Girl education in India has improved in the last decade. Awareness is one of the reasons behind it. But still in many areas in India, boys are given preference over girls as far as education is concerned. Government is playing its role in the education of the girl child by means of strategies, interventions and programmes like greater access to and enrolment in schools, greater transition to upper primary level and special help provided to disadvantaged sections of the society. There is policy framework enshrining the vision of girl’s education that enabled the Government to design different strategies, interventions, schemes and programmes with specific objectives that impinge on girl’s education.
There is a thrust and special focus on girl’s education in the planning and provisioning for UEE, in SSA. Following steps have been taken by the government:
1. Free textbooks to all girls up to class VIII.
2. Separate toilets for girls.
3. Back to school camps for out-of-school girls.
4. Bridge courses for older girls.
5. Recruitment of 50% women teachers.
6. Teachers programmes to promote equitable learning opportunities.
7. Gender-sensitive teaching learning materials including text books.
8. Intensive community mobilization efforts.
9. Innovation fund per district for need based interventions for ensuring girls attendance and retention.
10. Efforts are also made to address issues within the classroom to enable a conductive learning environment and monitor progress along key indicators in girl’s education.
While designing programmes for girl’s education, the education administrator addresses both generic and specific issues. The gender perspective is sought to be integrated in all the programme components and the specific interventions such as incentives to offset economic disadvantage, relaxation of norms for tribal areas etc. are contextualized interventions required to address various factors of disadvantage. Intensive and innovative efforts are taken up at the micro-level to retain focus on girl’s education and mobilize women/women’s groups for
girl’s education.
SPECIAL SCHEMES
1. The NPEGEL scheme is meant for the educationally backward blocks (EBB) where both girls who are in and out of school. The out of school girls include never enrolled and drop out girls. In the case of girls in elementary school, the thrust is on girls with low attendance rates and girls with low levels of achievement. Ensuring a positive self image and to eliminate gender bias in the classroom is also in the design of the scheme.
2. The second major initiative, in the EBBs, is the Kasturba Gandhi Balika Vidyalaya (KGBV) scheme that provides for setting up of residential upper primary schools for girls from SC, ST, OBC & Muslim communities. This scheme targets areas of scattered habitations, where schools are at great distances and are a challenge to the security of girls. This often compels girls to discontinue their education. KGBV addresses this through setting up residential schools, in the block itself. KGBV addresses this through setting up residential schools, in the block itself. The KGBV scheme very specifically targets adolescent girls who are unable to go to regular schools. As the KGBVs specifically targets communities where girls are more disadvantaged, such as SC/ST, OBC and Muslim minorities, the scheme provides for a minimum reservation of 75% of the seats for girls from SC/ST/OBC and minorities communities and 25% to girls from families that live below the poverty line.