A recent survey conducted by NCERT (National Council Of Educational Research And Training) has found that students of Class VIII in Delhi schools fared way below the national average in fields like mathematics, science and social sciences.
The National Achievement Survey (NAS), conducted by NCERT under the central government’s Sarva Shiksha Abhiyan (SSA), tests students of classes III, V and VIII students’ performance in the four subjects, namely, reading comprehension, mathematics, science and social sciences. While Delhi students fared ‘significantly below national average’ in mathematics, science and social sciences,their performance was slightly better in reading comprehension, which was marked as ‘not significantly different from the national average’. To quantify this finding, the NCERT survey states that, across the country, the average score of students in mathematics was 245, while students from Delhi scored an average of 228. Only students from Meghalaya and Puducherry got a lower score in this subject.
The NAS, conducted by NCERT, tests students of classes III, V and VIII students’ performance in reading comprehension, mathematics, science and social sciences.
Further the NCERT survey shows that in social sciences and science, students from Delhi had 237 points each, significantly lower than the national average of 247 and 251 respectively. Interestingly, students from rural areas in Delhi outperformed students from urban areas in all subjects, but scored par or more than the national average in subjects like reading and social sciences. The findings of the study point to a severely crumbling institute of education, wherein, despite all the effort and investment, no real transfer of education is taking place. With the recent decision to reduce the syllabus of students in Delhi school by dropping several topics, the quality of education might take a nose-dive further. A comprehensive and quick strategy to address the falling standards of education in Delhi needs to formulated, maybe in partnership with NCERT, before the problem aggravates to levels where it is impossible to solve.