Revisiting Follow Your Dream

Read an old, about a half page long, Hebrew story which seems a summary of Alchemist written by Paulo Coelho. The story is about a dream of Rabbi Eizik like Alchemist is the story of Santiago’s dream about the treasure. Rabbi lives in Krakow but in his dream he sees a treasure under a bridge which is leading to the King’s palace in Prague. Believing in his dream Rabbi starts his journey in search of the treasure. But he surprised to see a group of soldiers are guarding the bridge round the clock and there was no such indication in the dream. He becomes restless thinking how he can dig under the bridge in the presence of the soldiers. Looking to Rabbi’s restlessness, the captain of the soldiers asked him if he needs any help. Considering kindness of the captain, Rabbi honestly narrated him the story of his dream that he is all the way from Krakow to Prague for the treasure. The captain laughed sympathetically and told that he is also getting the similar dream repeatedly about the treasure which is buried under the kitchen stove of some Rabbi Eizik at Krakow. Rabbi thanked the captain, travelled back home and found the treasure under his kitchen stove. The end is similar in Alchemist in which the treasure was there in the small abandoned church in Spain from where Santiago has started the journey for the treasure to Egypt. The message is common what you are looking for are around or within but you have to travel far for realisation.

Survey of Experience with Educated Functionally Illiterate

Do you have any experience of educated but functionally illiterate person? Definitely, you do have as there are millions of functionally illiterate around us. Please share your experience in this survey.

Background
Many definitions are available on functionally illiterate and one of them is "a person with some basic education who still falls short of a minimum standard of literacy or whose reading and writing skills are inadequate to everyday needs". In day to day functioning we discover some people who have completed their formal literacy education but in reality unable to comprehend what they read or unable to express their thought in writing. Many university students both undergraduate and postgraduate unable to write an idea or have difficulties in under¬standing the ideas of a text. According to the UNESCO report, "no country is immune to functional illiteracy".

My Experience
I cite following four events of my experience with functionally illiterate persons. The first two events were with the bank officers of the top rated and highly reputed banks regarding account opening and change of address. I filled the prescribed account opening form according to the instructions on the form and submitted to the concerned officer for further process. The officer gave it back that the last page, which is titled with "Additional Information (Optional)", is blank. Yes, I left it blank intentionally because it is optional. But the officer ordered me to fill it. When unable to convince or teach meaning of 'optional' word, I followed the order as I was in need of the bank account. I received triple rewards from the officer by a pat, a big smile and the account for my obedience, quick learning skill and in particular for the illiterate act. In another occasion, when I submitted change of address form to the bank I received reply, what is the meaning of this process as you have bank cards and Internet banking facility with the account. Unaware of how to convince and in this case when the officer was none other than the Branch Manager, simply I gave an intent look. In response, the manager gave me a sarcastic look for my foolishness and a prizewinning smile on her intelligence. I cursed me a lot why I tried and started to think how to redirect the bank posts.

The second pair of events was with a shopkeeper and mobile service provider regarding mobile connection form and email enquiry. The shopkeeper returned the form when I submitted for mobile connection. He was asking me to fill the part where I had written ‘not applicable’. It was the part titled with "Please fill form 60/61 (whichever applicable) given below in case you do not have PAN/GIR No.". Form 60 to be filled by a person who does not have either a PAN or GIR number. Form 61 to be filled by a person who has agricultural income. I told him that I have already provided PAN and do not have income from agricultural business. But he was persistence that he has processed thousands of such forms. I also took stand and explained him thoroughly why I am refusing to do so. He reluctantly accepted my form. I was happy being able to prevent an illiterate act but unaware of the consequences. I started enjoying new mobile connection. After a week one morning all of a sudden I was unable to call or receive any phone calls. The day was one of the busy and mobile-dependent day as I was expecting a call from overseas, two calls from the event organising committees, two calls from the friends regarding important matters and a call from an unknown courier company regarding delivery of household goods. I went to the shopkeeper. He phoned immediately to the mobile service provider but in vain. The shopkeeper assured me that he will take care of the matter. He also raised a doubt indirectly that it may be because of the unique form with ‘not applicable’ in forms 60 and 61. Now what? Instead of the busy, productive and mobile-dependent day, the day became one the worst and unique by its own way as I spent most of the time inside a cubicle of a public telephone shop for calling overseas, the organising committees and the friends, reaching to the unknown courier company and obviously for follow-up with the mobile service provider. When there was no sign of life in my mobile, in the evening, I sent an email to the customer service with relevant details, such as mobile number, name and address. Next day morning I received reply. While opening email I was happy that the quick reply shows more likely resolution of the problem and was thanking to the inventors of Internet and email. The email was saying "Thanks for your email regarding … ... ... ... but please send us following information.
Customer Name:
Mobile Number:
Address:
… ".
Wow! What is this? I already sent the information. I checked my email. Then I was able to appreciate the company’s commitment towards customers as they were not simply promising but were putting it in practice too their motto of better customer-centred services. You see, what mistake I did, I provided my mobile number first but they need customer name first. You see! When I didn’t have any words to express my gratitude for their approach, I simply provided the information asked in the sequence by controlling myself that by mistake I may write "Please read my email carefully I have already provided the required information". Then I missed even pleasure of receiving any reply of my emails but enjoyed my patient for a few days. After restoring the mobile services, the shopkeeper told me that he has done some paper work on behalf of me but I didn’t have courage to ask what type of paper work!

