Post News Network
Bhubaneswar, Feb 21: Enrolment of students in primary and upper primary schools in the state has been dwindling, admitted school and mass education minister Debi Prasad Mishra, who pointed out that between 2010-11 and 2013-14 the number of students in schools has come down from 51,79,626 to 49,24,453.
Not only students, the number of schools has also gone down sharply, Mishra said in a written statement in the Assembly.
There were 52,521 primary and upper primary schools under the department in 2011-12. However, the number of schools reduced to 51,594 in 2013-14, with 927 schools closing down in two years. The minister said that the state government had engaged a New Delhi based organisation ICRA to conduct a study into the causes of the reduction in the number of students in primary and upper primary schools.
The ICRA report has pointed to poor quality of teaching, poor parent-teacher interaction, lack of school resources, migration for livelihood, closure of mines as some of the causes for the decline in the primary education sector.
ICRA has suggested that measures be taken for the orientation of parents and maintenance of school report cards.