured in India.
  • Minimum Levels of Learning (MLL).
  • Continuos and Comprehensive Evaluation - CCE.
  • The thinking behind removing detention of students under the RTE Act.

• 00:47:06 - The National Curricular Framework 2005 (NCF)
  • The thinking behind creating the National Curricular Framework in 2005.
  • The use of NCF by the States as a framework.
  • Why the States don't want to use NCERT's textbooks.

• 00:54:31 - Age-appropriate curricula vs overambitious curricula
  • Why children are often being compelled to learn things they can't really understand at their age.

• 00:57:26 - National level surveys of learning levels in India
  • NCERT's surveys of learning and achievement levels.

• 00:58:35 - The value of Pratham's Annual Survey of Education Reports (ASER)
  • Why the ASER reports have limited value.
  • Two negative effects of the ASER reports.

•  01:04:20 - Teacher Accountability
  • Teachers themselves should be enabled to monitor the learning levels in their classes.
  • Why are only teachers being held accountable, but no one else higher up in the education system?
  • The need for top-down accountability rather than bottom-up accountability.

• 01:08:35 - The relevance of PISA tests in India
  • Why PISA tests may not be relevant for India at this time.
  • The lack of a national vision in India for what kind of quality we want in our secondary school students, and what they ought to know by the time they leave school.
  • The need to develop a vision for secondary school students and put it out in the public domain for debate - IGNUS-ERG is working on this.

What is the Government's official stand on India's participation in the PISA 2012 tests?

After India's poor performance in the Programme for International Student Assessment (PISA) 2009 cycle of tests, there is no clarity about India's participation in the PISA 2012 cycle of tests. There have been news reports indicating and suggesting that the Government has decided against participating in the 2012 cycle, but the Government does not seem to have made any statement yet. Here is a summary of what I have been able to glean from the news reports and questions raised in Parliament.

Indian Express (September 3, 2012)

Just why did Indians perform so badly at the Programme for International Student Assessment (PISA) as to stand at the bottom of the ladder? The government thinks it is not a reflection on the country’s schooling. Advised by the NCERT, the HRD Ministry has concluded that India trailed in the international rankings because of the questions posed.

Terming these out of context, the government will take up the issue with organisers of PISA before deciding on full-scale participation in the test for 2012, with students from 10 of its states.

...

The ministry has concluded that there was a socio-cultural disconnect between the questions and Indian students. The ministry will write to the OECD and drive home the need to factor in India’s “socio-cultural milieu”. India’s participation in the next PISA cycle will hinge on this.

Considering that over 70 nations participate in PISA, it is uncertain whether an exception would be made for India. Incidentally, the Ministry of External Affairs is not enthused about a pan-India participation in PISA as it is expected to throw up discouraging results. India is already close to missing the 2012 cycle and may have to wait for 2015.

The NCERT in its report concluded that “non-exposure of students (especially in rural areas) towards the items tested in PISA” was a critical factor in the poor performance by Indian students. They cited questions relating to ATMs and use of air bags in cars.

Times of India (September, 9, 2012)

"India is already late for the 2012 test as preparations began a year in advance. If the questions conform to our sensibilities , we will take part. We will enter into a correspondence with OECD before taking a final call," says the official. But it may already be too late. The question is: why participate at all if one is not ready for it?

...

Sydney Rebeiro, former dean, University of Delhi, says such standardized tests factor in various levels of education. But the HRD official says these tests would be difficult for children in rural areas. "If the child hasn't heard of airbags, hot air balloons and ATMs, he won't even attempt those questions. Also, such detailed questions would be confusing; straight questions would work better." But surely international tests can't be tailor-made for each country? Besides, other countries are also taking these tests.

Indian Express (July 18, 2012) carried a report, which does not seem to have been corroborated or confirmed by anyone else. Presumably, MEA refers to the Ministry of External Affairs here.

... [The HRD Ministry] is putting up a brave face and wants the PISA assessment done in as many as nine states now. But, strangely, it is the MEA that seems to have developed cold feet. The HRD Ministry has to take an approval from the MEA to get this assessment done and the MEA is learnt to be sitting on the proposal for many days now.

Some MPs have raised questions in Parliament on the India's performance in the 2009 cycle of PISA tests and what the Govt plans to do going ahead and the then HRD Minister's answers relating to PISA tests in India are excerpted below. This is as official as it gets.

• Manish Tewari, Devji Patel - Lok Sabha Unstarred Question No. 1226 answered on 21.03.2012

  The purpose of this PISA (2009) pilot study was to build our capacity for international participation and to understand the methodology and other aspects of the international survey. 

• Motilal Vora -  Rajya Sabha Unstarred Question No. 4745 answered on 18.05.2012
• S. Thangavelu - Rajya Sabha Unstarred Question No. 861 answered on 17.08.2012

  The Programme for International Student Assessment (PISA), 2009 covered only two States, Tamil Nadu and Himachal Pradesh in India and indicates unsatisfactory performance of students in these two States. 

