Impact of Covid-19 on School Education with special focus on SC students Findings of a Rapid Phone Survey Submitted to Scheduled Castes Development Department (SCDD) Government of Telangana Submitted by SCSDF Research Unit CENTRE FOR ECONOMIC AND SOCIAL STUDIES N.O. Campus, Begumpet, Hyderabad – 500 016 Web: www.cess.ac.in, email: [email protected] Phone: 040-23402789, 23416780, fax: 040-23406808 December 2020 Report Submitted to Scheduled Castes Development Department Impact of Covid-19 on School Education in Telangana CONTENTS Page 1. The Backdrop 4 2. Methodology 4 TEACHERS’ PERSPECTIVES 3. Did schools complete the syllabus prior to the lockdown? 6 4. What did teachers do during school closures? 6 5. Modes and extent of teaching support extended by teachers 8 6. Support provided to students and teachers’ outlook 9 7. Challenges of remote teaching and its impact on different 10 student groups 8. Teachers’ perspectives on the impact of school closures and 12 their preparedness for reopening STUDENTS’ PERSPECTIVES 9. Occupational profile of student households 12 10. Students’ access to digital devices 13 11. Levels of access to remote learning during the school closures 14 12. Factors reported by students for not accessing remote teaching 16 13. Access to digital devices and remote learning by gender and 18 level of schooling 14. Key challenges confronted by students in accessing online 19 teaching 15. Is it difficult to learn certain subjects through remote modes of 20 teaching? 16. Online teaching no substitute for class-room teaching 21 17. Food-related constraints resulting from school closures 22 18. Likely impacts of extension of school closures 23 19. Post-survey developments: An update 23 2 Centre for Economic and Social Studies (CESS) Report Submitted to Scheduled Castes Development Department Impact of Covid-19 on School Education in Telangana ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS This report contains the findings of a rapid phone survey carried out by the Scheduled Castes Special Development Fund Research Unit of CESS. The survey was conducted during the peak (early August) of the Covid-19 pandemic when the norms and restrictions were still in place. The team from the SCSDF Research Unit rose to the occasion to conduct this phone survey amid challenging circumstances with the initiation of our Director. Since this is a follow-up study, we had the benefit of rapport and the contact details of teachers and principals/head masters of the sample schools under different managements. We had to make repeated phone calls to each sample respondent. The interactions mostly took place through prior appointments with the respondent stakeholders – often at odd times – early morning or late evening. We are grateful to all the respondents for their co-operation during the survey. Prof Revathi, and Dr Prudhvikar Reddy provided inputs to the survey design and analysis. S Harinath, P Anjaneyulu, K Bhaskar and S Naresh from the SCSDF research unit participated in the phone survey. Dr D Sreeramaraju provided the technical assistance in preparing the tables. We are thankful to them for the support received in the completion of the report. S Laxman Rao Head, SCSDF Research Unit CESS 3 Centre for Economic and Social Studies (CESS) Report Submitted to Scheduled Castes Development Department Impact of Covid-19 on School Education in Telangana 1. THE BACKDROP The Government of Telangana clamped a state-wide lockdown on March 20 this year in the wake of Covid-19 outbreak – prior to the nation-wide lockdown imposed by the Central Government on 25 March. In Telangana the lockdown was extended in phases until May 25. But in June the lockdown restrictions began to be rolled back in phases amid growing number of Coronavirus positive cases across the nation. As part of the lockdown all the educational institutions in Telangana remained closed and the closures continued until the end of 2020. In fact the pandemic struck even before the schools and colleges could complete teaching and conduct the final examinations for the academic session 2019-20. The SCSDF Research Unit of CESS conducted a rapid phone survey (in view of the Covid-19 protocols and restrictions) during the first half of August, 2020 to map the impact of Covid-19 on high school education in the State amid the unprecedented circumstances characterized by - school closures, absence of the regular face-to-face teaching, apprehensions about loss of learning, exploration of alternative methods of reaching out to students (such as remote teaching) and weighing of different options in deciding the status of “Corona batch” (academic year 2020-21) in general.1 The core objectives of the study include: (1) To understand how prepared the school managements were to tackle the pandemic-induced challenges. (2) To assess the impact of Covid-19 school closures on students’ learning. (3) How prepared the students were to adapt to remote teaching methods. (4) To assess the impact of school closures on different vulnerable social groups, with special reference to Scheduled Caste students. (5) To document the challenges encountered by students and teachers in switching over to digital learning/teaching. 