More Than Half Of Indian Districts Suffered Due Covid-induced Online Education, Shows Report

A recent report by the Ministry of Education has highlighted the great digital divide India has faced due to the Covid-19 pandemic with around 61 per cent of districts nationwide having very little exposure to digital learning due to limited availability of computers, Internet facilities and teachers trained to handle technological tools in schools, 

The Department of School Education and Literacy (DoSE and L), Ministry of Education (MoE) has released the Performance Grading Index for Districts (PGI-D) for 2018-19 and 2019-20. PGI-D assesses the performance of the school education system at the district level by creating an index for comprehensive analysis.

The report shows how schools performed poorly under the category of digital learning and scored the lowest compared to the other parameters which were considered while creating the index.

According to the Indian Express, In the index, as many as 180 districts scored less than 10 per cent on digital learning, 146 districts scored 11 to 20 per cent, while 125 districts had scores between 21 and 30 per cent.

The report further states, "The Covid-19 pandemic has highlighted the changes required in our existing system in terms of the adoption of digital learning as part of mainstream learning to continue education at home… This necessitated a need for a domain on digital learning in PGI-D, which is not there in state PGI. The Covid-19 pandemic has highlighted the changes required in our existing system in terms of the adoption of digital learning as part of mainstream learning to continue education at home… This necessitated a need for a domain on digital learning in PGI-D, which is not there in state PGI."

The PGI-D is expected to help the state education departments to identify gaps at the district level and improve their performance in a decentralised manner. The indicator-wise PGI score shows the areas where a district needs to improve. The PGI-D will reflect the relative performance of all the districts in a uniform scale which encourages them to perform better.