ASER survey 2020

Why in news?

• Results of ASER survey 2020 has been published.

About ASER:

• ASER stands for Annual Status of Education Report.
• This is an annual survey that aims to provide reliable estimates of children’s enrolment and basic learning levels for each district and state in India.
• ASER has been conducted every year since 2005 in all rural districts of India.
• It is the largest citizen-led survey in India. It is also the only annual source of information on children’s learning outcomes available in India today.
• Unlike most other large-scale learning assessments, ASER is a household-based rather than school-based survey.
  • This design enables all children to be included – those who have never been to school or have dropped out, as well as those who are in government schools, private schools, religious schools or anywhere else.
• In each rural district, 30 villages are sampled. In each village, 20 randomly selected households are surveyed. This process generates a total of 600 households per district, or about 3,00,000 households for the country as a whole.
• Approximately 7,00,000 children in the age group 3-16 who are residents in these households are surveyed.
• The ASER model has been adapted for use in several countries around the world: Kenya, Uganda, Tanzania, Pakistan, Mali and Senegal.

Who conducts the survey?

• ASER tools and procedures are designed by ASER Centre, the research and assessment arm of Pratham.
• Pratham is a non-governmental organisation working towards the provision of quality education to the underprivileged children in India.
• It is conducted by close to 30,000 volunteers from partner organisations in each district.
• All kinds of institutions partner with ASER: colleges, universities, NGOs, youth groups, women’s organisations, self-help groups and others.

Survey Parameters

• Information on schooling status is collected for all children living in sampled households who are in the age group 3-16.
• Children in the age group 5-16 are tested in basic reading and basic arithmetic. The same test is administered to all children.
• The highest level of reading tested corresponds to what is expected in Std 2; in 2012 this test was administered in 16 regional languages.
• Every year, some additional tests are also administered. These vary from year to year. In 2007, 2009, and 2012, for example, children were tested in basic English.
• In addition, basic household information is collected every year. In recent years, this has included household size, parental education, and some information on household assets.

Results of 2020 Survey:

• ASER 2020 was conducted in 26 states and four Union Territories.
• A total of 52,227 households and 59,251 children in the 5-16 age group were surveyed in a phone based survey.
• There is a shift in enrollment from private to government schools — 69.55 per cent children in the 6-14 age group are enrolled in government schools, up from 66.42 per cent in 2018.
• Proportion of boys enrolled in government schools has risen from 62.8 per cent in 2018 to 66.4 per cent in 2020, while for girls, that number has gone up from 70 per cent to 73 per cent in the corresponding period.
• Among enrolled children, 61.8 per cent live in families that own at least one smartphone, a big jump from 2018 when merely 36.5 per cent children lived in families with at least one smartphone.
• However the survey found that despite the high smartphone penetration, only about one-third of children reported getting some form of learning material from their teachers in the week preceding the survey
• However almost 75 per cent of children said they received some form of learning support from family members, with older siblings playing a key role.
• While overall more than 80 per cent children said they had textbooks for their current grade, this proportion was higher among students enrolled in government schools (84.1 per cent) than in private ones (72.2 per cent).

PRELIMS QUESTION

Consider the following statements regarding education in India:
1.Kerala reports the highest literacy rate in India as per 2011 census.
2.According to the All India Survey on Higher Education (AISHE), India’s Gross enrolment ratio in higher education is more than 40 percentage.
Which of the statements given above is/are correct?
(a)1 only
(b)2 only
(c)Both 1 and 2
(d)Neither 1 nor 2

Answer to prelims question