ASER Report 2018

The NGO Pratham has released its 13^th Annual Status of Education Report (ASER)- 2018.

• ASER 2018 is a nation-wide household survey that provides a snapshot of children’s schooling and learning for a representative sample of children across rural India.
• Children in the age group 3 to 16 are surveyed to find out their enrollment status in school or pre-school. Children in the age group 5 to 16 are assessed one-on-one to understand their basic reading and arithmetic abilities.
• ASER continues to be the only national source of information about children’s foundational skills across the country.

Findings

• Schooling Levels: Enrollment and Attendance
  • Overall enrollment (age 6-14): The enrollment of children for the age group 6 to 14 has been above 95%, since 2017. Children not enrolled in school has fallen below 3% at 2.8% in 2018.
  • Girls out of school: In 2018, the overall proportion of girls in the 11 to 14 age group out of school has fallen to 4.1% from 10.3% in 2006. Further, in 2008, more than 20% of girls in the 15 to 16 age group were not enrolled in school. In 2018, this figure has decreased to 13.5%.
  • Private school enrollment: In 2016, proportion of children (age 6-14) enrolled in private school stood at 30.6% and is almost unchanged at 30.9% in 2018.
• Learning levels: Foundational skills in reading and arithmetic
  • Reading 
    • Std III- The percentage of all children in Std III who can read at Std II level has increased from 21.6% in 2013 to 27.2% in 2018.
    • Std V- In 2018, 50.3% of Children enrolled in Std V can read at least a Std II level text. This figure has inched up from 47.9% in 2016
    • Std VIII- ASER 2018 data indicates that of all children enrolled in Std VIII in India, about 73% can read at least a Std II level text. This number is unchanged from 2016.
  • Arithmetic
    • Std III- The all India figure for children in Std III who are able to do at least subtraction has not changed much, from 27.6% in 2016 to 28.1% in 2018. For government school children, this figure was 20.3% in 2016 and 20.9% in 2018.
    • Std V- The proportion of children in Std V across India who are able to do division has increased slightly, from 26% in 2016 to 27.8% in 2018.
    • Std VIII- The overall performance of Std VIII in basic arithmetic has not changed much over time. Currently about 44% of all children in Std VIII can solve a 3-digit by 1-digit numerical division problem correctly.
• Learning levels: ‘Beyond Basics’- In ASER 2018, children in the age group 14 to 16 were given a few tasks which required calculations to be done in everyday contexts. Children were asked to calculate time, compute how many tablets would be required to purify water (application of unitary method), figure out where to buy books given two different price lists (financial decision making), and compute a discount.
  • Of the 14-16 year olds who could solve a numerical division problem, a little under half could compute the time question correctly, 52% could apply the unitary method to calculate how many tablets were needed to purify a given volume of water, about 37% were able to take the correct decision regarding the purchase of books, and less than 30% could compute the discount correctly.
  • In all cases, fewer girls could solve questions correctly as compared to boys.
• Teacher and Student Attendance- At the all India level, no major change is seen in students' and teachers' attendance. Average teacher attendance has hovered at around 85% and average student attendance at around 72% for the past several years in both primary and upper primary schools.
  • Nationally, substantial improvements are visible in 2018 in the availability of many school facilities mandated by Right To Education (RTE).
  • The fraction of schools with usable girls' toilets doubled from 2010, reaching 66.4% in 2018.
  • The proportion of schools with books other than textbooks available increased from 62.6% to 74.2% over the same period (i.e. from 2010 to 2018)

• Physical Education and Sports Facilities- This year, ASER introduced a series of questions on the availability of sports infrastructure in schools.
  • In 2018, about 8 out of 10 schools had a playground available for students, either within the school premises or close by.
  • Physical education teachers are scarce in schools across rural India. Only 5.8% of all primary schools and 30.8% of upper primary schools had a physical education teacher available. In majority of schools, another teacher was tasked with supervising physical education activities as well.
  • Sports equipment of some kind was observed in 55.8% of primary schools and 71.5% of upper primary schools.