2. METHODOLOGY This phone survey is a follow-up study2; it covers schools under five different management types under the Government of Telangana. The survey covers a half (15) of the total sample of 30 schools covered by the previous study on the performance of SC students vis-a-vis others under five managements. The rapport established and the contact details collected by CESS during the previous study helped it greatly in conducting this phone survey. The present phone survey covered schools under the following five managements: 1 Schools remained closed at the time of writing this report – December 2020. 2 The previous study compared the performance of SC students vis-à-vis other students in schools governed by different managements. It found that the academic performance of SC students in the core subjects is lower than that of the other students under all management types (ZPSSs, TREIS and TSWREIS). Moreover, within the SC category the SC students of TREIS (general residential) schools fared better than their counterparts studying in schools under ZPSSs and TSWREIS managements. 4 Centre for Economic and Social Studies (CESS) Report Submitted to Scheduled Castes Development Department Impact of Covid-19 on School Education in Telangana 1. Zilla Parishad Secondary Schools (ZPSSs) 2. Telangana Social Welfare Residential Educational Institutions Society (TSWREIS) 3. Telangana Tribal Welfare Residential Educational Institutions Society (TTWREIS) 4. Telangana Residential Educational Institutions Society (TREIS or “general residential”) 5. Telangana Tribal Welfare Ashram Schools (ashram schools) The management-wise schools covered by the study are presented in table 1. They are spread across five erstwhile districts of the State consisting of co-educational, boys and girls schools. The sample schools are, therefore, representative in terms of geography, governance types and student composition. Schools under all managements have English as the medium of instruction – except ashram schools which have both English and Telugu media. Table 1: Schools covered by the rapid phone study Erstwhile ZPSSs TREIS TSWREIS TTWREIS ASHRAM Districts SCHOOLS Porandla Peddapur Chintakunta Marrimadla 1 Karimnagar (Co-Ed) Camp (B) (G) (B) Siddapur Bandarupally Rayaparthy Kothaguda 2 Warangal (Co-Ed) (B) (G) (G) Mahabub Jadcherla Wanaparthy Madhanapur Wanaparthy Kalwakurthy 3 nagar (Co-Ed) (G) (B) (B) (B) Kerameri 4 Adilabad (G) Palwancha 5 Khammam (B) TOTAL 3 3 3 3 3 The respondent sample consists of school heads (principals/head masters) and teachers; and students. All heads of sample schools and five teachers from each sample school were covered. As for the student sample, 16 students were selected from each sample school. Thus the sample consists of 90 heads/teachers and 240 students in all. The student sample was drawn from 9th and 10th classes, given the importance of these grades in secondary education, particularly in the context of the prolonged disruptions caused to the normal academic activities. It may be stated here that the students of schools under five governance types covered under this survey belong predominantly to the vulnerable and historically disadvantaged social groups – Scheduled Castes, Scheduled Tribes and Backward Classes (the student sample comprises respondents belonging to these three social groups). 5 Centre for Economic and Social Studies (CESS) Report Submitted to Scheduled Castes Development Department Impact of Covid-19 on School Education in Telangana Table 2: Sample details of students and school heads Principals/HMs Teachers Students Management (one per school) (5 per school) (16 per school) ZPSSs 3 15 48 TSWREIS 3 15 48 TREIS 3 15 48 TTWREIS 3 15 48 ASHRAM SCHOOLS 3 15 48 Total 15 75 240 Each of the two respondent groups – teachers and students – was administered a set of questions related to the impact of Covid-induced school closures. The findings of the survey are, accordingly, presented in two sections covering the perspectives of the two stakeholder groups. 3. TEACHERS’ PERSPECTIVES 3.1. Did the schools complete the syllabus prior to the school closures? Summated responses from the school heads and teachers indicate that overall 64% of the schools completed their syllabus prior to the pandemic-induced school closures. And the remaining third of the schools completed up to 90% of the academic portion. The general residential schools lagged behind on this front with only 45% of them reported to have covered the syllabus completely. It may be recalled here that the abrupt lockdown was declared during the fag-end of the academic year in March, 2020. 3.2. What did the principals/teachers do during the Covid-19 school closures? Across the spectrum of the schools covered by the survey, a majority of teachers (62%) were involved in preparations for different modes of remote teaching such as compiling or preparing educational material and videos, and were learning how to continue teaching through different remote methods and technologies.