Class Apart
Every year when results of annual School Leaving Certificate (SLC) are announced, the growing disparity of education in public and private schools come to the forefront. But every time this issue gets buried under the heap of other burning issues. This year, too, less than one-third of students from public schools who had appeared for the annual high school examination could pass the test. Experts say odds are heavily stacked against the students of public schools given the prevalent pattern of investment, family support, culture of education, Opportunity to Learn (OTL), teaching learning environment and so on. The investment per child per year for secondary level students in public schools is six times less than students in private schools. Naturally, there will be disparity. Unless specific strategy is adopted to uplift the situation, Nepal is staring at a future where there will be educational status-based class division, which will trigger untold social and economic consequences
By SANJAYA DHAKAL
When SLC results were published last week, the first focus went on the toppers of the annual examinations. Samir Shrestha of Kavre Mahavidyalaya, Banepa became the nation-topper securing 91.37 percent marks. Shubha Acharya of Galaxy Public School , Kathmandu and Urmila Khulal of Siddhartha Higher Secondary School , Banepa shared the spot of first among the girls, securing 91 percent marks each.
But when the dust settled over the initial enthusiasm of bright faces of students and exuberant parents, the bleak picture emerged.
Just over one-third of students who had appeared for the test had actually managed to pass it this year – the trend of underperformance that has been consistent over the years.
More importantly, the disparity in the results between students of public and private schools was disturbingly huge. Whereas 80 percent of students of private schools passed the SLC, the same proportion of students from public schools failed it. The performance by girl students among the public school students was even bleaker.
Figures Speak
Although the government has been setting aside 15 percent of the total annual budget for the education sector, the results still seem disappointing. The figures of this year’s SLC results speak for themselves.
Only 38.72 percent students of the total of 216,303 regular examinees have passed this year’s examinations held in March/April. Likewise, 1856 regular examinees secured first division with distinction, 31,029 got first division, 45,888 were in the second division while 4974 came in the third division. On the exempted side, of the total 57,860 students who appeared for the examinations, only 8.86 percent passed.
Of the total 171,440 students of government schools who appeared for the annual test, only 49,648 (28.96 percent) could pass. On the other hand, among the students of private schools, over 80 percent passed the test.
Again, students of private schools were dominant in securing good division marks. Of the total students from government schools, only 8000 could come out in first division whereas 22,000 students from private schools managed to achieve the feat. This year the number of students who passed with distinction stood at 90 (for public schools) and 1766 (for private schools). Likewise, number of those who passed in third division stood at 4621 (for public schools) and 144 (for private schools), according to the available data.
Public Vs Private Disparity
“I think there are a number of factors responsible for the poor performance of public schools,” said Baburam Pokharel, founder principal of V.S. Niketan Higher Secondary School and senior vice president of Private and Boarding Schools Organization of Nepal (PABSON). “And the most important factor is the affect of conflict on them. Most public schools could not even run properly for 50 days even as the minimum number schools days has been fixed at 180 per year. Likewise, the lack of ownership and responsibility among the teachers of public schools is also to blame.”
On the other hand, representatives of government schools claim that lack of seriousness on the part of the government and the existing environment of fear are responsible for the poor outcome. Baburam Adhikari, general secretary of Nepal Teachers’ Organization, said that the situation could be improved if schools could be declared zones of peace and if their infrastructure can be developed.
However, experts and educationists point to deeper flaws in the system. Professor Dr. Min Bahadur Bista, in fact, lists a number of disadvantageous factors that work against public schools. “First of all the time-on-task is high in private schools for both students and teachers; they provide proper learning environment and engage the students; they have frequent testing and screening mechanism; they make available additional learning resources, they have professional human resource; they build practice of homework; they have strong administrative management; their parental involvement is high; their students enjoy proper learning environment in their families; they can select best students and remove under-performers; and the students of private schools get 13 years of education including pre-primary level when they appear for SLC,” he listed.
In this backdrop, the students of private schools just cannot be compared with those from public schools who lack all those facilities listed above. At present, as Dr. Bista says, most of the students in public schools are the First Generation of Schoolers – meaning their parents have had no education. Typically, the first generation of schoolers are always under-performers.
The growing disparity is going to have a lot of adverse consequences for the future of the country. “We are building a separate education-based class system, which will be detrimental to our interests,” said Dr. Bista.
Other Disparities
There are many other disparities apart from public and private schools. Even within public schools, odds are heavily against girls. These days, in developed countries, girls are leading toppers in school examination. But, in Nepal , they are the worst performers because they get unequal importance in teaching-learning.
Dr. Bista adds that a study has shown that while school-going girls have to work, on average, for 4-6 hours a day on household chores, the boys work only for 1-3 hours. “The Opportunity To Learn (OTL) is higher for boys. They are more likely to get support and attention from teachers as well as families. The girls also lack role-model and there is no high-expectation from the girls,” he added. “Likewise, the OTL is also quite lower for non-Nepali speaking community like indigenous, Dalits and other disadvantaged people.