• Ashok Tanwar - Lok Sabha Unstarred Question No. 3945 answered on 05.09.2012 specifically asked "whether there is any proposal to implement International Student Assessment (ISA) Programme in all States so as to build capacity for international participation and to understand the methodology and other aspects of the international survey; " (sic)

  The Programme for International Student Assessment (PISA), a project of Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD), was piloted in two Indian states, namely, Himachal Pradesh and Tamil Nadu. However, no decision has been taken to implement the Programme in all states of the country. (emphasis mine)  

The official view (as of September 09, 2012) is that the Government has not taken any decision. Since time is running out for participation in the 2012 cycle of PISA tests, the Minister of HRD ought to make a statement on the following:

• Has the Government written to the OECD (organisers of PISA 2012) about its concerns of a socio-cultural disconnect between the questions and Indian students? If so, when did the Government write to OECD? If not, when does the Government plan to write to the OECD?
• If the Government has already written to the OECD, has the Government received a reply from the OECD in response to its letter? If so, when did it receive the reply and what did the OECD say?
• Has the Government taken a decision to participate in PISA 2012 or not? If so, what has it decided? If not, by when does the Government expect to take a decision?

The lack of any official statements makes one wonder - is the Government planning to take no decision till it is too late to participate in the 2012 cycle and then tout that as the excuse for not participating?

Govt backtracks on home schooling; says not permitted under the RTE Act

In a volte face, the Govt has reversed its view (filed earlier in an affidavit in the Delhi High Court) that home schooling is permissible under the Right to Education Act.

Deccan Herald reports

The Union government took a U-turn before a division bench of the Delhi HIgh Court, saying its earlier stand that the Right to Education Act does not come in the way of home-schooling was "incorrect and contrary" to Section 10 of the Act.

The Centre had sought time to file a fresh affidavit clarifying its stand.

...

Advocate Ashok Agarwal, in the capacity of an intervener appointed by the High Court in this case, had objected to the government's and the petitioner's stand in their affidavits.

"The demand on the part of the petitioner for home-schooling or alternative forms of schooling and the stand taken by the Union Government in support of such demand through counter affidavit dated July 16, 2012 is based on completely casual and erroneous interpretation of the letter, spirit and intent of the RTE Act," he had submitted in his response.

The Delhi High Court directed the Union of India to file its counter affidavit by December 19th, 2012.

Case Details:

Delhi High Court Case no. W.P.(C) 8870/2011

SHREYA SAHAI AND ORS  Vs. UOI AND ORS
Advocate: Somnath Bharti

(APPELLATE JURISDICTION) , COURT NO. 1 ,  (DIVISION BENCH-1) 
HON'BLE THE ACTING CHIEF JUSTICE , HON'BLE MR. JUSTICE RAJIV SAHAI ENDLAW

Additional Respondents:

Ashok Aggarwal
Central Board of Secondary Education 
National Institute of Open Schooling
Association of Unaided Private Schools

Jandhyala B G Tilak, has argued in the Economic & Political Weekly that the affidavit submitted in July 2012 by the Government to the Delhi High Court permitting home schooling under the Right to Education Act contradicts the letter and spirit of the Right to Education Act.

The Prohibition of Unfair Practices in Schools Bill, 2012 - full text of the draft

The Central Advisory Board of Education (CABE) has come up with a draft legislation for prohibiting unfair practices in schools.

A copy of the full text of the draft of  The Prohibition of Unfair Practices in Schools Bill, 2012 can be downloaded here (~15MB pdf).

I quickly scanned through it and at first glance, the bill seems to be excessively harsh and severe on the schools, although there are some very good clauses too, which could bring about much needed transparency in the functioning of schools.

The proposed draft legislation was to be presented before the Central Advisory Board of Education (CABE) meeting on November 1st, but Business Standard reports that the CABE Committee meeting for November 1st was postponed due to the change of guard at the Ministry of HRD.

According to a report in Law et al, even before the Government officially published the draft of the bill,  the Independent School Federation of India (IFSI) filed a petition in the Delhi High Court on this and the Court has already issued orders on the petition.

The Delhi High Court on Wednesday directed the Central Advisory Board of Education (CABE) to publish on its website the proposed “Prohibition of Unfair Practices in Schools Bill, 2012" framed by it.

A bench of Justice Rajiv Shakdher was today hearing a petition by Independent School Federation of India (ISFI) seeking direction to CABE to give appropriate hearing to all before finalizing penal provisions in the proposed Bill.

ISFI also sought direction to Ministry of Human Resource & Development (HRD) to give appropriate representation to the managements of private schools in the composition of CABE to give their suggestions.

In its petition ISFI has alleged that although CABE gave lip-representation to academicians but no representation is given to private management.

The proposed legislation would be presented before the Central Advisory Board of Education (CABE) meeting on November 1.