Appeal for Participation
Please contribute by taking part and encouraging your friends to take part in this survey by writing your experience with functionally illiterate in the space below for comment. You are welcome to write as many as events you want. Thanks in anticipation.

beyondblue in Curriculum: A Preventive Measure for Depression and Related Disorders

Background
There is no health without mental health but mental and neurological disorders, such as depression, anxiety, schizophrenia and epilepsy, are common worldwide including substances abuse, alcohol and drugs use disorders. Estimates made by World Health Organisation (WHO) in 2004 showed that about 450 million people globally suffer from mental and behavioural disorders and one person in four will develop one or more of these disorders during their lifetime.1 Stigma about mental disorders and fear of discrimination increase suffering and vulnerability of the individuals and families affected by mental disorders and then suffering become intense and pervasive. Higher levels of stigma and fear of discrimination prevail more in urban areas and among people with higher levels of education. The myths and misconceptions associated with the disorders, such as a public survey in South Africa showed that most people thought mental illnesses are associated to stress or a lack of willpower than medical disorders (http://www.who.int/mental_health), make conditions worse.

About half of mental disorders begin before the age of 14. Table 1 shows rate of mental disorders in young people ranged from 8% in the Netherlands to 57% in service recipients in San Diego, California, USA.

Table 1 source: Patel Vikram, Flisher Alan J, Hetrick Sarah and McGorry Patrick. Mental health of young people: a global public-health challenge. Lancet 2007; 369: 1302-1313.

There is sufficient evidence that mental health problems are increasing worldwide. The report based on the work by WHO and the World Bank states that by the year 2020 depression will be the second largest cause of global disease burden. In addition to the affected people’s suffering, stigma and discrimination, mental disorders may influence overall society in terms of reduced or lost productivity, expenditure for treatment, support, education as well as criminal justice due to mental disorders. The global burden of mental disorders is well beyond the treatment capacities. The social and economic expenditure associated with this growing burden will not be reduced by the treatment of mental disorders alone.2 Many promotional, educational, awareness and preventive programs are needed; preventive interventions can be a cost-effective and an essential step to prevent or address mental disorders or problems.

Preventive Interventions
Several reviews and analysis have established that prevention programs produce significant benefit by reducing the rates of future social, behavioural and academic problems. Durlak and Wells3,4 found significant mean effects ranging from 0.24 to 0.93 according to program type and target population by reviewing about 177 universal prevention studies. One of the promising universal interventions is Zippy’s Friends program designed to help children in the first years of school and to develop the necessary skills for life-long emotional well-being.5

Neil and Christensen report a review of twenty four efficacy or effectiveness trials of nine Australian intervention programs.6 The FRIENDS program and Resourceful Adolescent Program (RAP) were effective with the strongest evidence. The six trials targeting anxiety for evaluating the FRIENDS program, an anxiety prevention program for children from 7 to 16 years of age, reported lower anxiety immediately or at follow-up. The ten of the seventeen universal trials for depression reported positive outcomes. For randomised controlled trials of universal programs, 50% of trials targeting depression and 57% of trials targeting anxiety produced positive outcomes.6 The FRIENDS is a cognitive-behavioural program of 10 sessions that teaches children skills to cope with anxiety more effectively and builds emotional resilience, problem-solving abilities and self-confidence.7 The evaluation of the RAP, a school-based resilience building program, showed a two thirds reduction in depressive symptoms.8 MindMatters takes an organisational approach and provides a strategy to promote children’s mental health and well-being through all dimensions of the school environment.

