INDIA's LITERACY DRIVE: AP fails to learn its lessons!

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• June 22, 2011 
• DC.

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June 21: At the recent launch of the “ enrollment drive” programme in schools coinciding with the beginning of the new academic year on June 13, the Chief Minister, Mr N. Kiran Kumar Reddy, said he was ashamed to admit that Andhra Pradesh’s literacy rate lagged behind all the other stat`es in south India. In fact, AP is competing with Jharkhand for a place at the bottom of the literacy ladder.

The huge dropout rate in government schools in the state poses a major challenge to the government, but one it seems in no hurry to accept. The state has an unacceptably high dropout rate of 46.21 per cent at school-level. Out of every 100 students who were admitted to class I during 2000-01, only 54 reached class X in the last academic year in 2010-11. The dropout rate is higher in the case of students belonging to scheduled castes and scheduled tribes, primarily due to poverty, which forces them to work at a very early age. In the case of STs, the dropout rate is a whopping 72.66 per cent, while in the case of SCs, it is 49.68 per cent. More girls drop out of school among STs — 73.77 per cent — as opposed to 71.61 per cent in the case of boys. The dropout rate among SC boys is 49.68 per cent, and 49.67 per cent in the case of SC girls.

Five districts in the state have recorded a dropout rate of more than 50 per cent between the academic years 2000-01 and 2010-11. Mahbubnagar, known for large-scale migration of labour, has the highest dropout rate of 59.97 per cent, followed by Kurnool with 57.44 per cent. Medak recorded a dropout rate of 56.87, Prakasam, 55.65 and Guntur recorded a dropout rate of 53.07 per cent during this period. Two districts each from the Telangana and the Andhra regions figure in the list of five districts with the highest dropout rates, the other being a district in Rayalaseema region.

There is no dearth of lip-service to Primary Education and Health, but when it comes to some concretised results, the lowest of budgetary allocations are made and the little granted funds too are allowed to lapse due to rank apathy of the Administration!

Full Story at,

http://www.deccanchronicle.com/channels/cities/hyderabad/ap-fails-learn-its-lessons-877