News Analysis India

Tag: Bihar students

  • Covid effect: 75 lakh students will suffer loss of learning in Bihar

    Express News Service
    PATNA: A Unicef estimate says nearly 75 lakh children in Bihar will experience learning loss in the midst of Covid-induced lockdown. This is so because as many as 31% of school students do not have access to digital devices to avail online classes.Nearly 7 lakh students are not expected to return to their schools, the Unicef study said. The adolescents (14-18-year-old), comprising nearly 5.49% girls and 0.26% boys, are expected to drop out of schools.

    In a presentation to education officials, Prassana Ash, monitoring and evaluation specialist, and Pramila Manoharan, education specialist in Unicef Bihar, highlighted the scenarios related to the Covid-19 second and third wave and its impact on children’s learning.Citing some key point-estimations, they said nearly 75 lakh children in Bihar will experience learning loss; assuming 31% students do not have access to digital devices; 3 per cent or nearly 7 lakh students are not expected to return to school.

    Bihar additional chief secretary, in-charge of education department, Sanjay Kumar also spoke about strategies and solutions to ensure continuity of learning for the most marginalized children in Bihar in light of the pandemic and continued lockdown and school closures. “We are aware that a vast majority of children cannot access online classes or e-resources. We are looking at solutions and have requested the Centre to provide devices to bridge the digital divide in education.”  

    Terry Durnnian, Chief of Education, Unicef India, said all efforts should be made to ensure that the most marginalized groups of children can continue their learning. Nafisa Binte Shafique, chief of Unicef Bihar, made a strong plea for safe re-opening of schools with complete adherence to safety protocols. 

  • Bihar Intermediate exams: Toppers belong to lesser-known schools of smaller cities

    Express News Service
    PATNA: Students of lesser-known schools from smaller cities in Bihar have proved their talent again in the Bihar Intermediate exams, declared on Friday. Among them, three girls belonging to middle-class families have topped in all the streams- science, arts and commerce. The toppers said that they used the lockdown period to study hard which helped them in getting the top positions.

    Sonali Kumari – one of the topper girls, who has topped in science stream, is the daughter of a thela-vendor of Nalanda district while Madhu Bharati – topper in Arts is the daughter of a teacher in Khagria. Sugandha Kumari – Commerce topper from Aurangabad is the daughter of a local fertiliser trader.

    Almost all toppers, including the three, admitted that lockdown, in fact, posed a challenge to them but they converted the crisis in opportunity for completing revisions ahead of examinations. Madhu Bharti and Sonali Kumari now desire to study further aspiring to go in the Indian Administrative Service while Sugandha Kumari wants to pursue charted accountancy.

    Educational experts said that the pandemic failed to dampen the spirits of students, especially girls. “The 80 -90% students,who come from rural and semi-urban areas have become more concerned towards their study aiming to civil services and other coveted posts compared to students of urban areas. As a result of this, students of rural background are doing better these days”, said noted educationist Dr Archana Kumari.

    Bihar’s education minister Vijay K Chaudhary has also said that girls topping in the examinations in Bihar indicate a better change in society on the way for half of the population. “Their success indicates the success of CM Nitish Kumar’s schemes like cycle yojan, poshak yojna and financial assistances of Rs 25,000 to unmarried girls upon passing intermediate and Rs 50,000 for both married and unmarried girls on passing graduation,have started bringing tremendous positive changes”, Chaudhary said.

    As per official figures, Madhu Bharti has topped in the arts stream by obtaining 463 marks, Sugandha Kumari obtained 471 and Sonali Kumari topped with 471 marks out of a total of 500 marks. Speaking to the media, Madhu Bharti in Khagaria said that she used the entire lockdown period in going through the courses and preparing models notes. “It (lockdown) was the best time for me to self-study”, she said adding that she aspires to become an IAS officer.

    In the same way, Sugandha Kumari said that she did a wider study during the lockdown to get to the position. “I wish to tell other students who are next to appear in the intermediate examination that they should focus more on a wider study with positive mindsets”, she said.

    Sonali Kumari stated that proper utilisation of lockdown periods along with regular study helped her to gain the top position. She also aspires to become an IAS officer. As per official data, a total of 6,43,678 girls had appeared in all streams of intermediate examination and of them, 5,18,591 have passed.

  • Post lockdown, Bihar govt brought over 32 lakh dropouts back to schools

    Express News Service
    PATNA: In a special post-lockdown drive, over 32 lakh children have been enrolled in Bihar’s government schools. The drive, christened as ‘Praveshotsav’, was launched across the state from March 8 to 24 by the education department to bring the school dropouts back to classrooms. The programme used the service of school teachers, Aanganwadi sevikas and the Jeevika-Didis.

    According to education minister Vijay K Chaudhary, the state government is determined not to leave a single child out of school and the Praveshotsav has yielded a great result with good support from the people. According to the director of primary education Dr Ranjit K Singh, a total number of 32, 08,503 children have been brought back to classes 1 to 9 across the 38 districts.

    “The children have been enrolled in nearly 69,558 government-run primary, upper secondary and high schools in the state”, Dr Singh said. He added that the parents were encouraged to send their wards to schools through various modes of communications including village meetings and dramas. The department has also enrolled 5,535 are differently-abled children.

    The highest number of children — 13,55,465 — has been enrolled to class 1, while 5, 77,885 children have been enrolled to class 6.  He said that the highest number of 772 differently-abled children have been enrolled in Nalanda district followed by 316 in West Champaran,  289 in Sitamarhi, 276 in Samastipur and 251 in Nawada.  In the same way, Dr Singh said, 1,94,877 children have been enrolled in Muzaffarpur followed by 15,861 in Vaishali, 1,52,562 in Sitamarhi, 1,36,616 in Purnia, 1,32,209 in Madhubani, 1,28,684 in Nalanda, 1,27,453 in West Champaran and other districts.

    Besides this, the department has also decided to start a 3-month long ‘Catch-Up class from April 8 for the pupils to help them cover their courses suffered during the lockdown