Performing Grade Index 2021-22

What’s in today’s article?

• Why in News?
• India’s School Education System
• What is the Performance Grading Index (PGI) on School Education?
• PGI 2.0
• Highlights of the PGI for the year 2021-22

Why in News?

• According to the Union Ministry of Education’s Performing Grade Index (PGI), Chandigarh and Punjab emerged as the best performers in school education for the year 2021-22.

India’s School Education System:

• The Indian Education System is one of the largest in the world with more than 1.5 million schools, 8.5 million teachers and 250 million children from varied socio-economic backgrounds.
• The Sustainable Development Goal 4 (SDG4) adopted by India in 2015 seeks to ensure inclusive and equitable quality education and promote lifelong learning opportunities for all by 2030.
• Such a goal will require proper assessment and monitoring of indicators set out in goals.

What is the Performance Grading Index (PGI) on School Education?

• It was designed by the Department of School Education and Literacy, Ministry of Education, and launched in 2017.
• It helps States/UTs to identify specific interventions required to make transformational changes in school education.

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PGI 2.0:

• In the last 4 years, States/UTs reached saturation level in many indicators of PGI, and few indicators became redundant due to rapid changes adopted during COVID-19 period.
• Certain policy initiatives and interventions introduced post implementation of National Education Policy (NEP) 2020 also necessitated for aligning indicators of PGI for proper tracking the progress.
• Therefore, indicators of PGI (70) have undergone transformational changes in 2021-22 and were renamed as PGI-2.0.

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Highlights of the PGI for the year 2021-22:

• The two domains – access and equity – are the only ones where any state (Delhi) managed the top grade (Daksh).
• For learning outcomes, one of the key indicators of good performance, the top performers are Punjab, Chandigarh and Rajasthan while no states/ UTs could achieve the top grade for teacher education and training.
• In 2019-20, Punjab, Chandigarh, Tamil Nadu, Andaman and Nicobar Islands and Kerala topped the index, while the index during the Covid period (2020-21) recorded Kerala, Maharashtra and Punjab as the best performing states.
• Punjab and Chandigarh find place in the sixth grade (Prachesta- 2) while six states could make it to the seventh grade (Prachesta-3).
• The three poorest performing states/UTs are Arunachal Pradesh, Meghalaya and Mizoram.
• Highlighting the inter-state disparity, the maximum and minimum scores obtained by states/ UTs in 2021-22 are 659.01 and 420.64 respectively.
  • The deviation of 23.8% indicates that states like Arunachal Pradesh, Meghalaya and Mizoram have to put more effort to reach the top slot.
  • This disparity was 51% in 2017-18 indicating that PGI also helped bridge the performance gap among states/UTs over the years.

Q1) What is the Sarva Shiksha Abhiyan?

Sarva Shiksha Abhiyan (2001-02) is Government of India’s flagship programme for achievement of Universalization of Elementary Education in a time bound manner, as mandated by 86th constitutional amendment making free and compulsory Education to the Children of 6-14 years age group, a Fundamental Right.

Q2) What is Article 21A of the Indian Constitution?

The Constitution (86th Amendment) Act, 2002 inserted Article 21-A in the Constitution of India to provide free and compulsory education of all children in the age group of 6-14 years as a Fundamental Right in such a manner as the State may, by law, determine.

Source: Performing Grade Index out: Chandigarh, Punjab top performers in school education | ToI