NEW DELHI, July 18: For the second time on the trot, Meghalaya has been ranked the lowest in the Performance, Infrastructure and Equity (PIE) Index 2020-21 in primary and secondary education.
The index was published on Monday in a paper released by the think-tank, Observer Research Foundation. The paper was titled “The PIE Index 2020-2: Measuring the health of primary and secondary education systems in India”.
The index was developed to measure the health of primary and secondary education system broadly on three parameters – performance, infrastructure and equity.
It divided the states and union territories (UTs) into three categories – large states, small states and UTs. Among the small states, Sikkim and Goa secured the top ranks, while Meghalaya and Arunachal Pradesh had the lowest ranks.
In some states such as Tripura, only 20% of schools had access to electricity. In Bihar and Meghalaya, the proportion of those with working computers is only 15%, said the paper.
The UTs performed the best while the small states were ranked the lowest. The Ministry of Education has its own tool – the Performance Grading Index or PGI.
In the PIE index, Punjab emerged as the best-ranking large state. It is closely followed by Kerala and Tamil Nadu. The worst-performing large states were Uttar Pradesh and Bihar. Among the UTs, Lakshadweep, Puducherry and Chandigarh performed exceedingly well.
The PIE index has been used to track changes in education from 2016-17 to 2020-21. Learning outcomes, infrastructure, and equity must all be given attention, the paper said.
“States and UTs should strive towards bridging the gap between private and government schools, boys’ and girls’ education, and caste-based differences in grades. Affirmative action is needed to make certain that girl students and other marginalised groups are not left behind,” the paper said.
It further said the National Education Policy (NEP), 2020, is expected to usher in substantial improvement in the education sector and “could favourably impact learning outcomes across the nation”.
“The NEP also seeks to increase access and equity through online courses, which would have a positive effect on equity,” the paper said.
The PIE index is developed from the perspectives of both outcomes and processes. However, it does not factor in governance processes aiding outcomes such as attendance, teacher availability, and transparency.
The PIE index uses data from the National Achievement Survey (NAS 2021) for performance and equity sub-indices, and the Unified District Information System for Education (UDISE 2020-21) for measuring the infrastructure sub-index.
The scores in English and mathematics were used to evaluate the performance of the school system. The differences in learning outcomes of students from marginalised communities – based on gender, caste, school type – in Classes 3, 5 and 8 were considered to measure equity. Availability of separate toilets for males and females, drinking water, classrooms with electricity and working computers were factors considered for the infrastructure sub-index with data from UDISE.
This index would also provide insight to state-level policymakers in terms of how they can improve their systems which could be helpful during the implementation of NEP in a data-driven manner.
Overall, the large states performed significantly better compared to the small states. The eastern and Northeastern states have a poor PIE index value. Although they are doing well on the performance index, they lag in infrastructure. The small states have the lowest score on this parameter. Lakshadweep ranks first on infrastructure among all states and UTs due to its relatively small number of schools which is around 45.
“In most states, around 90% of schools had separate toilets for males and females, drinking water, and functional classrooms. However, only about 85% had access to electricity and 50% had working computers,” the paper added.