Shift in Earth's Magnetic North Pole

• British Geological Survey has reported that the earth’s magnetic north pole is moving from its current position in Canada to Siberia.
• The shift is causing geophysicists to reconsider the world magnetic model which is used for navigation purposes.
• The World Magnetic Model (WMM) is a standard model of the core and large-scale crustal magnetic field.
• It is used extensively for navigation by the United Kingdom and the US for Defence purposes, the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) and the International Hydrographic Organization (IHO). It is also used widely in civilian navigation and heading systems.
• The Magnetic model which is updated at every five years and was supposed to be updated in 2020, but due to the unexpected shift, it has been preponed to January 30, 2019.
• Scientists think that reason for such shift is geomagnetic pulses beneath South America and the high-speed jet of liquid iron beneath Canada.

Geographical Poles vs. Magnetic Poles

• Geographic Poles
  • The Earth rotates on the geographic north and south poles. The geographic north and south poles are where lines of longitude (meridians) converge in the north. The south and north pole are directly opposite to one another.
• Magnetic North PoleThe Earth acts as one big magnet.
  • The Earth consists of a solid iron core. Surrounding the iron core is an ocean of hot, liquid metal.
  • The liquid metal that flows in Earth’s core creates electrical currents, which in turn creates our magnetic field.
  • The Magnetic North Pole (also known as the North Dip Pole) is a point on Ellesmere Island in Northern Canada where the northern lines of attraction enter the Earth.
  • This means that a compass needle point to the Magnetic North Pole – which is different from the geographic north.

Odisha Government’s KALIA Scheme

KALIA or “Krushak Assistance for Livelihood and Income Augmentation” scheme was launched by the Odisha Government for farmer’s welfare.

• The aim of the scheme is to accelerate agricultural prosperity and reduce poverty in the State payments to encourage cultivation and associated activities.
• The scheme is being seen as a viable alternative to farm loan waivers.
• Under the scheme, around Rs, 10,180 crores will be spent over three years until 2020-21 in providing financial assistance to cultivators and landless agricultural laborers.

Eligibility

• Small and marginal farmers, landless agricultural household, vulnerable agricultural household, landless agricultural laborers and sharecroppers (actual cultivators) are eligible under different components of the scheme.

Provision of the Scheme

• For Cultivators: All farmers will be provided Rs 10,000 per family as assistance for cultivation. Each family will get Rs 5,000 separately in the Kharif and Rabi, seasons, for five cropping seasons between 2018-19 and 2021-22. Crop loans up to Rs 50,000 are interest-free.
• For Landless Agricultural Households: Financial Assistance of Rs.12500will be provided to each landless Agricultural Household for Agricultural allied activities like for small goat rearing unit, mini-layer unit, duckery units, fishery kits for fisherman, mushroom cultivation and bee-keeping, etc.
• For Elderly: The elderly, sick and differently-abled population who are unable to take up cultivation, will be provided Rs 10,000 per household per year.
• Insurance for cultivators and landless agricultural household: The KALIA scheme also includes a life insurance cover of Rs 2 lakh and additional personal accident coverage of the same amount for 57 lakh households.

Advantages of KALIA scheme

• KALIA targets a whole bunch of rural activities.
• KALIA scheme support farmers farming on a small scale, sharecropping, fishing, animal herding, which are not covered under bank loans, but are caught in debt traps set up by local moneylenders.
• KALIA is considered as a better alternative to farm loan waiver as loan waivers penalize honest farmers who repay on time and can discourage them from doing so. 

Important Facts for Prelims (16th January 2019)

Global Aviation Summit 2019

• The Ministry of Civil Aviation, Government of India, in collaboration with Federation of Indian Chambers of Commerce and Industry (FICCI) has organized first of its kind Global Aviation Summit in Mumbai.
• The theme of Global Aviation Summit is “Flying for all - especially the next 6 Billion”.
• The Summit aims to provide a platform for the stakeholders to brainstorm over the future of the aviation industry and identify the growth areas.
• It also gives the opportunity to highlight the latest concepts like drones, air taxis, new jets, and ultra-light aerial electric vehicles etc.
• Vision 2040 for the aviation sector was also launched during the summit.
• The vision document highlights the growth potential in different sub-sectors of Indian aviation and the key action steps which are required to be taken to achieve the desired objective.