In Australia, several other initiatives, such as the beyondblue schools research initiative, the KidsMatter initiative and the Aussie Optimism Program, have been performed to address student mental health. The beyondblue schools research initiative was a universal intervention program designed to reduce depressive symptoms experienced by the students at secondary school. The initiative has been investigated by annual assessments during the three-year intervention program followed by a two-year follow-up. Twenty-five pairs of high schools were assigned to an intervention and a comparison group across Queensland, South Australia and Victoria. The classroom curriculum was a sequential thirty-session program delivered in three years during Year 8, 9 and 10. The curriculum was delivered by the teachers who completed one day's professional development program. Sawyer Michael et al.9,10 observe that the students experienced negligible changes in the levels of depressive symptoms. It is disappointing that the intervention failed to achieve significant change in the levels of depression despite of obvious strengths and benefits of the project. The assessments on quality parameters of delivery are hard to find as it is a most dependable factor for success of any teaching program. A trial of KidsMatter initiative was carried out in hundred and one primary schools. The analysis by Slee et al.11 revealed variations in the quality of implementation across schools and significant differences in the involvement and support of parents, staff and school leadership. The Aussie Optimism Program, a 20-week universal mental health promotion program based on cognitive–behavioural intervention procedures, was delivered to Year 8 students of three schools in Brisbane. The results show the program was beneficial to the students who were experiencing emotional and behavioural difficulties.12

A number of school-based intervention programs produce positive outcomes. WHO13 has published thirty five case studies of mental health promotion programs, initiatives and strategies from nineteen countries so that organisations can use in their own communities and countries. However, even highly regarded programs also need further evaluation considering local social, economic and environmental contexts before implementation.

Epilogue
There is sufficient evidence that ecological interventions programs in schools, for enhancing cognitive, problem-solving and social-emotional skills of children and adolescents, can influence positive mental health and reduce emotional and behavioural problems. However, an intervention program alone is insufficient; schools, teachers and parents have to pay more attention to giving children the skills they need not only to pass the exams but also to live balance, happy, proactive, productive and fulfilled lives. It is clear that schools remain central to impart life skills including planning, opting for alternative right paths, conflict resolution, time management, anger management, stress management and grief and bereavement management. However, life skills have to conceal in side entire school-based curriculum, co-curricular and extra-curricular activities so that each child by default acquire minimum skills to live balance, happy and fulfilled lives. The programs with positive psychology approach can be incorporated in school curriculum for the development of resilience, such as adaptive thoughts, behaviours and problem-solving.

References

1. World Health Organization. Prevention of mental disorders: effective interventions and policy options, a report of the World Health Organization Department of Mental Health and Substance Abuse in collaboration with the Prevention Research Centre of the Universities of Nijmegen and Maastricht. 2004.
2. World Health Organization. Promoting mental health: concepts, emerging evidence, practice, a report of the World Health Organization, Department of Mental Health and Substance Abuse in collaboration with the Victorian Health Promotion Foundation and the University of Melbourne. Editors: Helen Herrman, Shekhar Saxena, Rob Moodie. 2005.
3. Durlak JA and Wells AM. Primary prevention mental health programs for children and adoelscents: a meta-analytic review. Am J Community Psychology 1997; 25: 115-152.
4. Durlak JA and Wells AM. Evaluation of indicated preventive intervention (secondary intervention) mental health programs for children and adolescents. Am J Community Psychology 1998; 26: 775-802.
5. Mishara BL and Ystgaard M. Effectiveness of a mental health promotion program to improve coping skills in young children: Zippy’s Friends. Early Childhood Research Quarterly 2006; 21: 110-123.
6. Neil Alison L and Christensen Helen. Australian school-based prevention and early intervention programs for anxiety and depression: a systematic review. MJA 2007; 186: 305-308.
7. Barrett Paula M, Farrell Lara J, Ollendick Thomas H and Dadds Mark. Long-Term Outcomes of an Australian Universal Prevention Trial of Anxiety and Depression Symptoms in Children and Youth: An Evaluation of the Friends Program. Journal of Clinical Child and Adolescent Psychology 2006, 35: 403–411.
8. Shochet IM, Dadds MR, Holland D, Whitefield K, Harnett PH and Osgarby SM. The efficacy of a universal school-based program to prevent adolescent depression. Journal of Clinical Child and Adolescent Psychology 2001; 30: 303-315.
9. Sawyer Michael G, Harchak Taylor F, Spence Susan H, Bond Lyndal, Graetz Brian, Kay Debra, Patton George and Sheffield Jeanie. School-based Prevention of Depression: A 2-Year Follow-up of a Randomized Controlled Trial of the beyondblue Schools Research Initiative. Journal of Adolescent Health 2010.
10. Sawyer Michael G, Pfeiffer Sara, Spence Susan H, Bond Lyndal, Graetz Brian, Kay Debra, Patton George and Sheffield Jeanie. School-based prevention of depression: a randomised controlled study of the beyondblue schools research initiative. Journal of Child Psychology and Psychiatry 2009; 51: 199-209.
11. Slee PT, Lawson MJ, Russell A, Askell-Williams H, Dix KL, Owens L, Skrzypiec G and Spears B. KidsMatter Primary Evaluation Final Report. Centre for Analysis of Educational Futures, Flinders University of South Australia. 2009.
12. Swannell Sarah, Hand Matthew and Martin Graham. The Effects of a Universal Mental Health Promotion Programme on Depressive Symptoms and Other Difficulties in Year Eight High School Students in Queensland, Australia. Journal School Mental Health 2009; 1: 229-239.
13. World Health Organization. Mental health promotion: case studies from countries, A Joint Publication of the World Federation for Mental Health and the World Health Organization. Editors: Shekhar Saxena and Preston J. Garrison. 2004.

