Learning to grow

States should give school reopening priority

Now that the Omicron variant of Covid-19 appears to be receding and 75 per cent of the adult population have been administered two doses of the vaccination, states are addressing the question of reopening partially locked-down economies. Inevitably, with the economy and employment-creation languishing from pre-Covid times, the focus has been on reopening shops and establishments, malls, hotels, gyms, beauty parlours, and so on, since these are all sources of employment and demand. Largely overlooked in this discourse, however, is the prolonged closure of India’s schools. Here, too, the discussion and concern have been centred on access to digital learning, enhanced parental responsibilities on home learning, and the psychological impact of limited socialisation. Also, given the exam orientation of our education system, the efforts of education ministries and school administrations have accorded considerable thought and energy to ensuring that students at senior and school-leaving (10+ 2) levels get to attend physical classes and sit for exams.

 
Though these are all valid concerns, the fact is that the vast majority of India’s young people between the ages of five and 15 who are about to enter or will enter the workforce a decade from now have effectively lost almost two years of school education owing to the pandemic (the post-Delta pandemic school reopening was all too short). This is no small setback at a time when India urgently needs to upgrade workforce skills in readiness for the global knowledge economy. Worse, millions of children at infant and primary levels have missed out on the critical formative learning stage. Though online classes have been the mainstay of schooling these past two years, this medium can by no means replace the experience of classroom learning.

 
It is also clear that the benefits of this mode have been uneven across income spectrums, since it depends on owning a smartphone or computer and an internet connection. The latest ASER study highlighted how smartphone ownership did not automatically translate into children having access to the device — some 26 per cent of children had no access to them at all, with states such as West Bengal and Bihar showing dire levels of device deprivation. ASER’s study focused on rural education but the trends are unlikely to differ in urban India. The survey also shows that the key beneficiary of these closures has been the unregulated tuition industry, which is an expensive option for the poor and lower middle class. The emergence of online learning unicorns highlights the business opportunities embedded in the pandemic-induced education gap.  

 
Though these issues are obvious, the responses across states have been extremely uneven. Some states such as Tripura, Maharashtra, Telangana, and Tamil Nadu have decided to open schools from February 1 for all classes (some districts in Maharashtra reopened last week). Other states have allowed reopening the 10+2 classes. But the vast majority of state administrations — including India’s most populous state of Uttar Pradesh and other poll-bound states — have yet to announce reopening schedules, leaving millions of children in limbo. Given the long-term implications of serious learning losses, especially among the poor, states should accord priority to getting children back to school sooner rather than later. It would be no exaggeration to say India’s future depends on it.