Tuesday 14 December 2010

Education System in Nepal

Neither modern nor traditional

-Jaga Bhandary-

In 1951 the right for every citizen to get education was adopted in Nepal. Before this constitution was settled only the Royal Family and the ruling classes had access to education. The rulers feared that, if poor and lower cast people would get free education, they would be critical and dissatisfied. The people should therefore be kept ignorant, which was for the better. After 1951 "the dissemination of modern education concepts was slow. The education system was not formally centralised until 1971. At that time, a uniform curriculum was developed (ibid). This was Nepal's first national plan for educational development. The government also made a first attempt to look at education as an "investment in human resource development”.

The next educational revolution occurred in 1990. It was connected to the new constitution in the society which was based upon democratic principles, a multiparty system. For a long time there were no political parties operating freely in Nepal, and there were no public debate on education. At the World Conference on Education, held in Jomtien (Thailand) in 1990, Nepal decided to endorse the Jomtien Declaration. The main goal for education was agreed to be "Education for All".

In the past two decades, there has been a dramatic expansion of education facilities in the country. A number of new schools, colleges (public as well as community) have been opened. As a result, adult literacy (age 15+) of the country was reported to be 48.2% (female: 34.6%, male: 62.2%) in the Population Census, 2001, up from about 5% in 1990–91. Beginning from about 300 schools and two colleges with about 10,000 students in 1951, there now are 26,000 schools (including higher secondary), 415 colleges, five universities, and two academies of higher studies. Altogether 5.5 million students are enrolled in those schools and colleges who are served by more than 150,000 teachers.

Despite such examples of success, there are problems and challenges. Education management, quality, relevance, access are some of the critical issues of education in Nepal. Societal disparities based on gender, ethnicity, location, economic class, etc. are yet to be eliminated. Resource crunch has always been a problem in education. These problems have made the goal of education for all a challenge for the country. The historical monopoly of educational opportunity by members of the wealthier and higher caste groups gradually is still increasing. After the post movement of 1990-91, Schools and colleges were open to all. As a result enrollment figures are rising rapidly. The long-standing prejudice against the education of women seems to be very slowly breaking down, as attested to by increasing enrollments of girls in schools and colleges. Yet two distinct biases--social class and geography--remains pronounced in educational attainment. Despite general accessibility, education still nonetheless primarily served children of landlords, businessmen, government leaders, or other elite members of the society, for they are the only ones who could easily afford to continue beyond primary school. They also are far more able to afford, and likely to continue, education beyond the high school level. Many students in the general population drop out before they took the School Leaving Certificate examination. There is an even more important ingredient for success after leaving school: if the quality of available higher education is considered inadequate or inferior, higher caste families can afford to send their children overseas to obtain necessary degrees. Foreign educational degrees, especially those obtain from American and West European institutions, carry greater prestige than degrees from Nepal. Higher caste families also have the necessary connections to receive government scholorships to study abroad.

Further, education still remains largely urban-biased. The majority of education institutions, particularly better quality institutions, have been found in urban areas. In rural areas where schools are set up, the quality of instruction is inferior, facilities are very poor, and educational materials are either difficult to find or virtually unavailable. Consequently, if rural families are serious about the education of their children, they are forced to send them to urban areas, a very expensive proposition that the vast majority of rural households could not afford. Although there has been a remarkable numerical growth in the literacy rates, as well as the number of education institutions over the years, the quality of education has not necessarily improved. For example, at higher educational level, the research focus or tradition is virtually absent, largely because there are few research facilities available for professors. There are some excellent private schools, mostly located in the Kathmandu Valley, but many have appeared to be merely money-making ventures rather than serious, devoted educational enterprises. The large majority of schools and colleges are run by poorly prepared and poorly trained teachers and professors. Schools and colleges frequently are closed because of strikes. Students have little respect for teachers and professors and are concerned with obtaining a certificate rather than a quality education. Cheating is rampant during examinations at all levels.