Fundamental Right of Children to Free and Compulsory Education in India

Thursday the first day of April 2010 marks a special day for Indian children as the right of children to free and compulsory education (FCE) act 2009 is came into force. The right to education inhabits a central place as education can help to develop the skills, confidence and ability to secure all other rights. Hence, the right to education is also an enabling right to exercise all other rights. The constitutional commitment to free education for all children has existed since 1950 but now it has become a legal obligation enforceable through the courts. However, many challenges are on the path to meet the UNESCO’s goal on universal primary education to all children by 2015. The objectives of this article are to (1) show a landmark accomplishment of the country’s development by the right of children to FCE act 2009 in general and in the field of education in specific; (2) determine challenges to be addressed to achieve the desired quality outcome; and (3) create an awareness for collective commitments to address the known and unknown challenges.

Background
Dr Aradhya and Kashyap mentioned a history on the demand for a law on FCE in India. The history starts with Dadabhai Naoroji and Jyothiba Phule’s demand of state sponsored free education for all children in 1882; the first law on compulsory education introduced by the state of Baroda in 1906; Gopal Krishna Gokhale’s unsuccessful Bill in 1911 to Article 45 Indian constitution 1950 as directive principle in which states required to ensure the provision of FCE to all children till the age of fourteen to be attained in 1960. Several developments were proposed and/or implemented between 1950 and 1992-93 keeping right to education as a directive principle. The rulings by the Supreme Court of India (AIR 1992 SC 1858 and AIR 1993 SC 2178) led need for effective guarantees as they state the right to education up to age fourteen provided by the constitution was a fundamental right. Following that judgments and other action by the groups, fundamental right to education was inserted in the constitution by the eighty sixth constitution amendment act 2002. The right to education act 2009 is a law that enable the implementation of the constitution amendment.

Main Provisions in the Act
A few salient features and provisions extracted from the right of children to FCE act 2009 and its model rules.
• Every child, including disable, of the age six to fourteen have right to FCE in a neighbourhood school till completion of elementary, from first to eighth class education. The education is free of cost including school fees, text books, writing materials and uniforms, and if required transportation, residential and other facilities. Compulsory indicates compulsory admission, attendance and completion of the elementary education.
• The out-of-school children allow in an appropriate class based on their age after a special training for the duration of a minimum three months to maximum two years.
• Appropriate government may make necessary arrangement to provide early childhood care and free pre-school education for children of the age three to six with a view to prepare them for the elementary education.
• The schools have to provide minimum facilities, such as school building, adequate teachers according to the numbers of children in each class, library and play material.
• The government schools provide FCE to all and aided schools to proportion, but minimum twenty five percent, of admitted children. The specified category schools like Kendriya, Navodaya and Sainik schools, and private unaided schools admit minimum twenty five percent children of weaker and disadvantaged groups, such as poor, scheduled caste, scheduled tribe and the socially and educationally backward class, and provide FCE for which the government would reimburse the expenditure. The same admission provisions are for pre-school.
• Collection of any capitation fees is punishable as well as any screening procedure for admission.
• In absence of a birth certificate, a hospital register record, anganwadi record or an affidavit is enough as a proof of age for the purpose of admission in the schools.
• The central government shall develop a framework of national curriculum, develop and enforce standards for teachers training.

India is a signatory to key international instruments, such as Universal Declaration of Human Rights 1948, that guarantee the right to education for all (EFA). However, India was an exception to the global trend towards the establishment of compulsory universal primary education as many countries, such as Ghana, Ivory Coast, Libya, Zambia and Zimbabwe, with income levels lower than India have done better in this area. Now with this law, India joins over 135 countries that have legal guarantees to provide FCE to children and becomes an actual participant country to these international instruments.

Current Status of Primary Education
Despite of all the commitments made by the governments under international instruments for providing EFA, particularly FCE to children, millions of children still remain deprived of educational opportunities. UNESCO EFA Global Monitoring Report 2010 presents progress in reducing out-of-school children by about third, a decline of 33 million, to 71 million. Much of the decline took place in India after the 2001 launch of the universal primary education (Sarva Shiksha Abhiyan) program but out-of-school children are still 10% of the global total, more than 7 million. Furthermore, the facts from household surveys suggest that administrative data may underestimate out-of-school children, by 16 million, more than twice the official figure.

