RIGHT TO OPPORTUNITY!

   

India has entered to make education a constitutional right .The act cam to force on 1 April 2010

The RTE act looks forward to:

1)Provide elementary education to all children between the age of 6 to 14.

2)It confers the responsibility of providing free education upon local authorities and government.

3)It lays down norms ding pupil teacher ratio, infrastructure,teacher working hours .

4)It prohibits a) physical punishment b) mental harassment c)screening procedures for admission d)capitation fee e) private tuition by teacher e) running schools without recognition.

Pitfalls in the act:

1) The act provides free education up to the age of 14 but it is oblivious of the predicament   that a disadvantaged child will suffer after he/she has studies in an elite school. How will he/she will be able to cope up with a school below par .They would feel dismayed, crestfallen and beguiled.Moreover the act does not talk about the education of the child before six.

2)It confers the responsibility of imparting free education on local authorities which might pave way for corruption .The schools which ought to be recognized by these local authorities might have to grease their palms failing which they might lose their licence

3) The prerequisites for a school to get recognized are not pragmatic  Schools sans playground cannot be recognized .At present time when land prices have shot up this is like asking for moon. There are thousands of unrecognized schools running in the country.They provide education to poor children who cannot afford an elite school.The stringent rules place good and bad unrecognized schools under the same radar.A large number of schools will  get closed due to this which will be a huge setback for the implementation of the act.

4)The act does not define the teaching standard which is a huge blow to the act itself.Talking about infrastructure and playground but not about teaching standard is like a movie with huge sets but no screenplay.

A dream of educated India cannot be fulfilled just by providing 25 percent reservation in elite schools.It needs something more than that.Government should try to incorporate private schools which are not able to fulfill the prerequisites help them raise  their standard and incorporate them into the formal system..Moreover the upper limit of the age should be up to eighteen.The  Government should be far sighted when it comes to such issues.