Study of Small Schools in Karnataka – Final Draft Report Study of SMALL SCHOOLS IN KARNATAKA FFiinnaall RReeppoorrtt Submitted to: O/o State Project Director, Sarva Shiksha Abhiyan, Karnataka 15th September 2010 Catalyst Management Services Pvt. Ltd. #19, 1st Main, 1st Cross, Ashwathnagar RMV 2nd Stage, Bangalore – 560 094, India SSA Mission, Karnataka CMS, Bangalore Ph.: +91 (080) 23419616 Fax: +91 (080) 23417714 Email: raghu@cms -india.org: [email protected]; Website: http://www.catalysts.org Study of Small Schools in Karnataka – Final Draft Report Acknowledgement We thank Smt. Sandhya Venugopal Sharma,IAS, State Project Director, SSA Karnataka, Mr.Kulkarni, Director (Programmes), Mr.Hanumantharayappa - Joint Director (Quality), Mr. Bailanjaneya, Programme Officer, Prof. A. S Seetharamu, Consultant and all the staff of SSA at the head quarters for their whole hearted support extended for successfully completing the study on time. We also acknowledge Mr. R. G Nadadur, IAS, Secretary (Primary& Secondary Education), Mr.Shashidhar, IAS, Commissioner of Public Instruction and Mr. Sanjeev Kumar, IAS, Secretary (Planning) for their support and encouragement provided during the presentation on the final report. We thank all the field level functionaries specifically the BEOs, BRCs and the CRCs who despite their busy schedule could able to support the field staff in getting information from the schools. We are grateful to all the teachers of the small schools visited without whose cooperation we could not have completed this study on time. We thank the SDMC members and parents who despite their daily activities were able to spend time with our field team and provide useful feedback about their schools. SSA Mission, Karnataka CMS, Bangalore Study of Small Schools in Karnataka – Final Draft Report Table of Contents 1. EXECUTIVE SUMMARY .................................................................................................................................. 2 2. BACKGROUND ................................................................................................................................................ 7 3. OBJECTIVES AND SCOPE OF THE STUDY............................................................................................... 8 4. APPROACH AND METHODOLOGY .............................................................................................................. 9 5. CURRENT STATUS OF SCHOOLS ............................................................................................................ 12 6. ACCESS TO FACILITIES ............................................................................................................................. 19 7. TEACHERS PROFILE................................................................................................................................... 20 8. CHILDREN PROFILE .................................................................................................................................... 23 9. FEASIBILITY OF CONTINUANCE OR CLOSURE OF SCHOOLS .......................................................... 26 10. TEACHER AND COMMUNITY PERCEPTION ......................................................................................... 31 11. SUGGESTIONS FOR CONTINUANCE / CLOSURE................................................................................. 34 ANNEXES ANNEX – 1: TERMS OF REFERANCE (TOR) ANNEX – 2: LIST OF SMALL SCHOOLS ANNEX – 3: QUESTIONNAIRE ANNEX – 4: LIST OF 123 SCHOOLS ALREADY CLOSED ANNEX – 5: LIST OF 972 SCHOOLS TO BE CONTINUED ANNEX – 6: LIST OF 166 SCHOOLS WITH UP TO 10 ENROLMENT TO BE CONTINUED ANNEX – 7: LIST OF 323 SCHOOLS TO BE CONTINUED MERGED ANNEX – 8: SAMPLE VILLAGE MAPS SHOWING NEIGHBOURHOOD SCHOOLS 1 SSA Mission, Karnataka CMS, Bangalore Study of Small Schools in Karnataka – Final Draft Report 11... EExxeeccuuttiivvee SSuummmmaarryy The Governing Council of Sarva Shiksha Abhiyan (SSA), Karnataka Mission felt the need for conducting a feasibility study of all the primary schools with enrollment up to 10 children. In this regard, Catalyst Management Services Pvt. Ltd (CMS) Bangalore entrusted for conducting the study. This report is prepared based on the information collected in 1585 small schools (as per the list provided by SSA). The study envisaged complete enumeration survey of all small schools, which is defined as schools with enrolment of up to 10 children. Thus, based on the 2008 – 09 data on enrolment of children, there were 1585 schools with enrolment of 6 to 10 children was provided. All these schools were visited and information on trend in enrolment over the last nine years has been collected. In addition, information on infrastructure facilities available in the schools and the human