Primary education is a most critical requirement at early age for acquiring basic competencies and life skills. India has achieved a milestone in education field by this ground-breaking act but this essential law alone is insufficient to make effective impact on ignorant parents and to cover the large number of out-of-school children. Some parents may have compelling reasons to keep their children out-of-school, such as the children are more needed in earning for family maintenance, household chores or minding younger and very old kin, as the figure in the UNICEF report indicates the same that 12% children aged five to fourteen were involved in labour activities in 2008. A child is considered to be involved in labour if at least one hour of economic activity or at least 28 hours of domestic work done by five to eleven year olds during a week and at least 14 hours of economic activity or at least 42 hours of combined economic activity and domestic work done by twelve to fourteen year olds. Some parents may be unaware as it is happening in birth registration that in India less than 50% children are registered at birth. Children are out-of-school may be because they are children of workers who are on frequent move, children of illegal migrants, domestic servants, displaced, street children, etc.

Low levels of parental education and family poverty are two main obstructions regardless other disadvantages, such as age, gender, place of residence, language, ethnicity or caste but the two obstructions combined with any of these disadvantages create multiple obstructions to school entry, attendance and to keep children in school. According to the latest EFA Report, a child in India spends on average over seven years in school, rich urban children more than eleven years, poor rural boys less than six, poor rural girls three and poor girls in the state of Bihar on average two years in school. The study using household survey data found about 60% attendance gap for scheduled caste children aged six to fourteen could be mainly due to poverty and lower parental education. The study of 400 slum-dwelling in Delhi found only half the primary school age children were in school whereas citywide enrolment rate was more than 90%. A study in 2006 shows only 66% enrol in grade one reach the last grade and 13 to 15% students dropped out before completing the first grade.

Child Labour
India has the largest number of child labourers under the age of fourteen including an estimated 12.6 million engaged in hazardous occupations. Despite of regulations child labourers exist as those children have to work for survival and full-time education is a luxury for them than a fundamental right. An enormous continuous effort is required from all the stakeholders to change this luxury into fundamental right. The problem of child labour could be taken care of to some extent by FCE combined with early childhood care and education (ECCE). An alternative income or study allowance could be more effective measure moving child from labour work to education. Meanwhile learn while earn is a necessity for working children. The same approach has taken by the Supreme Court of India mandating a reduction of working hours to maximum six hours a day for child labour coupled with at least two hours of education at the expense of the employer (AIR 1997 SC 699).

Role of Early Childhood Care and Education
Although the right of children to FCE act 2009 mentions ECCE it covers only education from first to eight grades. Children from disadvantaged households have the most to gain from ECCE as early interventions have much higher returns, and the most to lose from being excluded as it could lead to the promotion of child labour and other forms of inequity. When children enter in primary education at the age of six, gap in language and other skills due to poverty and other disadvantages are much apparent that those children can hardly catch up with the children who have participated in ECCE programs from the age of three and have exposure of language-rich environments. Early childhood is a highly sensitive period for most of the developments, such as physical, motor development, cognitive, language, social and emotional. A child receives extremely poor ECCE, as may be in poor households and some orphanages, is likely to suffer from the development deficits that are difficult to rectify later. The results of the study conducted in the United States show the importance of exposing children to language-rich ambience. By age four, child of a professional has heard 50 million words, a working-class family 30 million and child of a welfare recipient has 12 million words. The nature of verbal interaction also differs with socio-economic background as by age three, the child of professional has received 0.7 million encouragements while the child of welfare recipient 60,000. The children from lower socio-economic backgrounds are likely to face more difficulties later in learning and adapting surroundings if difficulties with language development are ignored in early life. A good-quality ECCE can provide a better environment for language development to compensate the disadvantage at home as school entry at the age of six does little to reduce the gap. Good-quality ECCE is good for all children but particularly for those who are from disadvantaged households as ECCE can play an important role to balance disadvantage in the area of social, economic and language, and can cut the transmission cycle of the disadvantage across generations. Several governments, such as United Kingdom, are scaling up early childhood care as part of wider anti-poverty initiatives. The studies in Cape Verde, Egypt, Guinea, Jamaica and Nepal have consistently found most disadvantaged children benefit from ECCE programs regardless poverty, gender, ethnicity, caste or religion. ECCE not only enhance such developments but work as a powerful boost to education, improve primary school enrolment, attendance and performance and can reduce inequalities. These benefits are well discussed and justified with the research studies and empirical examples in the UNESCO and UNICEF reports.

