Over 16,179 schools in J&K have less than 50 student enrollment: MoE
‘18% schools in J&K have adverse PTR’
The Ministry of Education (MoE) in its latest report said that around 16,179 schools in J&K have less than 50 students enrolled.
This is despite the J&K Education Department’s claims of filling the gaps in the education sector.
The Union Ministry also said that 18 percent of the schools have adverse PTR while of the total 23,173 schools in J&K, 848 schools across J&K are with zero enrolments while 2413 schools have only a single teacher
The observations made by the MoE have raised concern about the functioning of the government schools in J&K as the School Education Department (SED) has been repeatedly claiming that no school with zero enrollment exists in J&K.
As per the official document, the MoE has made this analysis as per the UDISE-2022 and has mentioned the total number of schools across J&K as 23,173.
Talking to Greater Kashmir, Project Director Samagra Shiksha J&K, Rakesh Magotra said that the observations made by the MoE were not as per the latest UDISE-2023-24 data.
“No school with zero enrollment exists on the ground after carrying out rationalisation of teachers, we also addressed the issue of single-teacher schools as well,” Magotra told Greater Kashmir.
The SED in 2023 officially closed all the merged schools and removed their names from the UDISE data.
Following this exercise, the actual number of schools reduced from 23,173 to 18,723 across J&K.
“We have removed the names and data of all these merged schools from UDISE which were officially closed. However, the latest UDISE data is yet to be certified by the Ministry of Education and that is why they have considered UDISE 2022 while making observations about schools with zero enrollment and schools with single teachers,” Magotra said.
He said that the department has submitted the latest UDISE data to the Ministry of Education and is expecting the data will be certified shortly.
“We were expecting that the report of MoE will be released by June and by that time our latest UDISE data would have been certified as well,” Magotra said.
The MoE made these observations during the Project Approval Board (PAB) meeting held in February this year.
The PAB was convened to consider the Annual Work Plan and Budget (AWP&B), 2024-25, under Samagra Shiksha for J&K.
The meeting was chaired by the Secretary of School Education and Literacy (SE&L), Government of India (GoI).
Meanwhile, the MoE observed that of the total 950 ICT laboratories approved for J&K, only 421 have been made functional so far.
“The benefits of digital education can be leveraged only when these pending ICT and smart classrooms are made functional,” the MoE observed.
It said that the Digital Infrastructure for Knowledge Sharing (DIKSHA) was an important resource of QR-coded textbooks and specialised e-contents.
“This needs to become part of the pedagogy in the classroom, wherein the resources available can be used by teachers in classroom transactions,” the MoE observed.
It asked the J&K SED to give priority to completing the ICT and smart classrooms so that the school children can utilise these resources.
“To further augment this effort, the focus should also be on saturating internet connectivity, especially in secondary and senior secondary schools,” the MoE said.
The MoE said that of the total 1315 skill education laboratories approved for J&K, only 553 have been made functional and 762 are pending in J&K.
“The National Education Policy 2020 underscores the importance of skill education for all students, especially those in the secondary stage of schooling. J&K is urged to reassess these previous approvals in light of the changing job roles and develop a list of proposed new roles that could be created following the requirements,” the official document reads
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