Topic 1 : Data for better education, a brighter future for students
Context
Learning outcomes data in the Annual Status of Education Report (ASER) 2023 is, unarguably, cause for concern, but rather than lament, ASER, complemented by other data, must be used for corrective action.
Annual Status of Education Report (ASER)
- The ASER, is an annual, citizen-led household survey that aims to understand whether children in rural India are enrolled in school and whether they are learning.
- ASER has been conducted every year since 2005 in all rural districts of India. It is the largest citizen-led survey in India.
- ASER surveys provided representative estimates of the enrolment status of children aged 3-16 and the basic reading and arithmetic levels of children aged 5-16 at the national, state and district level.
Key Highlights of the Report
- Overall, 86.8% of 14-18-year-olds are enrolled in an educational institution.
- There are gender differences, with fewer females (28.1%) enrolled in the Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics (STEM) stream compared to males (36.3%).
- Only 5.6% are taking vocational training or related courses. Vocational training is more prevalent among college-level students (16.2%).
- About 25% of the youth cannot read a Class II level text fluently in their regional language.
- While females (76%) outperform males (70.9%) in reading a Standard II level text in their regional language, males excel in arithmetic and English reading.
- Only 57.3% can read sentences in English, and of those, almost three-quarters understand their meanings.
- Close to 90% of all youth have a smartphone in the household, and 43.7% of males have their own smartphone compared to 19.8% of females.
- Males generally outperform females in digital tasks, and performance on digital tasks improves with education level and basic reading proficiency.
- Over 50% of students in the 14-18 age group face difficulties with elementary division problems, and around 45% struggle with tasks such as calculating the number of hours a child slept based on bedtime and wake-up time.
Major issues and suggestions
- Foundational learning trajectories are typically flat and become flatter in the upper grades, which means that unless children acquire foundational skills in the primary grades, they are extremely unlikely to acquire them in later grades, in the absence of focused interventions.
- Focusing on school-based reading improvement programmes without investing in encouraging and empowering these children to return to school and to reading may not yield transformative results.
- Recognising letters or decoding simple words is not the major challenge most face. They need guidance, practice, and lots of encouragement and motivation to read.
- The availability of reading materials and books is a crucial factor in developing reading habits and abilities. ASER clearly indicate that only a small fraction of rural households has reading materials, other than school textbooks.
- Community libraries can create rich, vibrant spaces that foster reading, creativity and critical thinking.
- But just setting up libraries is not the solution. They need to be managed right, led by committed and enterprising individuals who can rekindle an interest in reading, drawing children, youth and adults to these libraries.
- Developing aspirations is important but youth need the support, mentorship and inspiration to evaluate these aspirations, identifying alternative better-suited prospects if available, and undertaking preparations and measures needed to fulfil the aspirations.
- Digital technology can equip youth with the foundations of their aspired professions and also bridge connections with relevant professionals.
Way forward
Data, and not just ASER data, when designed and collected with rigour and the right intent, highlight problems but also have crucial pointers for action. What is needed is to move beyond the immediate instinct to lament over the problem and dig deeper to discern where to act, how to act and who must act.
Topic 2 : The blurry lines between wildlife ‘capture’ and ‘rescue’
Introduction
Rescue is defined as an act of saving or being saved from danger or difficulty. On a fundamental level, when it comes to wildlife, the term ‘rescue’ conjures up a sense of hope for the survival of the animal, the drama of the operation, admiration for the skills of human responders, and an acknowledgment of the struggles of coexistence.
Wildlife capture and rescue
- Here, in India, the escalating frequency of human-wildlife interactions is undeniable.
- Given the inevitability of conflict with wildlife, we should look for better solutions than those which focus solely on reactive capture and relocation, which have frequently proven unsustainable, or, worse, fatal to the animals involved.
- Navigating the blurry lines between what constitutes a true “wildlife rescue” and “capture” can be a nuanced challenge in India.
- The successful capture of animals frequently involved in conflict, such as elephants, snakes, and large carnivores, takes many complex forms, requiring chemical and physical immobilisation, alongside a balanced team of experts, each with their specific roles.
- Common scenarios necessitating actual ‘rescue’ include instances such as leopards trapped in open wells, elephants stranded in irrigation tanks, snakes trapped in homes, or even elephant calves separated from their herds.
- However, the mere presence or sighting of wildlife in areas outside our perceived notion of their ‘habitat’ does not always necessitate a “rescue”.
The rescue of snakes
- The failure to distinguish between capture, removal, and rescue becomes all the more apparent when we look further into how conflict with snakes is managed.
- The frequency of interactions with snakes is higher than with all other wild animals combined.
- Unfortunately, this leads to a greater incidence of poor handling, unnecessary removal from habitats, relocation to unfamiliar terrain, and the use of snakes as props in social media posts, all in the name of ‘rescuing’ them.
- There is plenty of evidence to suggest that relocated snakes have extremely poor survival prospects.
- Just as importantly, relocation does not really resolve conflict. Instead, it creates a vacuum that more than one snake could subsequently occupy, thereby potentially increasing the frequency of conflict.
- These ‘rescue’ operations, irrespective of species, do more harm than good, as they can cause physical trauma, injuries, and undue stress, compromising the animals’ post-release survival chances.
- Overall, the term ‘rescue’ itself carries the implication that one species is under threat from another. Either elephants or snakes are under threat from humans or human development activities, or humans are under threat from the wild animals with whom they share a lived space.
- Attempting a ‘rescue’ in either scenario may villainise one party or another and erode public faith in conservation efforts. ‘Rescue’ as a solution to conflict draws a line in the sand, and pits animals against people. This does not help long-term conservation goals.
- We need to see community more holistically, as comprising and integrating both human beings and non-human animals, instead of driving divisiveness through our wildlife management practices.
Suggestions
- The resolution of potential conflicts that arise between humans and non-human animals in shared environments should begin with a realistic assessment of the situation by identifying the problem, limiting any factors that may stress the animal, making sure other proactive measures have been exhausted, and basing any intervention on the most ethical means — one that considers the welfare of the animals and the people involved.
- Proactive mitigation strategies to avoid conflicts before they occur should always be our first instinct.
- Some promising approaches being tested across India, especially by the Karnataka Forest Department, include early warning systems, regular monitoring, fencing, better lighting, public education, and improved waste management to reduce, or better prepare communities for potential interactions with wildlife.
Conclusion
Relocation of a wild animal disrupts two ecosystems — the one that the animal is taken from, and the one to which that animal is introduced. We should look for an approach that leaves every one of us, human and animal alike, better off.