The positive impact of ECCE program participation on education at the primary level and beyond is well documented that ECCE can increase school readiness, enrolment in the first grade, completion of school education and achievement, and can reduce delayed enrolment, dropout and grade repetition. The evaluation of some programs in both developed and developing countries shows participation in good-quality ECCE contributes the quality with achievement at subsequent levels of education. In a disadvantaged district of Nepal, 95% children who attended an ECCE program went on to primary school, had significantly higher marks and repetition rate was one-seventh in the grade one, than 75% who failed to attend. ECCE experience in the United Kingdom shows improved intellectual development, concentration, independence and sociability during the first three years of primary education. An African country achieved the higher completion rate and the lower repetition rate in primary school due to higher ECCE enrolment ratio. Children in Kenya, Uganda and Zanzibar had better language skills and results until grade four than who missed ECCE programs. Twelve year olds who had participated in good-quality ECCE in New Zealand performed better in reading and mathematics. Class retention of low-income and immigrant children in primary school increased by 9 to 17% with wider literacy and numeracy benefits due to the French ECCE program. The study on the Turkish Early Enrichment Project, comprising pre-school and parenting skills, in low-income low-education areas of Istanbul shows 86% children are still being in school after seven years, than 67% who fail to take part in the project. ECCE can also an instrument to improve girls’ enrolment in school as when young children attend ECCE programs their female kin are relieved from care responsibilities, which is a barrier to girls’ education. Children who have positive learning experiences in ECCE make a better transition to primary school and beyond, and are more likely to begin and complete it at the appropriate age. ECCE can improve the effectiveness of the FCE and decrease costs for both governments and households by reducing dropout, repetition and the special trainings for delayed entry.

Acknowledging the benefits of good-quality ECCE, most Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development countries provide at least two years of free ECCE. Although the specific effects are a subject of debate, good-quality ECCE has the potential to enhance children’s well-being in formative years; complement the care received at home; compensate disadvantages; provide easier transition to primary education; better completion rates; increase social equality; high economic returns; reduce poverty; and to weaken the influence of parental factors on later education achievement. Instead mere extension of formal school, ECCE programs should be adaptable, developmentally appropriate and responsive to the needs and interests of pre-school children.

Quality of Education
Quality education is an agenda of almost every country to ensure students acquire decent learning, values and life skills including life-long learning skills that help them to play a positive role in their societies. However, quality education and its assessment is a subject of debate as less agreement on a single concept and the concept means in practice. Quality education is a dynamic concept that changes and evolves with time and social, economic and environmental contexts of place. Many quality indicators are identified, such as learners’ cognitive development and role of education in promoting commonly shared values, attitudes of responsible citizen and in creative and emotional development.

India has hardly adopted any international or national level assessments that measure learning achievements. Assessments during primary school years provide an opportunity to identify growth and remedial measures to prevent dropout. In rural India, only 28% grade three students could subtract two-digit numbers and only a third could tell the time in 2008. During 2005, a study is conducted to compare learning achievements of the students from Orissa and Rajasthan states in India and the Trends in International Mathematics and Science Study (TIMSS) participating countries. The results showed ninth grade students ranked alongside students from the poorest performing TIMSS countries and the range in scores was wider than for all countries except South Africa.

Major influencing factors on quality education are learner characteristics, teaching and learning, learning outcomes and contexts of place. Learner characteristics include aptitude, perseverance, school readiness, prior knowledge and barriers to learning. FCE with ECCE and such other measures can improve learners’ characteristics. Teaching and learning comprises teaching methods including assessment, feedback and incentives, learning time, class size, teaching and learning materials, physical infrastructure and facilities, school governance and human resources, such as teachers, inspectors, officials and principals. The dynamics of the teaching and learning process, such as adaptable teaching methods according to the learners’ characteristics and contexts, interaction in the classroom, use of instructional and other materials, and feedback mechanisms for learners’ improvement, play an important role in better learning. Teachers obviously play a key role in the dynamics of the teaching and learning process regardless policies for quality education. Therefore, the teachers related matters are significant, such as rigorous entry and continuing criteria for teachers, balanced workloads suitable to impart quality education, periodic trainings, handsome salary and service conditions. Role of core subjects, pedagogy, language and leadership are also to be considered for better learning. Learning outcomes consider development in many areas including literacy, numeracy, life skills, life-long learning skills, perceptions, behaviours, creative and emotional skills, values, attitudes of responsible citizen along with social benefits from them. India needs a national level continuous assessment system up to higher secondary level to identify students’ growth in the learning outcomes comparable with their own previous assessments. Evaluations of literacy and numeracy are easy than the other learning outcomes. A framework of national curriculum, uniform teachers’ training and related norms are required, and already indicated in the right of children to FCE act 2009, to conduct national level assessments and for easy transition in case of child relocate to another school.

