To School or Not to School? School Enrolment in India

Most villages in India have a government primary school and yet a third of India's kids do not go to school. Is the prevalence of child labour to blame? Policymakers, keen to find a single causal factor which will get them off the hook, blame parental indifference. Are parents put off by the low quality and/or the cost of schooling?

A paper from the Delhi School of Economics and the University of Oxford argues that understanding why so many children fail to attend school is the greatest development priority in India today. Analysis of the determinants of school participation uses data gathered from a household survey in the populous northern states to present a multi-causal view of educational deprivation in rural India.

Although government schools charge negligible fees and do not turn children away, 41 percent of all 6-14 year old children (and 54 percent of girls) in northern India were out of school in 1993. Parental interest in education is high (a majority favour compulsory education) but they take a dim view of the quality of state education. The official norm of a pupil-teacher ratio of 40:1 is widely flouted. Teacher lobbying for cushy urban postings means isolated rural areas are disproportionately understaffed. If all children aged 6-10 in the sample villages were enrolled in a government primary school, there would be over a hundred pupils in each class. Leaky roofs make schools unpleasant environments during the monsoon. Often there are no teaching aids.

The study looked at the respective influences on school participation of such aspects of school quality as: pupil-teacher ratios; physical facilities; the presence of female teachers; teacher attendance rates; frequency of inspection; the provision of mid-day meals; teacher qualifications and training; frequency and severity of physical punishment and teacher-parent cooperation.

Among the findings are:

• Out-of-school kids work about 4.7 hours a day, two hours more than school attenders. Work hours for eldest daughters in poor families are significantly longer.
• Private primary schools are found in 17 percent of all villages and are not just attended by children from privileged families.
• While household wealth significant enhances school participation for girls, ownership of land and domestic animals has a negative effect.
• If they do make it to school, the social disadvantage of caste is not apparent: the achievements of scheduled-caste pupils are no lower than those of other pupils.

The small "backward" Himalayan state of Himachal Pradesh bucks the regional trend. Here strong community involvement in education has created an impressive 96 percent attendance rate for 6-14 year olds. What would get similar numbers of children in other states into school? Evidence from the study suggests that:

• Provision of school meals is a significant incentive to attendance. Girl pupils who get lunch are 30 percent more likely to finish primary school.
• Greater promotion of women's development committees in villages would raise female school attendance rates.
• Wider support of parent's associations would boost attainment levels.

Note: This article is based on "'School participation in rural India' Review of Development Economics" by Jean Drèze and Geeta Gandhi Kingdon, February 2001.