Delhi High Court case details:

Delhi High Court Case no. W.P.(C) 6857/2012

INDEPENDENT SCHOOL FEDERATION OF INDIA & ANR  Vs.   THE UNION OF INDIA & ANR
Advocate: SK Chauhan

The orders passed by Justice Rajiv Shakdher have not yet been uploaded on the Delhi High Court website, at the time of writing this post. The next hearing of the case is scheduled for November 5th.

Schools seem to fear that the Government will ride roughshold over their concerns and drive the bill through Parliament without giving them a fair hearing. Hence the pre-emptive petition by ISFI in the Delhi High Court. Though the ISFI has taken up the cudgels on behalf of the schools, correspondents and principals of all private, aided and unaided ought to go through the draft bill and consider the legal and practical implications of the bill, if it becomes law in the proposed form. Various associations of schools across the country would do well to print and mail a copy of the draft bill to each and every school correspondent/principal to ensure they are aware of the bill and can provide their feedback.

There needs to be widespread public debate on the draft bill with the views of schools, teachers, parents and the policy establishment taken into account to improve the draft legislation, before it becomes law.

Home schooling is now permissible under the RTE Act. Govt. Clarifies the word "Compulsion"

IMPORTANT UPDATE:

On Oct 17, 2012, the Government reversed its earlier stand (referred to in the original post below) and now says home schooling is NOT permissible under the RTE Act. For more details, see new post on this. The Government will be filing a fresh affidavit on this in Delhi High Court on December 19, 2012.

--------------------- Text of my original post continues below ---------------------

The Government has clarified in the Delhi High Court that parents interested in home schooling their children or adopting alternate forms of education are now perfectly at liberty to do so. According to a report in the Indian Express (July 20, 2012),

In response to a public interest litigation, the Ministry of Human Resources Development filed an affidavit in the Delhi High Court, which stated that

"Parents who voluntarily opt for alternate forms of schooling may continue to do so. The RTE Act does not come in the way of such alternate schooling methodologies or declare such form of education as illegal."

The Ministry’s response came after the High Court directed it to respond to a petition filed by a 14-year-old girl, Shreya Sahai, who opted for home schooling but contended that Section 18 of RTE Act does not recognise any other mode of imparting education except the one through formal schooling.

“The benefits of all children aged 6-14 years and their parents who feel threatened because their right to choose a mode of education for primary education stands violated as the Act restricts the same only to a formal school,” she said.

All other modes of imparting education, except a formal school, like home schooling, alternate schools of education and the schools not subscribing to the norms and curriculum mandated in the Act stand declared illegal under sections 18 and 19 of the Act, said the petition. 

The Hindustan Times (July 20, 2012) adds,

The affidavit clarifies that the Act concerns itself with the rights of children, and is not a compulsion. “The compulsion is on the appropriate government and the local authority to provide free education to all children up to 14 years,” the affidavit said.

This statement in the affidavit provides complete clarity on the connotation of the world "compulsion" in the RTE Act. The compulsion is on the state to provide free education and not on the citizens to be educated in a conventional school.

Case Details:

Delhi High Court Case no. W.P.(C) 8870/2011

SHREYA SAHAI AND ORS  Vs. UOI AND ORS
Advocate: Somnath Bharti

(APPELLATE JURISDICTION) , COURT NO. 1 ,  (DIVISION BENCH-1)
HON'BLE THE ACTING CHIEF JUSTICE , HON'BLE MR. JUSTICE RAJIV SAHAI ENDLAW

Additional Respondents:

Ashok Aggarwal
Central Board of Secondary Education
National Institute of Open Schooling
Association of Unaided Private Schools

Periscope 7 - 50 new DTH channels for Higher Ed, Open Schooling, New Education Commission, Higher Ed GER, Expenditure on IITs

• "Starting nearly 50 DTH channels for Higher Education in the Country within the XI Plan period has occupied a high place under the National Mission on Education through ICT (NMEICT) at present. MHRD’s request to ISRO for providing 2 transponders has been noted by ISRO and sent to the INSAT Coordination Committee. NMEICT has an allocation of Rs. 120 crore for the DTH channels to begin with." Source: Lok Sabha UnStarred Question No. 3397 Answered on 14.12.2011

Since the Minister's reply says it will be done within the XI plan period, the channels should be in place before the end of 2012. Sounds unrealistic. The NMEICT, in its mission document, had listed as one of its 48 ambitious objectives, 

34. Content delivery through EduSAT and narrowcasting of TV signals. Providing 1000 DTH (Direct to Home) channels on 40 transponders [to be availed through the Department. of Space] so that a separate DTH channel is available for every subject for every class in various languages to the extent possible.