The remote areas are still more handicapped. They lack subject-based teachers. Due to conflict and violence, schools are operated for less than 150 days in one year. Nobody knows when the students/teachers will be abducted. Likewise, the positions of 30,000 teachers in government schools still lie vacant.
There is a big gap in the investment as well. Even now the investment per child per year stands at Rs 1800-2200 for secondary level students in public schools compared to Rs 12,000 in private schools.
In school levels, rarely any student ‘fails’ in most of the western countries. Even in countries with centralized education system, pass percentage is, on average, 60-80 percent. “When the pass percent drops below 50, then it means there is a serious flaw in the system. Nepal is probably the only country in the world with such high failure percentage,” said Dr. Bista.
At present, the government gives heavy emphasis on Basic and Primary education – for which 55-60 percent of total budget on education is spent. It is still not clear how much share will be given to technical/vocational; secondary and higher education. “A couple of years from now, we will hopefully reach the Universal Primary Education. So, higher education is equally important. While we cannot deny that number one priority needs to be primary education at present, this should not be done at the cost of secondary and higher education,” said Dr. Bista.
The overall literacy rate in Nepal stands at around 55 percent at present. The access to basic and primary education has expanded to include 80-84 percent of kids.
While the access to primary education is increasing, it is equally important to focus on the quality in secondary and higher education. Otherwise, the huge investment will only go in vain.
“Disparity Is Huge And Growing”
‑ Dr. Min Bahadur Bista
Professor Dr. Min Bahadur Bista is a well-known educationist. Bista has decades long experience in the education sector. Currently, he is working in the SLC Study – a DANIDA-funded research team formed to assess the SLC education and suggest ways to improve upon the existing weaknesses. The team will present its report to the government in next few months. He spoke to SANJAYA DHAKAL on a number of issues surrounding the quality and existing disparity in education. Excerpts:
How do you assess this year’s SLC results?
We have seen that over the years there has been consistent underperformance by the students. In most years, the pass percentage of SLC stand at around 30 percent. This shows that despite all the reform efforts, we have not been able to bring about fundamental difference in their achievement. In particular, there are a number of reasons why SLC pass percentage stood at 38 percent (8 percent less than previous year) this year. They include lack of proper screening (pre-SLC tests) in government schools as many of them could not hold the send-up examinations and testing conditions for the students due to environment of insecurity and fear. Besides, on the basis of our study, it can be said that the question paper to test the achievements are not the objective, valid, reliable or consistent instrument. There needs to be standardization of testing papers.
What about the past efforts to reform the system?
There were projects like BPEP and SEP. But they only focused on macro-level structural system fixing. They did not concentrate on process and output. Curricula were revised but conditions of schools were not improved. The focus of reform should be on children and classroom rather than on teachers’ training, curricula or text-book distribution.
How do you see the future of education then?
The future will be alarming if there is no immediate re-engineering of the system. At present, we are in the phase of system expansion and we are moving from the elitist model of education (that we adopted in the past) to the mass-schooling model (attempting to rope in as many students as possible in education). Naturally, in this phase the focus will be on quantity rather than quality. And in this phase, normally the performance is also below par. One reason for this is because overwhelming majority of students will represent the First Generation of Schoolers whose parents are illiterate and in whose family there is no culture of education. But this does not mean that we can work in business-as-usual practice.
Is there any flaw in testing system?
The Office of Controller of Examinations (OCE) is a highly inefficient, bureaucratic and non-professional organization that suffers from resource crunch. It needs institutional reform and autonomy to hold competitive examinations. At present, the OCE is not a testing organization but a logistics management organization. Although it generates huge resources, it does not have access to those resources.
Do you think we need to change the current number-based grading system?
The current number-based grading system is unscientific and it does not tell about the actual capability of students. It is also highly unreliable. The same student can get 20 marks when checked by one examiner and get 40 when checked by another. Besides, the current syllabus is content-heavy. We need not give equal priority to all the eight subjects. At present, if a student fails in one subject, say Physical Education, then he will be declared a failure even when he might have obtained excellent marks in subjects like Maths, Science and English. And, the students also do not have any option to re-appear the examinations when they feel they could get higher marks next time. As such, we have to embrace the letter-based grading system. There should be a system of providing subject-based qualifications as well.
What about the existing disparities in public and private school education?
The disparity is huge and growing. The SLC results show that while 80 percent of students from private schools pass, the same percent from public schools fail. There is a huge gender-based disparity with girl students faring much lower than boy students. Then there is disparity in investment, family support, human resource etc on public and private education. There are also disparities among students from Nepali-speaking and non-Nepali-speaking communities. The test papers are urban-biased and favorable to Nepali-speaking and middle class population.
How do you rate the performance of public schools?
We must remember that most students at public schools hail from poor households. The public schools serve those students coming from a difficult environment. Firstly, it is important to inject the habit of schooling among such students. The physical conditions of the public schools are also very poor. There is a need to have early intervention to improve their conditions. A specific strategy is required to uplift them.
