Nexus of Good: Leading the change

Many states in the country were faced with several challenges in school education. Andhra Pradesh was one of them; it faced issues relating to scale, a fragmented approach to delivering public education and frequent changes in leadership. Additionally, the changing programme directives and reduced funding resulted in an inconsistent and poor focus on the quality aspect. There were other challenges including low learning levels among students; poor student strength in government schools; increased enrolment in inadequately-regulated English medium private schools; mushrooming of poor-quality private teacher training colleges; lack of integrated and quality school/student data, lack of transparent and accountable administrative systems, a large number of legal cases etc.

K Sandhya Rani, an officer from the Indian Postal Service came to be appointed at the post of commissioner of school education in Andhra Pradesh in January 2015. Displaying commendable leadership qualities, she made efforts to address some of the challenges that beset school education in the state. The focus was on improving student learning outcomes, facilitating teachers' professional development, consolidation of government schools, and improving governance by putting transparent and accountable administrative processes in place. Technology was leveraged effectively and pilots were conducted and scaled up for greater impact.

A School Information Management System (SIMS) was put in place by mapping and integrating Aadhaar-seeded Childinfo data and Unified – District Information on School Education (U-DISE) data. These integrated data were cross-validated with other data sets and were followed by verification at the school and household level. The whole exercise led to 98.86 per cent of students' data mapped to Aadhaar — both in public and private schools. SIMS helped to develop an Aadhaar-seeded database of over 1,80,000 government school teachers.

Under Vidya Vikasam — a student learning outcome improvement programme — Assessment Cell was set up in the State Council for Education Research & Training (SCERT) in partnership with the Center for Science of Student Learning (CSSL), Centre Square Foundation (CSF) and Samagra. Its objective was to drive pedagogical and assessment reforms in public and private schools. An analytical portal was created to track student-wise performance covering summative assessments from grade VI onwards.

After extensive stakeholder consultations, an ed-Tech policy and an action plan was developed and implemented with the objective to leverage technology for impacting three key areas in school education – enhancement of student engagement in their learning process, supporting teachers' knowledge and skill-building, and improving governance through transparent and accountable systems.

To support teachers' professional development through technology-integrated pedagogy, an improved in-service teacher training portal (APEKX) — with subject/school/mandal/district/state-wise dashboards to understand the student learning gaps, online awareness, knowledge and skill-building opportunities — was set up. This was finally morphed into the national DIKSHA portal that was considered a pathbreaking initiative to support teachers develop, curate, contribute and access digital content; and exchange lesson plans, online modules and training among other things. Digital/Virtual classrooms were set up in thousands of government schools.

To improve governance, support planning and ensure transparent and accountable administration, initiatives like developing an Integrated Data Management Systems (SIMS), eHazar – real-time Aadhaar-based daily-twice Teacher Attendance System, performance-based online transparent Teacher Transfer System, computer-based Teacher Eligibility and Teacher Recruitment Tests, tracking teacher training and professional development, online system to track and expedite private schools registration and recognition, integration with AP High Court for monitoring legal cases, were taken up.

Several projects were implemented at scale in government schools in partnership mode. These included Ananda Lahari Abhyasana (ALA) in partnership with Rishi Valley Institute for Educational Resources (RiVER-TiDE) for implementing the Multi-Grade-Multi-Level (MGML) teaching-learning programme in 1,342 double teacher primary schools.

Evidence-based systematic school rationalisation/consolidation exercise was taken up during 2015-16 and 2017-18 resulting in merging/closing of over 6,000 unviable schools.

AP School Education Department entered into partnerships with 14 NGOs, especially focussed on improving student learning outcomes, building skills and capacities of teachers, project management, supporting technology innovations in data design and management, improving teaching-learning processes, developing a strategic framework for long-term reforms and systemic transformation, etc.

School (education) Transformation Framework — Badi Parivartana — was developed in partnership with Tata Trusts. It is a long-term strategic vision and action plan to deliver an overall child-centric education by stitching together some of the reform initiatives already underway and designing new interventions for gap areas.

A combination of long-term planning, focus on key areas prioritised with extensive stakeholder consultations, leveraging technology, building capacities of the team, partnerships etc. saw the impact on several fronts.

The Aadhaar-seeded SIMS database of students and teachers increased visibility of all education-related metrics for effective decision making, a one-stop-shop for all stakeholders with a far-reaching impact. It helped improve governance, school consolidation exercise, planning and budgeting, monitoring, procurement, indenting and supply for mid-day meals, school uniforms and textbooks, private schools' recognition/opening additional sections, rationalisation of aided schools, inter-departmental data mapping and convergent programme implementation, etc. During 2015-16 and 2016-17, the SIMS helped remove about 6,00,000 duplicate or double enrolments of students (found both in private and government schools) after appropriate field verification, resulting in savings of Rs 132.86 crores in SE Budget under MDM, textbook printing and supply. The teacher database helped in implementing the e-Hazar, online performance-based teacher transfers, in-service teacher training, issue of No Objection Certificates (NOCs), medical reimbursement etc.

After studying the AP state SIMS, the National Institute for Education Planning and Administration (NIEPA), MHRD modified the U-DISE application to U-DISE+ and enabled other states to build similar integrated databases. SIMS project earned many rewards including the South Asia MANTHAN Award in 2016-17.

AP showed significant improvement in National Assessment Survey (NAS) moving from 17th rank to 3rd rank in grade-III at primary level; from 22nd to 5th position in upper primary grades and ranked 2nd position in Class 10 performance. The student performance analytics followed by dissemination of key findings sensitised teachers to improve in-classroom practices.

There was a net shift of over 2.30 lakh student enrolments from private schools to government schools in AP during 2018-19 and 2019-2020. Initial apprehension and reluctance among teachers gave way to appreciation and adaptation of the new technology solutions. There has been significant improvement in governance due to transparent and accountable systems in place, effectively handled teacher grievances and reduction in court cases (especially post-teacher transfer or the conducting of Teacher Recruitment Tests). The commissionerate of Andhra Pradesh received the "Impact Catalyst 2019 Award at the Catalysing Social Impact Forum, Bangalore in August 2019 in recognition of the systemic approach taken for developing the Badi Parivartana framework.

K Sandhya Rani managed to accomplish what was considered impossible. She leveraged public-private partnerships and engaged with other government agencies to scale the wonderful work that she initiated in the true spirit of nexus of good.

Views expressed are personal