Increase in students enrolling for tuition classes post-Covid pandemic: ASER

The Annual Status of Education Report, that surveys the learning outcomes in school-going children, has pointed at a sharp increase in students enrolling for tuition classes in a post-Covid situation. The study also points at an increase in the availability of smartphones among students.

As many as 6,99,597 children across 3,74,554 households in 19,060 villages in 616 districts across the country were surveyed for the study.

The report shows that the percentage of students between class 1 and 8 taking tuition classes currently stands at 30.5 per cent in 2022, which is an increase from 26.4 per cent in 2018. States like Bihar (70 per cent) and Jharkhand (45 per cent) had higher instances of children taking tuition as compared to states like Himachal Pradesh (10 per cent) and Maharashtra (15 per cent). Over 30.9 per cent students between the first and eighth standard took private tuition among students in government schools when compared to 29.7 per cent students in private schools.

The report states that tutoring seems to have been a tradition in states such as West Bengal and Bihar, where the proportion of children going to private schools was low and nearly 70 per cent children were going to tutors. “Large numbers of young people in villages earned a living by tutoring children in these states. It appears that in the post-pandemic period, the practice of private tutoring may spread and grow in other states as young educated people prepare for, and wait for jobs,” it said.

Between 2018 and 2021, the percentage of enrolled children having at least one smartphone at home has risen from 36.5 per cent to 67.6 per cent. In 2022 while almost every household (95.8 per cent) had a cell phone (an increase from 90.2 per cent in 2018), in the same period, the proportion of households with smartphones doubled from 36 per cent to 74.8 per cent. In many states, over 90 per cent households had a smartphone. Over 88.1 per cent of the households with smartphones in the 2022 report had a working internet connection.

The report released on Wednesday revealed an increased enrollment (72.9 per cent) in government schools, which is an increase from 65.6 per cent in 2018. The study has also pointed at a creased level of readability among students – only 20.5 per cent students in the third standard can read, compared to 27.3 per cent in 2018 – and decreased proficiency in math. The study revealed that only 25.9 per cent students can read the numbers from 1 to 9, when compared to 28.2 per cent in 2018 in the case of third standard students.