Annual Status of Education Report (Rural) 2007

Assessing effectiveness of India’s education system

ASER tools tracks the efficacy of the Indian education system annually. It provides evidence on efforts that have worked and those that have failed. This document presents ASER’s findings in 2007.

The purpose of ASER’s rapid assessment survey in rural areas was to get reliable estimates of children’s schooling and basic learning at the district level and measure the changes in these statistics over the previous year. In 2007, children were assessed on simple reading and comprehension tasks for the first time. Findings include:

• Major progress is observed in enrollment and provision of schools, teachers, toilets, and water supply in most states;
• Remarkable jump observed in mid-day meal provision;
• Overall, proportion of out of school children has dropped;
• Increase in pre-schools (balwadis and aanganwadis) coverage, especially in the North, is impressive;
• Overall, reading levels have improved, but math learning ability has not registered much change;
• Overall, teacher attendance shows improvement, while children’s attendance levels remain relatively unchanged.