LUCKNOW: The Performance Grading Index (PGI) for school education has some good news for UP.
With 804 points out of 1,000, UP has attained grade A in 2019-20 in school education, according to the index released by ministry of education on Sunday.
Its grade last year was C.
The state has made significant improvement in the governance processes by upping its score by 67 points—from 214 in 2018-19 to 281 (out of 360 in 2019-20).
Despite strengthening the areas of governance, UP is among the 24 states which have scored less than 80% of the maximum score.
This implies that even if this indicator has been accorded the highest importance, UP must focus upon areas ranging from monitoring the attendance of teachers to ensuring transparent recruitment of teachers and principals that will lead to critical structural reforms.
Basic education minister Satish Dwivedi thanked Yogi Adityanth’s dream project ‘Operation Kayakalp’, which is aimed at strengthening the infrastructure in schools.
“Our Mission Prerna campaign has helped in improved learning outcomes for students.
We aim to achieve grade A+ next year,” Dwivedi said.
The grading index, which analyses the performance of states on 70 parameters, has put UP with 10 other states that have shown improvement in their score by 10% to 20% in comparison to last year.
The report stated that UP has shown an improvement by at least 10 points in areas of learning outcomes and quality in school education due to an improvement in their reporting mechanisms.
In learning outcome and quality, UP scored 132 points (out of 180) in 2019-20 against 114 in 2018-19.
The scores obtained in higher standards are less than those in lower standards.
It is, therefore, imperative to ensure better interventions at the lower standards as it will have a positive cascading effect at the higher levels, stated the report.
Infrastructure and facilities in UP require attention.
With a score of 113 out of 150, this area is a cause for concern as a proper school building with adequate facilities is a must to improving the overall quality of school education.
Indicators like availability of ICT facilities and timely availability of textbooks and uniforms, which are critical inputs for better performance of students (and mentioned in the RTE Act), are measured in this domain.
In access and equity, the state scored 65 (out of 80), and 213 (out of 230) respectively.