Involving communities in skills development is a key to success as well as continuous teachers training. In India, a 2005 survey in a district of Uttar Pradesh revealed poor reading skills among seven to fourteen year olds as 60% could not read and understand a story intended for first grade students. A randomised evaluation showed information sharing hardly improved reading skills but remedial reading camps, additional two hours reading classes a day over three months, run by volunteer trainers achieved significant improvements in early reading. In a district of Kenya, teachers were trained for five days to teach effective reading skills to grade two students. The result showed reading speeds of grade two students had improved on average 80% after the teachers training. More children centred and resource-rich libraries are needed in and outside schools in India. A provision of continuous reading is needed in the curriculum from pre-school to secondary school so that effective reading becomes a life-long habit.

Significance of Higher Education
Poverty is a strongest factor contributing to out-of-education and the transmission of poverty across generations. Poverty is also a source of vulnerability as when poor people hit by an economic or health problem which affect children’s education and may lead poverty to next generation. Education can be a powerful medium to break poverty transmission mechanisms. However, poverty itself is a strong constraint for education opportunities, stimulating the transmission of the disadvantages across generations. The role of education deserves far greater recognition as part of an anti-poverty strategy as well as for education across generations. Ignoring importance of secondary and higher education for current generation could lead the next generation with low levels of education as in India, children of mothers with secondary or higher education are three times more likely to attend pre-school programs than children of mothers with no education. Maternal education has an impact on the United States pre-school participation as attendance rates of four year olds were 55% for children of mothers who have dropped out of secondary school but 87% for children of mothers with a college education. Although it is a high financial investment for the governments in India, a study allowance or income support (may be as a loan with the help of financial organisations) up to higher education for the students from poor households can break chain of out-of-education and poverty cycle.

Collective Commitments
Many known and unknown sources need to address to achieve the goals of FCE. Combined substantial efforts are essential from every related citizen and organisation to achieve the desired and quality output, to translate this law into reality and to eliminate gap between promise and performance. More responsibilities lie with the governments, schools, teachers, parents/guardians, non-government and charity organisations working in education field and social workers. More acts, policies, laws, procedures, monitoring systems for progress and performance may needed for effective implementation of the right of children to FCE act 2009 and effective output of teaching-learning process. Let us put all the head and hand efforts together and support the children’s own good, greater good of the country and globe.

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References are excluded due to space but major references are UNESCO EFA Global Monitoring Reports and publications, UNICEF publications, related papers, the judgments of Supreme Court of India, the constitution amendment act 2002, the right of children to FCE act 2009 and its model rules.

Sustainable Information Technology Ecosystems

(Published in Deccan Chronicle newspaper on Sunday, March 7, 2010.)

Many researchers discuss the need for sustainable or green Information Technology(IT) ecosystems. Sustainability is defined, by United Nations Brundtland Commission, as "meet present needs without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their needs". The IT ecosystems includes computer hardware, software, communication devices, networks, their interconnected and dynamic relationships, facilities, such as computer centres, data centres, electrical power systems, air-conditioning equipments, management strategy and organisational culture.

The organisations going green are putting their sustainability efforts towards energy and environment considering concerns on energy crises, increasing energy costs, the threats from hazardous materials and climate change. IT is the central system for most of the organisations and uses a lot of power operated resources. IT produces more hazardous materials as it changes its hardware in every three to four years. Therefore, IT is a part of the energy and environment problem. However, IT can be a part of the solution using applications, such as teleworking, cloud computing, videoconferencing, VoIP and virtual visits, which consume relatively less energy and likely to reduce waste.

Today’s situation is alarming for energy consumption, electronic waste and greenhouse gas emissions. According to a 2006 Gartner report, energy costs in a few years could rise to more than 50% of an overall IT budget. The Environmental Protection Agency states that in year 2007 more than 63 million computers in the United States were replaced or thrown. This electronic waste spreads a toxic cocktail of chemicals in the soil. McKinsey forecasts that carbon footprint of IT will triple during 2002 to 2020 from today’s estimated 2 to 2.5%.

Initiatives for sustainable IT are seen as feel good and soft initiatives that are considered divorced from the activities to cut costs. But the studies show going green is not only cutting or saving costs but good for both business and the environment. According to the Global e-Sustainability Initiative(GeSI), IT industry could save $800 billion dollars in energy costs by 2020 by implementing energy-efficient policies. The GeSI’s SMART 2020 report highlights that "IT sectors could drive a reduction of up to 15% of global emissions, or more than five times the footprint of the sector itself, and create new business lines worth hundreds of billions of dollars in the process".