Formal schooling in modern times is still constrained by the economy and culture. Children are generally needed to work in the fields and at home. Many students begin school late (at ages nine or ten); more than half leave school after completing only one year. Educating females are viewed as unnecessary; as a consequence, their enrollment levels are far lower than those of males. Regional variations often hindered the effectiveness of uniform text materials and teacher training. Although the government was relatively successful in establishing new schools, the quality of education still remains low, particularly in remote regions where the majority of the population lives. Terrain further inhibited management and supervision of schools.
The total number of schools, both public and private, has reached 28,131, at the primary level. Likewise, the net enrolment rate of students has reached 87.4 percent. The percentage of girl students has increased more as compared to that of boys in primary schools. The participation of girl students has increased from 43 percent to 48 percent. Of the children of school going age, 38 percent of the children of Adibasi Janajatis have participated, whereas 18 percent of Dalits and only one percent of children with disability have participated. Against the target of 0.8 for literacy gender equity index, it has reached 0.61. At the primary level, the proportion of female teachers has reached to 30.6 percent, that of Dalits to 2.5 percent and Adibasi Janajatis to 17.8 percent.

Although there has been progress in the development of primary education, even now, nearly 12.6 percent of the children are deprived of primary education. Of this, the poor, Dalits, Madhesis, and Adibasi Janajatis are the most deprived and excluded. There has not been equal access to school and higher education for all genders, groups and regions. The class repetition rate and drop out rates are high and the passing out rate is also not satisfactory. So, the Government of Nepal should address some major issues raised in education sector.

Issues:
Access • Access is limited with the gross enrolment ratio of about 6%.
Equity • The bottom two quintiles’ share in all level education is very less. Currently overall enrolment is expanding primarily in the private sector. This is likely to restrict even more the access to education for poor segments of the population.
Quality • Barring a few private and public institutions, the quality of education is poor. The quality assurance and accreditation system is not is place except for a rudimentary system in place in professional education like engineering and medicine.
Relevance • Collaboration between employers and academic institutions is weak, and so is the R&D in these institutions. As result, barring few premiere institutions the relevance of education to the job market needs is poor.
Financing • Barring a few, public institutions are not sustainable financially. Government
spending in education specially in higher education is low – about 7% of public expenditures in education.
Governance • Although Nepal has initiated the process of decentralization as a means of
improving governance, overall the governance of public education is still weak.

In course of development of education sector, we have so many problems and challenges to be addressed as well as so many opportunities to be grabbed.

Some major Problems, Challenges and Opportunities are as follows.

Problems:
Following problems have appeared in the education sector:
• Basic physical infrastructure not developed for quality education.
• Supply of teachers in relation with the number of children not made.
• A wide disparity between community and private schools in passing out rates.
• Increasing number of educated unemployment.
• Exclusion of women, Dalits, persons with disability, backward groups, Adibasi Janjati
groups, Madhesis, conflict affected, and displaced from the mainstream of education.

Challenges:
Of the major challenges existing, the following are critical:
• Inability to implement decentralization in a practical way.
• Inability to enhance the competence for work performance of the stakeholders and
educational managers at the local level as expected.
• Inability to adjust the teacher student ratio to decrease the number of illiterate.
• Inability to make institutional reforms in the educational structure.
• Inability to implement the principle of cost sharing.
• Inability to make adjustments of the certificate level education of universities with higher secondary education.
• Inability to link education with the national and international markets.
• Inability to make effective monitoring of educational programs.

Opportunities:
The following opportunities have appeared in the education sector:
• Starting of the use of information and communication technology in education.
• Reforms made in Education Management Information System (EMIS).
• Increase in donor assistance in the implementation of the commitments made by Nepal in the international forum.
• Increase in interests/concerns among the schools and local communities on transparency, accountability, and responsibility.
• Increase in community participation in school management.
• Increase in partnership and collaboration between NGOs and the private sector.
• Notable participation of Nepal in the international forum on sports and success achieved as expected.
• National consensus and government’s policy commitment to make basic education available free of cost.

Now, we are trying to move ahead in line with Education for All as well as Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) of 100 percent enrollment by 2015. We are only debating on modern education system and global education. Our curriculum is greatly influenced by United States models, and it is developed with assistance from the United Nations Educational, Scientific, and Cultural Organization. In other hand, our educational background and facts are quite different in comparison with United State education system or European Education Model. Our education system is neither modern nor traditional. Our views are modern but resources and infrastructure facilities still remain traditional. However, modern education is not only our need but also compulsion to compete in international job market and minimize educated unemployment rate. So, it is necessary to make adjustment between modern education system and our ground reality. Modern education system has to be adopted keeping due respect to local fact. So many biases- social class, geography, economic class, gender, ethnicity, culture and religion have to be eliminated.

1 comment:

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