• Data on enrollment and expenditure in National Institute of Open Schooling (NIOS): Enrollments are much lower than I thought.  NIOS also enrolls students in 15 overseas centres of NIOS in UAE, Kuwait, Qatar, Oman and Nepal. Source: Lok Sabha Starred Question No. 381 Answered on 21.12.2011

Year	2009-10	2010-11	2011-12 (Upto Oct 31st)
Total Learners Enrolled	4,38,906	4,93,091	3,66,539
Learners from minority communities enrolled	88,983	92,185	62,696
% of minority community enrolled	20%	19%	17%
	Rs. in Crores	Rs. in Crores	Rs. in Crores
Budget: Plan Funds from Govt of India	15.00	11.25	15.00
Budget: Income Generated by NIOS	89.35	99.07	40.83
Expenditure: Plan Funds from Govt of India	11.61	8.19	6.02
Expenditure: Income Generated by NIOS	69.75	71.98	37.15

A recent report on the Development of the State Open Schools in India by T. Rajagopalan, erstwhile Education Correspondent of The Hindu, concludes that it is well nigh impossible to achieve the goal of Education for All through the formal education system alone or even the National Open School system alone. Rajagopalan says although the State Open Schools have an important role to play, the policy establishment pays only lip service to expanding educational opportunities and seems least interested in consolidating and strengthening the open school system in the states.

• New Education Commission: "In pursuance of the announcement made by the Prime Minister on 15th August, 2011, Government has decided to set up an Education Commission to make recommendations for improvement at all levels of education. The Constitution and Terms of Reference of the proposed Commission is being finalized by the Government after wide consultations." Source: Lok Sabha UnStarred Question No. 4492 Answered on 21.12.2011. Other than the news reports based on the PM's August 15th speech, I could find no other mention on any of the Government-related web sites on the setting up of the new education commission, but apparently they're working on it.

• Data on government expenditure on education as % of total government expenditure and also breakdown by segment within education. Note: This is NOT expenditure on education as a percent of GDP Source: Lok Sabha UnStarred Question No. 4500 Answered on 21.12.2011
  

	2008-09	2009-10	2010-11
% of total budget allocated to MHRD	5.16%	4.36%	4.50%

Sector	2008-09	2009-10	2010-11
Elementary Education	56.32%	48.75%	50.23%
Secondary Education	14.45%	15.57%	13.71%
Adult Education	1.17%	1.02%	2.61%
Higher Education (Including Technical & Other)	28.05%	34.66%	33.45%
Total	100.00%	100.00%	100.00%

• "The average annual expenditure per student in the Indian Institutes of Technology (IITs) is Rs. 2.82 lakhs, the tuition fees uniformly payable for under-graduate programmes by each student is Rs. 25,000 per semester.

The Council of the IITs, in its 43rd meeting held on 14th September, 2011, accepted ‘in principle’ the report of Dr. Anil Kakodkar Committee on the road map for enhancing the autonomy of the IIT system which has recommended, inter-alia, that while the students' scholarships, capital and infrastructure expenditure may continue to be met fully by the Government, the IITs may meet, on their own, the operational expenditure. Thus, while the capital costs may be taken care of by the Government, the student of under graduate programme may pay enhanced fee towards the recurring cost of education on getting employed, which is justifiable on the grounds of earning potential of an IIT graduate. An empowered Task Force has been constituted for implementation of the Committee’s recommendations. " Source: Lok Sabha UnStarred Question No. 4520 Answered on 21.12.2011

It is unclear from the statement if the annual expenditure of Rs. 2.82 lakhs includes both capital and operational expense per student or only operational expense per student. If the latter, the gulf between annual expenditure per student (Rs. 2.82 lakhs) and tuition fees paid per year (Rs. 50,000) by each student is substantial. If annual operational costs have to be recovered by the IITs through fees alone, the fees will have to rise by over 500%!

 

• "Gross Enrolment Ratio (GER) of students enrolled in higher education as a percentage of the population in the age group of 18-23 years in 2009-10(Provisional) is 15.0 (All Categories), 11.1 (Scheduled Caste) and 10.3 (Scheduled Tribe)." Source: Lok Sabha UnStarred Question No. 4593 Answered on 21.12.2011

Statewise 2009-10 Provisional GER data was also provided - Delhi (47.9) is the highest followed by Uttarakhand (36.0), Puducherry (29.1), Goa (28.3), Chandigarh (28.0). The GER for larger states Himchal Pradesh (23.9), Maharashtra (21.4), Chattisgarh (20.0), Tamil Nadu (19.0), Karnataka (18.1), Andhra Pradesh (16.9), Madhya Pradesh (14.9), West Bengal (11.9) and Uttar Pradesh (10.9) is lower. 

Want to look at the PISA test questions and try them out yourself?

Sample questions from the Programme for International Student Assessment (PISA) tests have been published by the OECD, the organisation that conducts the tests. Check out the questions. 

If your children are about 15 years old or more, you could ask them to try out the sample questions and see how they fare. Teachers may also like to try them out. It would be interesting to find out what teachers think of the level of these questions and the capability of their students to answer them. 

The list has sample questions from the field trials and the actual PISA tests administered in 2000, 2003 and 2006 including questions testing reading literacy, mathematical literacy, and scientific literacy. The detailed answer keys to all the questions are also provided.

