PANAJI: Goa continues to retain its position for one of the best gross enrolment ratios in the country (GER) for the female population in institutes of higher education.
Of Goa’s female population in the 18-24 age group, 34.6% girls are enrolled for various higher education programmes in colleges and universities, as per the All India Survey on Higher Education (AISHE) report of the Union education ministry released on Thursday.
“Andhra Pradesh, Arunachal Pradesh, Chandigarh, Delhi, Goa, Haryana, Himachal Pradesh, Puducherry, Tamil Nadu, Jammu & Kashmir, Karnataka, Kerala, Maharashtra, Manipur, Punjab, Telangana and Uttarakhand have GER of more than 30% for females in all categories.
The GER for female population at the all India level is 27.3%,” the AISHE report noted.
The state has the third best pupil-teacher ratio in the country and also has better enrolment ratio in higher education across social groups like SC, ST than the national average.
However, one area of concern that has emerged in the AISHE report is the reduced number of male enrolment for degree programmes.
The number of boys enrolled for undergraduate programmes in 2019-20 came down by almost a thousand students to around 15,600.
The number of boys registered for diploma programmes was also down to 4,412, lower by another thousand students over the previous years.
This is surprising given that the overall population of males in the 18-23 age group in Goa went from 10.22 lakh in 2018-19 to 10.54 lakh to 2019-20, as per the report.
This lower male enrolment ratio was only specific to undergraduate and diploma programmes in Goa for 2019-20.
In comparison, the enrolment in postgraduate and PhD programmes in 2019-20 only increased over the previous academic year with the numbers of both males and females showing an equal rise.
According to the AISHE report 2019-20, at one teacher for every 13 students, Goa also has among the best pupil-teacher ratio for higher education in the country, after Puducherry (10) and Lakshadweep (12).
As per the report, Goa also continues to be among the rare states with higher number of female teachers in higher education than male teachers.
“Out of total no.
of 15,03,156 teachers (in the country) for 2019-20 about 57.5% are male teachers and 42.5% are female teachers.
A few states like Kerala, Punjab, Haryana, Chandigarh, Meghalaya, Nagaland, Delhi and Goa on the other hand have more female teachers than male teachers,” the report states.