Going green requires a systematic planning including use of energy-efficient equipments, energy management, optimisation process by consolidation of servers and storage utilisation, virtualisation of servers, storage and applications, IT life cycle strategies, etc. The need of the day is securing smart grids, implementation of wireless networks instead of wired, use of recycled papers and both side printing if required and a responsible way to reuse, buy back and recycle computers, networks and cooling equipments.

According to the Aug 2007 EPA Report, best energy-management practices and high efficiency technologies can reduce power use in data centres by 30% and for cooling and power equipments up to 70%. Replacing CRT monitors by LCD monitors are extremely economical as relatively less power consumption, longer life span and lower air-conditioning bills due to less heat generation. Arthur D. Little reports that PCs waste $5.5 billion of power every year. The average desktop/monitor combination consumes up to 2000 kilowatt-hours(kWh) of electricity per year whereas a typical laptop with an LCD monitor consumes less about 570 kWh per year.

Reduction in energy consumption, waste and gas emissions can be possible with proper implementation of IT applications. Telecommuting (work from home) can reduce not only automobile travel but energy use by reducing the amount of dedicated office space. Using telecommuting, last year IBM was able to save $97 million in travel costs and was able to avoid more than 68,000 tons of CO2 emissions. IBM saves $1 billion in real-estate costs every year and claims another $16.5 million in cost savings from using instant messaging instead of the phone. Going green is a better way to save energy and the environment.

Electoral and Political Reforms

Support to all the following action items of the sixth National Conference on Electoral and Political Reforms organised by Association for Democratic Reforms.
1. A set of demands include barring candidates against whom serious charges have been framed in a court, disqualifying candidates who indulge in electoral malpractices, striking off names of people with non bailable warrants from voter rolls and the option of "None of the Above" on the Electronic Voting Machines (EVMs).
2. The need for a comprehensive Bill to regulate Political Parties. The issues of inner party democracy in political parties, and greater transparency and regulation of political party funding is required.
3. Specific action plan for carrying the National Election Watch (NEW) campaign forward.

Following few suggestions for discussion in the conference and to include them as action items if feasible.
1. A minimum educational/professional qualification and/or few years of experience in a professional field/social work are required to contest an election as elected members are working for the government and receiving salary, allowances and pension like any other employee. Being an organisation of high repute, government must have well defined eligibility criteria, recruitment rules for all the positions including for prime minister, chief ministers, cabinet ministers, state ministers and for members of parliament, state assembly, municipal council and Panchayat as rules applied to work for any position from a peon to managing director in any organisation.
2. Election agenda must contain detailed information about each agenda item and goal including the current status of the agenda item and the target to be achieved during the term of governance; a method to achieve the target; a detailed plan including work breakdown structure with activities, tasks, and milestones with a provision of periodical feedbacks from the people; a detailed schedule including timeline with starting and ending dates of each task; details regarding required financial, human and other resources; details regarding members of advisory team who are highly knowledgeable in the area and able to advice on the matter, core team who are ground level workers and coordinators, and monitoring team to monitor progress and performance; and details regarding appraisal system. For more details please read my article, Government Should Work in a Professional Way as a Corporate; Corporate India. Such detailed election agenda can help decision making process of voters as well as shows commitment of the political party, own responsibilities and how the party will contribute for which and what benefits of India.
3. All types of election campaign and propaganda are allowed only information and discussion on candidate’s plan on his/her contribution to future development during term; information and discussion on past performance of individuals and political party should be legally banned as well as any type of comments on opposition candidates and parties. Such practices will create a positive and progressive environment.

Please Volunteer to Do a Little for our Kids

Please participate in Earth Hour 2010, a worldwide effort to reduce energy consumption, and join millions of concerned citizens throughout the world in calling for action to save our planet for future generations.

Participating is easy, fun and absolutely free by turning off the lights and nonessential electrical appliances in our homes, offices and city between 8.30pm and 9.30pm on Saturday 27 March 2010 and sign up here.

Earth Hour started in 2007 in Sydney, Australia when 2.2 million homes and businesses turned their lights off for one hour. Year later, Earth Hour had become a global sustainability movement with involvement of more than 50 million people across 35 countries. Global landmarks such as the, Sydney Harbour Bridge, CN Tower in Toronto, Golden Gate Bridge in San Francisco, and Rome’s Colosseum, stood in darkness. In 2009, hundreds of millions of people took part in the third Earth Hour from more than 4000 cities in 88 countries to pledge their support for the planet. Let us make 2010 the biggest Earth Hour!

Involvement in Earth Hour is just one part of our big commitment to energy conservation. Be inspired by it and take steps to reduce our climate footprint all year round.

Please encourage people you know to take part, remember March 27 at 8:30 pm, switch off and show what can be done.