For some of the questions used in the actual PISA tests in past years, country-wise data on the percentage of children that got the answer right is also provided.

I think students studying in English medium schools in India would find the questions that test reading literacy quite challenging. In many English medium schools in India I doubt if the students are as fluent in English as they ought to be, despite English being the medium of instruction. I haven't come across the samples of questions adminstered in Tamil or Hindi during the 2009+ cycle of tests in Tamil Nadu and Himachal Pradesh. It would be interesting to look at samples of those. But in any case, the average test scores of those children in India who took the PISA 2009+ tests in their own first langauge were a bit lower than those who took the test in a language different from their first language (presumably, English was the language the latter took the test in). Reading literacy may be an issue even for students in schools where the local langauge is the medium of instruction.

If reading and comprehension is a problem, then students are likely to find the questions that test mathematical and scientific literacy challenging too, even if they may be good at math and science. 

We may be failing to build reading and comprehension skills as well as we ought to, whether in the local langauge or English. We need to figure out why we are not doing well on that front and what we can do differently to build those skills. Lack of reading and comprehension skills may be one of the reasons for the poor show in the PISA 2009+ cycle of tests by students in Tamil Nadu and Himachal Pradesh.

 

Aside 1: You can also try out examples of computer-based questions to test reading of digital texts, mathematical and problem solving skills. These have been tried out in a few countries during the 2009 cycle and will be tried out in the upcoming 2012 PISA cycle too, in some countries.

Aside 2: While only Tamil Nadu and Himachal Pradesh participated in the 2009+ cycle of PISA tests, more states in India will be participating in the 2012 cycle of PISA tests.

India's participation in PISA 2009+ cycle: Results from Himachal Pradesh and Tamil Nadu

The detailed report on the PISA 2009+ cycle of tests including the results for the pilot in India in the states of Tamil Nadu (TN) and Himachal Pradesh (HP) has been published by the Australian Council for Educational Research, which conducted the PISA 2009+ Cycle of tests. The entire database is also accessible online in an interactive manner for slicing and dicing the data (look for QTN and QHP in the countries list).

For perspective and comparison with HP and TN, I have picked the top three in the PISA results - Shanghai-China, South Korea and Finland and also USA as a large country (in geography and population terms) and a few other countries like Brazil, Russia, Mexico, Indonesia, Turkey and Argentina as emerging economies with large populations. Of all these countries, four of them, Finland, Mexico, Turkey and USA are part of the OECD. The OECD average is also provided - it is the arithmetic mean of the estimates for the 34 OECD countries that participated in PISA 2009.

Here're some results based on the report:

Extracts from Table B.2.1: Comparing countries’ performance in reading (p 105)

The last column indicates the % of students having proficiency in reading literacy above the baseline level to participate effectively and productively in life (Table B.2.2, p 109). There are seven proficiency levels in reading (Tables 2.2 to 2.6 p 15-17), ranging from Level 6, the highest level, involving sophisticated reading tasks that are generally only able to be completed by highly competent readers; through to Level 1b, involving elementary tasks that require only very basic reading skills. Level 2 is considered the baseline level of proficiency at which students begin to demonstrate the reading skills that will enable them to participate effectively and productively in life.

	Mean	S.E.	Confidence Interval	5th Percentile	S.E. of 5th Percentile	95th Percentile	S.E. of 95th Percentile	% at or over baseline
Himachal Pradesh	317	4	309 - 325	192	6.9	443	8.5	10.8
Tamil Nadu	337	5.5	326 - 347	211	4.5	472	14.4	17.3
OECD Average	493	0.5	492 - 494	332	1	637	0.7	81.2
Shanghai-China	556	2.4	551 - 561	417	5.2	679	3.3	95.9
South Korea	539	3.5	532 - 546	400	7.6	658	3.8	94.2
Finland	536	2.3	531 - 540	382	3.4	666	2.6	91.9
USA	500	3.7	493 - 507	339	4.2	656	5.8	82.4
Brazil	412	2.7	406 - 417	262	3	572	4.6	50.4
Russian Federation	459	3.3	453 - 466	310	5.8	607	5.6	72.6
Indonesia	402	3.7	394 - 409	291	5.8	510	5.8	46.6
Mexico	425	2	421 - 429	281	3.9	557	2.4	59.9
Turkey	464	3.5	457 - 471	325	5.1	596	5.4	75.5
Argentina	398	4.6	389 - 407	209	11.3	568	6.7	48.4

The OECD mean reading score is 493 with a standard deviation of 93. The mean reading scores of both HP and TN are 1.7 standard deviations below the OECD mean. Even the 95th percentile scores in HP and TN are below the OECD mean.  HP and TN rank significantly lower than the other emerging economies too.

