Impact of New Education Policy On Private School Selection By Parents

Impact of New Education Policy On Private School Selection By Parents

The ideal education that children must receive should aid development of skills that will help them not just excel academically but also groom them into empathetic, socially responsible and independently thinking human beings. The New Education Policy (NEP) that outlines the vision of India’s education system, if implemented in its true spirit, could help achieve this goal.

In 5 years from now, by when the New Education Policy would have been implemented, most school education boards, including the CBSE, would have rolled out a new assessment framework. This framework is expected to be more holistic and could test crucial life skills such as creative problem solving, critical thinking, and a variety of reasoning skills apart from subject knowledge and application of concepts to life situations. This is the right education children must get to be able to thrive in the 21^st century.

Most private schools today focus on teaching academic knowledge that helps in achieving marks in board exams, while development of skills required to lead a fulfilling life often takes a backseat because these are neither tracked nor assessed at any level. This is expected to change with the NEP.

Pre Primary and Primary Education is the Key

A child’s brain acquires 90% of its adult volume by age 6 (class 1/2) indicating that the absorption capacity at this stage of life is at its peak. Teachers in classroom observe that children are most curious during this stage of life. Parents too focus on building the right habits and values at home form early childhood years so that they can last a lifetime. During these years, if children are nurtured well at home and in school, their raised levels of curiosity and ability to think can make them reflective, deep thinking and self motivated learners for life.

Therefore right from an early age, children must be given an enabling environment that facilitates acquisition of a variety of skills, especially the skill to read and comprehend; and the skill to understand numbers and their operations. In the technical education parlance these skills are called foundational literacy and numeracy. The first 8 years of schooling from age 3 to 10 are most crucial for developing foundational literacy and numeracy. Research supports this opinion especially in the case of reading. NEP too suggests that as a country our focus should now be on building foundational skills from an early age.

Effective Teaching-Learning In Classrooms

The teaching-learning exchange that takes place inside a classroom plays a significant role in development of these fundamental building blocks of knowledge. The better the quality of interactions inside the classroom, higher is the scope for children to learn meaningfully. Many policies of a school positively impact the quality of this teaching-learning process but in my opinion the 3 most important ones are as follows.

1. “In-class” student teacher ratio

The lower this ratio, the better it is for students. 20:1 or below is ideal till grade 5. Most private schools have 2 teachers in a class in pre primary stage. Some schools have 2 teachers in a class in primary grades too which ensures individual attention and support to each learner enabling faster and deeper learning of new concepts. Favourable student teacher ratio also reduces the requirement of after school learning through coaching and tuitions saving both time and cost.

2. Number of students in a classroom (Class Size) – 20/25/30/35/40

Smaller class sizes have a big impact on student learning outcomes. This is proven by many researches and one such longitudinal research can be found here. The study shows that small class sizes provide short term and long term benefits to all students. In the Indian context 30 should be the maximum number of students in a class but in pre primary and early primary grades 20 is even better as younger kids need more support.

4 years back, I met a very perturbed parent. She had come back from her child’s PTM and narrated what she faced in a very well known Noida school that had a legacy and a big brand name. Her elder child, who was in grade 5 then, wasn’t good in Maths and thus she met the Maths teacher. She introduced herself to the teacher as mother of Vivek (name changed for privacy reasons). The teacher said that she teaches 6 sections of 40 students each and does not remember the name of all the children she teaches. She requested the mother to show her the picture of her son so that she can relate to the discussion she was about to have with her.

Such instances, quite common in schools with large class sizes, make a strong case for lesser students in a class. A school which has a class size of 25 will be able to deliver better quality of education than a school which has 40 students in a class. The teacher will be able to provide more class participation and doubt clearing opportunities to every child. She will have more time to review classwork and homework, and do a better job of providing constructive feedback. She saves time because she has to assess lesser number of students, and can invest it in better preparing for the class and deliver better lessons in the classroom leading to better student learning outcomes. And more importantly, she will be able to better connect with her students.

3. Teacher capacity building and coaching

This is one of the major determinants of how deeply children learn at school. Schools that conduct in-house, round the year teacher coaching programs through a dedicated team are likely to produce holistic learning outcomes in their students. Parents must select those schools for their children that have an unwavering commitment to teacher development. This is even more relevant now as teachers will have to be retrained on the NEP based new curriculum, which is expected to be drastically different from what they follow right now.

Schools with better trained teachers, smaller class sizes and better student teacher ratios were able to produce better learning outcomes compared to others during the last 9 month of online classes. Students of such schools thrived and parents of such students were content with the progress made by their children in the context of the pandemic.

What Can Parents Do?

Quite evidently, a school has a significant impact on the trajectory that the education of a child takes. Good schooling opens the doors for high quality university education that in turn provides opportunities to students to live a meaningful, resourceful and purposeful life.

It is therefore very important that parents choose the right school for their children right from Pre Primary stage. My advice would be to avoid small time play schools and if possible all playschools till such time they are better regulated under the new NEP regime and their quality of education monitored and governed against some reasonable standards.

Parents should look very closely at teacher quality, teacher training, class sizes and teacher student ratio for each of their shortlisted schools (even for established and well known schools) to ascertain which one is the best for their child. Though its always better to make a well researched decision in the first place when choosing a school for your child, but remember that it’s never too late to change too if you believe the decision has not gone your way.

About The Author

Harinder Chhabra is the Founder Director of The Infinity School, Noida Extension (India) and an alumnus of IIM Ahmedabad.

The Infinity School has been ranked as a Top 5 school in Noida Extension by Times School Survey 2020-21 and EducationWorld School Rankings 2020-21 within two years of its establishment.