resources, teacher and community perception have been collected. The distribution of 1585 small schools is observed to be concentrated in 13 districts (85% of the schools). In six districts namely Hassan, Tumkur, Chikmagalur, Uttara Kannada, Ramanagara and Mandya 841 (53%) small schools are located with more than 100 in each district. In 7 districts namely Shimoga, Kolar, Bangalore (Rural), Chikkaballapura, Chitradurga, Madhigiri and Mysore the number of small schools is in the range of 50 to 100 and the total number of small schools is 499 (32%). The growth in the population in these districts indicates 1.03% annual growth in districts with high density small schools, while it is 1.38% and 1.75% in other categories of districts. The study observed that 1461 (92%) are working and 123 (8%) schools are closed. The closure of the schools is due to low enrolment of children which are merged with other schools in the neighbourhood. The medium of instruction of the closed schools shows that Kannada schools are more as compared to other types of schools. It is seen that most of the schools closed (113 out of 123) are in the last one year. The number of schools closed based on the medium of instruction reveals that most of the Kannada schools have been closed more than a year ago as compared to other medium schools which are closed in the last six months. It is seen that 49% of 1461 working schools are 10 to 25 years old followed by 30% of the schools which are 25 to 50 years old. There are 8% of schools which are more than 50 years old and few of them are as old as a century. There are 6% schools which are as new as 2 to 3 years established across the state. The average distance to GP is about 4.5 kms from the school indicating that the small schools are located in other villages of the GP main village. It is seen that only 109 (8%) of the 1461 working schools are located in the GP head quarter villages which includes some of the schools located in the urban areas. 2 SSA Mission, Karnataka CMS, Bangalore Study of Small Schools in Karnataka – Final Draft Report The average number of rooms available in 1461 working schools is 2 and varies across schools in the range of 1 to 16. The maximum number is seen in GLPS Mirkhal, Bidar district, Basavkalyan Block, Beluru Cluster. One third of the schools are single room schools, while nearly 45% of the schools have 2 rooms. There are few schools where the number of rooms available is more than 5. The number of rooms used for instructional purposes among the total available rooms is only one. This is obvious because of low enrolment of children. Also, in schools having more than 2 rooms, all rooms are not used for instructional purposes. Functioning toilet for children and electricity facility is available in more than 75% of the schools. However, availability of drinking water facility for children is seen in 54% of the schools only. The other three facilities – compound, ramp and play ground - are available in about 25% of the working schools only. The trend in the number of teachers by gender in the 1461 working schools during the nine year period shows a declining trend during 2001 to 2006 and increasing in the next two years and again declining in the last two years. This decline is more among the male teachers as compared to female teachers whose number is continuously increasing excepting in the year 2009 – 10. The percentage of female teachers over the nine years is continuously increasing from 36% to 43%. However there has been a fluctuation in the annual rate of increase. OBC & General category teachers are over 60% followed by SC and Muslim groups who are almost same (15%). The other two groups namely the ST and other Minority (mainly Christians) teachers constitute less than 5%. The average length of service of teachers in the small schools is about 6 years. The tenure of services of the teachers in the small schools indicates that 17% of the teachers are having over 10 years followed by 33% with 5 to 10 years. More than one fourth of the teachers are having 2 to 5 years tenure while less than one fifth are in the range of 1 to 2 years tenure. Less than 5% of the teachers are new to the small schools with less than a year of service. The annual growth rate in the number of teachers in the working schools over the last nine years calculated based on the exponential trend (y=a*bt , y=number of teachers, t= no. of years) indicates that the overall growth rate is 1%. The genderwise growth rate shows negative growth of male teachers as compared to over 3% among female teachers. Across the different social groups, the annual growth rate is higher among the ST teachers (2.12%) as compared to other groups of teachers. The distribution of children by gender in the 1461 working schools