The other metric of  the percentage of students at or above the baseline level of proficiency is abysmally low in HP (11%) and TN (17%), and a serious cause for concern. While the OECD average is 81%, the percentage of students at or above the baseline level in countries like Brazil, Indonesia, Mexico and Argentina is in the 50% range. These countries seem to be far better off than HP and TN.

There may be a reason for this. In response to the question posed to students "What language do you speak at home most of the time?", the options being (1) the language of the test or (2) another language, a substantial majority of students said they spoke the language of the test at home in many countries - Finland (95.63%), Mexico (95.48%), Turkey (95.57%), USA (85.56%), Argentina (95.38%), Brazil (96.72%), Russian Federation (90.12%) and Shanghai-China (98.41%). But the corresponding numbers were much lower for Tamil Nadu (67.53%) and Himachal Pradesh (60.5%). I have only picked a few countries for comparison and have not looked at these numbers for all the other countries. Click here for the data.

One might think the low reading scores for TN and HP may be due to the fact that they were being tested in a language that was not their native language. Apparently the PISA 2009+ tests were administered in English, Hindi and Tamil in India (Source p 6). But surprisingly, the test scores of children in both Tamil Nadu and Himachal Pradesh who said the test language was not their first language were higher than the scores of children who said the test language was their first language!

To a similar question posed to schools "About how many students in <national modal grade for 15-year-olds> in your school have a <first language> that is not <the test language>?", the options being (1) 60% or more, (2) 40% to 60%, (3) 20% to 40%, (4) 10% to 20%, (5) 0% to 10%, only a very small percentage of schools said over 60% of students had a first language that is not the test language in many countries- Finland (0.06%), Mexico (5.22%), USA (5.65%), Argentina (1.48%), Brazil (1.67%), Russian Federation (11.01%). In contrast, the corresponding numbers were far higher for Tamil Nadu (75.46%) and Himachal Pradesh (82.76%). Click here for the data.

Another set of data also need to be examined in this context. The scores of students in those schools that offered significant amount of instruction in the first language to students whose first language was not the test language and the scores of students in those schools that offered some some instruction in school subjects through the first language to students whose first language was not the test language.

I'm unable to understand the relationship between the scores, the first language and the test language - other experts may be able to throw some light. There may be an issue about the medium of instruction and the medium of testing for children in India leading to a comprehension problem. This merits further investigation before the PISA 2012 series of tests are administered.

Extracts from Table B.3.1: Comparing countries’ performance in mathematics (p 121)

The last column indicates the % of students having proficiency in mathematical literacy above the baseline level to participate effectively and productively in life (Table B.3.2, p 124). There are six proficiency levels in mathematical literacy (Table 3.2 p 43) ranging from Level 6 (involving advanced mathematical skills and reasoning) through to Level 1 (involving routine mathematical tasks and procedures). Level 2 is considered the baseline level of proficiency at which students begin to demonstrate the mathematical skills that will enable them to participate effectively and productively in life.

	Mean	S.E.	Confidence Interval	5th Percentile	S.E. of 5th Percentile	95th Percentile	S.E. of 95th Percentile	% at or over baseline
Himachal Pradesh	338	4.2	330 - 347	223	6.8	458	8.8	11.9
Tamil Nadu	351	5.1	341 - 361	241	6.6	468	13.8	15.2
OECD Average	496	0.5	495 - 497	343	0.9	643	0.8	78
Brazil	386	2.4	381 - 390	261	3	531	5.9	30.9
Shanghai-China	600	2.8	595 - 606	421	7.1	757	4.6	95.2
South Korea	546	4	538 - 554	397	8.4	689	6.5	91.9
Finland	541	2.2	536 - 545	399	4.4	669	3.6	92.2
USA	487	3.6	480 - 494	337	4.3	637	5.9	76.6
Russian Federation	468	3.3	461 - 474	329	5.1	609	7.2	71.5
Indonesia	371	3.7	364 - 379	260	4.9	493	8.6	23.4
Mexico	419	1.8	415 - 422	289	3.2	547	3.3	49.2
Turkey	445	4.4	437 - 454	304	5.2	613	12.2	57.8
Argentina	388	4.1	380 - 396	231	7.9	543	7	36.4

The OECD mean mathematics score is 496 with a standard deviation of 92. The mean mathematics scores of both HP and TN are 1.6 standard deviations below the OECD mean. Even the 95th percentile scores in HP and TN are below the OECD mean.  Compared to the other emerging economies, HP and TN rank significantly lower.

The other metric of percentage of students at or above the baseline level of proficiency is abysmally low in HP (12%) and TN (15%), and a serious cause for concern. While the OECD average is 78%, the percentage of students at or above the baseline level in countries like Brazil, Indonesia, Mexico and Argentina is in the 23%-30% range. These countries seem to be just a bit better off than HP and TN in mathematical literacy.

