UNICEF to launch literacy campaign in Bihar

PATNA: Painting a grim picture of literacy level in Bihar, UNICEF assisted by the Bihar Education Project Council (BEPC) has decided to launch a massive campaign to make over four lakh girls literate in one month. UNICEF sources told that the BEPC together with UNICEF would launch a massive campaign next month to teach both out-of-school girls and academically weak girls studying in schools. "The campaign will use the accelerated learning strategy developed by Pratham, an NGO", sources said. According to UNICEF, research has suggested that if children do not learn to read by their first three years of schooling, they may never learn and may eventually drop out from school. Both BEPC and UNICEF feel that these learning camps will improve enrolment and retention of girls in schools. In all, 15,000 accelerated learning camps will be set up in over 7400 villages spread over 37 districts in the state and there will be 50-60 learners in each centre. "Each Centre will run for four hours per day for 30 days in June and Panchayat Siksha Mitras (PSMs) who have been trained on accelerated learning strategy will be instructors", they informed.

A training for 320 master trainers from various districts would be organised from May 18 to May 21 here and these master trainers, in turn, will train 15,000 Panchayat Siksha Mitras in schools to run the accelerated learning CAMPS. Although the learning achievement of elementary stage students in Bihar is much better than that of children in many other states, a recent study carried out by UNICEF revealed that about 41 per cent of children of 7 to 14 years can not read a simple sentences and 56 per cent of children can not read a story text. Another UNICEF study in nine districts of Bihar in December 2005 found that only 13 per cent of the children were able to read simple sentences without any mistake. The rest 87 per cent were not able to read anything at all or committed many mistakes. An earlier UNICEF study has also painted extremely grim picture of all the three spheres-- primary, secondary and higher education, revealing that a teacher barely spends two months of the year in the class rooms in Bihar. While there is no mechanism for the monitoring of teachers' performance, they are mostly involved in non-academic work, like government duty, which leads to poor attendance. Another major factor is the huge shortage of class rooms. Against the requirement of 3, 79,089 class rooms, as per the national norm (40:1), there are just 1, 43,027 available- 1, 99, 014 less, the report says. Though there was some improvement in the quality of primary education due to the introduction of Bihar Education Project, District Primary Education Project, Sarva Shiksha Abhiyan and mid-day meal schemes, the government could not not execute most of the central schemes. It had failed to get the second installment of the grant any year due to non-utilisation of funds.

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RANJAN RITURAJ SINH