Extracts from Table B.3.3: Comparing countries’ performance in science (p 126)

The last column indicates the % of students having proficiency in scientific literacy above the baseline level to participate effectively and productively in life (Table B.3.4, p 129). There are six proficiency levels in scientific literacy (Table 3.4 p 54) ranging from Level 6 (involving the application of scientific knowledge and knowledge about science to complex life situations) through to Level 1 (where the tasks require only limited scientific knowledge to be applied to familiar situations). Level 2 is considered the baseline level of proficiency at which students begin to demonstrate the science competencies  that will enable them to participate actively in life situations related to science and technology.

	Mean	S.E.	Confidence Interval	5th Percentile	S.E. of 5th Percentile	95th Percentile	S.E. of 95th Percentile	% at or over baseline (Table B.3.4)
Himachal Pradesh	325	4.2	317 - 333	209	6.8	450	11.1	11.2
Tamil Nadu	348	4.2	340 - 357	252	4.3	461	12.1	15.5
OECD Average	501	0.5	500 - 502	341	1	649	0.7	82
Brazil	405	2.4	401 - 410	275	3.5	554	4.8	45.8
Shanghai-China	575	2.3	570 - 579	430	4.9	700	3.3	96.8
South Korea	538	3.4	531 - 545	399	6.5	665	4.8	93.7
Finland	554	2.3	550 - 559	400	4.2	694	3.6	94
USA	502	3.6	495 - 509	341	4.8	662	6.7	81.9
Russian Federation	478	3.3	472 - 485	331	5.8	628	5.2	78
Indonesia	383	3.8	375 - 390	272	5.4	499	5.4	34.4
Mexico	416	1.8	412 - 419	291	2.8	544	2.8	52.7
Turkey	454	3.6	447 - 461	322	5	587	6.4	47.6
Argentina	401	4.6	392 - 410	228	10.6	564	7.9	70.1

The OECD mean science score is 501 with a standard deviation of 94. The mean science scores of both HP and TN are 1.6 standard deviations below the OECD mean. Even the 95th percentile scores in HP and TN are below the OECD mean.  Compared to the other developing economies, HP and TN rank significantly lower.

The other metric of percentage of students at or above the baseline level or proficiency is abysmally low in HP (11%) and TN (16%), and a serious cause for concern. While the OECD average is 82%, the percentage of students at or above the baseline level in countries like Brazil, Indonesia, Mexico and Argentina is in the 34%-70% range. These countries, especially Argentina (70%) seem to be far better off than HP and TN in scientific literacy.  

Visible, but unseen so far - what do we make of the PISA 2009+ results in HP and TN?

Despite the caveats about the quality issues in adminstering the PISA tests in India, the results need to be taken seriously. There is no doubt that our children are being tuned towards rote-memorization and are unable to comprehend or understand well enough and reason out. The ASER reports published annually by Pratham and the periodic reports put out by Educational Initiatives have been telling us as much for years.

The PISA 2009+ results provide us an opportunity to crystallise reform. Although we knew things aren't good, we have shied away from figuring out how bad they are. We can't do that anymore. Knowing that we are at the bottom of the list of 74 countries leaves us no room for denying the reality on the grounds that there is no data that says things are bad. The PISA 2012 cycle is only likely to show us how much worse it is when the data from all the other states are also available.

I hope we won't shoot the messenger and question the motives of the OECD which organises the PISA tests or worse, go into a shell and refuse to participate in the 2012 PISA cycle. It would be interesting to see what the MHRD has to say about the PISA results. I am waiting for an MP to ask a question about this in Parliament. The question will need to be phrased cleverly, or else the Minister will get away by saying nothing meaningful.

To improve, we will need to embark on serious and sustained assessment and exam reform to change the way we evaluate what students have learnt. If we begin testing for comprehension, understanding and the ability to think and reason out, there will be an incentive for schools, teachers and students to work towards honing those skills rather than the ability to reproduce the precise expected answer. Exam reform will also require changing the way things students are taught in a classroom and as a result teacher education as well. It will take many years to turn the system around, given the huge inbuilt inertia. But there is no alternative to the long hard way.

 

Dependence of students' scores on student and school characteristics

The detailed report also describes the variation of student scores as a function of various parameters to try and identify the factors that may be responsible for some students doing better on the tests. I've looked at the data on a couple of such parameters below.

Public Schools vs Private Schools

An index of school type is constructed by combining a classification of the school as public or private and the proportion of core funding received from government agencies. A public school is defined in PISA as one that is managed directly or indirectly by a public education authority, government agency, or governing board appointed by government or elected by public franchise. A government-independent private school is classified as one that is not managed by a government agency and receives less than 50% of its core funding from government agencies.

				Reading	Reading	Mathematics	Mathematics	Science	Science
Country	Category	%	%SE	Mean	SE	Mean	SE	Mean	SE
Himachal Pradesh	Public	85.07	3.08	310	5.41	331	5.45	317	5.84
Himachal Pradesh	Private	14.93	3.08	356	14.57	379	12.01	372	14.86
Himachal Pradesh	m	a	a	a	a	a	a	a	a
Tamil Nadu	Public	60.1	3.32	325	6.72	334	6.09	339	5
Tamil Nadu	Private	39.9	3.32	356	9.84	378	8.33	365	7.62
Tamil Nadu	m	a	a	a	a	a	a	a	a
OECD Average	Public	81.9	0.3	488	0.63	491	0.64	496	0.67
OECD Average	Private	17.85	0.3	518	2.02	519	2.04	525	1.93
OECD Average	m	1.17	0.36	444	5.18	452	8.47	458	6.11

m - Missing or invalid response category (this category is excluded from computations of group percentages in the international report)

a - The category does not apply in the country concerned. Data therefore missing

The mean scores of students in public schools can be compared to those in private schools through the response to a question posed to schools  "Is your school a public or a private school?". In almost all countries in the set that I looked at, students in private schools seem to have done better than students in public schools, except for Indonesia where students in public schools did better.

Students in private schools did better in Tamil Nadu (40% of schools tested were private schools) and Himachal Pradesh (15% of schools tested were private schools) too. Click here for the data.

Reading Habits of Students

The 15-year-old student populations in Tamil Nadu-India and Himachal Pradesh-India were estimated to have among the lowest reading literacy levels of the PISA 2009 and PISA 2009+ participants with more than 80% of students below the baseline of proficiency. Around one-fifth of students in these economies are very poor readers.

Students were assigned a reader profile based on their self-report to questions on two dimensions: effective learning strategies; and frequency of reading a range of materials.

Students with high levels of effective learning strategies were classified as ‘deep’ readers, while those with low levels of learning strategies were classified as ‘surface’ readers. Additionally, students who indicated they read a range of materials regularly were classified as ‘wide’ readers, those who indicated they only read magazines or newspapers regularly were classified as ‘narrow’ readers, and those who indicated they did not read any materials regularly were classified as ‘highly restricted’ readers.

Table 4.9 (p 93)

	Deep and Wide Readers		Deep and Narrow Readers		Deep and highly restricted readers		Surface and wide readers		Surface and deep readers		Surface and highly restricted readers
Country or economy	%	Score	%	Score	%	Score	%	Score	%	Score	%	Score
Himachal Pradesh	32	321	16	327	18	317	18	311	7	319	9	296
Tamil Nadu	13	360	10	366	14	321	22	336	17	342	23	313
OECD Average	19	546	25	506	29	504	5	462	10	440	13	427

Socioeconomic and Cultural Status

In PISA 2009 an index of social, economic and cultural status was constructed (ESCS). The data used to construct the index came from responses to a variety of items within the student questionnaire. These items included parental levels of education, parental occupation, the number of books in the home and a variety of items measuring family wealth, the presence of cultural possessions in the home, and the presence of educational resources in the home. This index is used in models presented subsequently in this chapter to unpack the amount of variance in performance that is, firstly, due to social, economic and cultural factors; and secondly, due to school level factors.

The socioeconomic profiles of Tamil Nadu-India and Himachal Pradesh-India are very similar (Figure 4.9 p 78). Both populations have low socioeconomic status relative to the OECD average. Socioeconomic status is not a strong predictor of reading performance, as measured by PISA, in these populations

Other indices that summarise responses from students, their parents or school representatives (typically principals) to a series of questions

Student scores can also be compared across a variety of other factors including:

student age, occupational status or parents, educational level of parents, language background, family structure, family wealth (whether students had the following at home: a room of their own, a link to the Internet, a dishwasher (treated as a country-specific item), a DVD player, and three other country-specific items (some items in ST20); and their responses on the number of cellular phones, televisions, computers, cars and the rooms with a bath or shower), home educational resources (whether students had the following resources at home: a desk and a quiet place to study, a computer that students can use for schoolwork, educational software, books to help with students’ school work, technical reference books and a dictionary) and cultural possessions (whether students had the following at home: classic literature, books of poetry and works of art),

relative grade of the students, learning time in school in the test language,  students' reading habits and activities, students' approaches to learning, students' attitudes towards school, students' perception of teachers, students' perception of the disciplinary climate in school, students' reports on teacher stimulation of reading, students' reports of how their language of instruction was taught by the teachers, students' use of libraries, students' reports on how they understood and memorised the text,

school and class size, student teacher ratio, proportion of girls enrolled, availability of computers in school, number of teachers, basis for admission to the school, whether resource allocation and curriculum and assessment policies were decided at the school level or at a higher level, teacher shortage, extracurricular activities in the school, student behaviour and teacher behaviour.

There is a wealth of data on all these indices made available in the detailed report on the PISA 2009+ cycle of test as well as the entire database that is accessible online. I have only been able to parse a small segment of the data as described above. There is much more to be gleaned from the data, if you are interested and motivated enough to dig through.

In other posts, I had looked at

• Programme for International Student Assessment: What? Why? How?
• India's participation in PISA 2009+ cycle: The Process
• India's participation in PISA 2009+ cycle: Terminology & Caveats