PRIVATE SCHOOLS AND GOVERNAMENTAL SCHOOLS

In recent years, India's economical growth improved continuously,

ameliorating the society livelihood and lifestyle. But, what about the

education system? The governmental efforts in order to improve and

increase literacy in the last century, since the independence, allowed

to the population to engage in schools and universities as never

before. But, there is still a gap between the private and the

governmental schools.

From an administrational point of view, we just can say that an

obstacle to a successful management of a governmental school is the

paperwork and the bureaucracy that involves all steps of work.

One of the main differences between these two kinds of schools is the

infrastructure issue. The construction of a public school is often new

and well maintained; while for the governmental the situation may be

more critical. May happens that in this type of schools there is a lack of

electricity, water, sanitation items and facilities. The electricity issue

represent a problem because is involved with the possibility to have

water in bathrooms, light in classrooms, air vents or any electronic

item (that may be very helpful in order to improve student's

knowledge). This substantial difference is more evident in village area,

and may be directly connected with the nature of both kind of schools;

in fact, in a governmental schools there's no need to pay fees or taxes

to attend, schools uniforms and materials (books, exercises book and

pens) are freely provided by the government. This allow to the

poorest people to send their children to school, avoiding them child

labour.

This may be seen as a great step forward, but at the same time is

necessary to underline the different chances that have students

coming from these two kinds of schools. In fact, because of big sums of

money invested in private schools, students not only live in a more

positively competitive environment, but also have the chance to join

different extracurricular activities that make their future Curriculum

more appealing. By contrast, in governmental schools the extra

activities are more related with more material and practical activities

that aims to improve student's livelihood, such as hand washing

activities. Often, these activities aimed to improve hygienic conditions

are conducted by local NGO, such as HEEALS NGO. In recent Years,

HEEALS managed to increase the livelihood of many schools,

providing RO water filter, facilities and realising educative workshops

about hygiene and sanitation. These practical activities have a

fundamental and positive implication in their daily life, but from an

academic point of view there is a gap.

Another big issue related to the distinction between private and a

governmental school is linked to the ratio of teacher to student.

In governmental schools this ratio is often too small, there are too

many children for few teachers; this mean that classrooms are more

crowded and the quality of teaching may have negative implications

that effects student's knowledge and teacher's work quality. It's easy

to imagine how much strong should be a teacher who teaches is such a

difficult environment, playing a role that is wider that one person can

imagine.

On concluding, it is important to underline that children shouldn’t pay

the bill for economical and financial choices, the main purpose of

education is the intellectual and human growth of students.

- Grandoni Laura

"A Rising Need To Combat A Rising Population"

According to the live population counter, Worldometer, India’s population is currently at 1,355,853,093…094…095. Equivalent to 17.74% of the entire world population, it is expected that the population density would squeeze 1,180 people into each square mile.^[1] The second largest country in the world by population, it is worth discussing the importance of population in an Indian context, especially considering the burden that an exponentially growing population plays on the distribution of WASH facilities. This piece will reflect on population growth - what it is, how it began, why it is important, and how India can work to combat an exponentially growing population for the sake of a more sustainable planet.

 Population has been recognized as an issue worth addressing for decades now. There is even an annual recognition, World Population Day, first acknowledged on July 11th 1987. This was the day the global population reached 5 billion people. With a current global population of 7.6 billion, the need for an annual recognition of population growth has remained steadfast across the world. This year, the theme was “Family Planning is a Human Right.” ^[2]

Family planning became officially recognized as a human right in Article 16 of the Proclamation of Teheran, an International Conference on Human Rights held in Teheran, Iran, in 1968. Article 16 recognizes the right of parents to determine the number and spacing of their children, to chose when and how often to embrace parenthood (if at all), and the right of women to avoid depletion, exhaustion, and danger related to too many pregnancies.^[3] The UN Population Fund and the World Health organization recognizes nine standards to ensuring family planning is upheld as a human right: family planning must be non-discriminatory, available, accessible, acceptable, of good quality, participatory, accountable, involve informed decision making, and practice privacy/confidentiality.^[4]

Access to family planning is a serious concern on a global scale, and India is certainly not exempt. Currently, only 53.5% of married Indian women (aged 15-49) use family planning methods, and 12.9% of women specified an unmet need for family planning.^[5] The difference in these statistics shows that not only is family planning specifically inaccessible for 12.9% of the population, but the remaining 33.6% do not recognize a personal need for family planning resources at all. Furthermore, female sterilization is the primary contraceptive being used (75.3%); Lack of access to a reversible form of contraception could intimidate women from making the choice to engage in family planning.^[6]

And it shows. With a current population of 1.3 billion people - almost 18% of the global make-up - India’s population is estimated to surpass China’s by the year 2024.[1] And a growing population, as we all know, has detrimental effects on the environment, quality of life and access to resources on a global scale.

Take WASH, for example - an issue that HEEALS seeks to address in its project implementation. Ensuring that the massive Indian population has access to proper WASH resources - clean drinking water, private and accessible toilet facilities, soap for hand washing, etc. - has proven itself to be a challenge in and of itself. This becomes multiplied by a growing population, not simply because more people materialize in need of these resources. But a growing population shifts demographics, and consequentially, the type of resources needed.

George St J Perrott and Dorothy F Holland expand on this in their article, Population Trends and Problems of Public Health: “Alterations in age composition, internal migration of racial or industrial groups, changes in population density and urban-rural movement require current adaptation of the health program to solve the new problems thus created.”[2] A large population of children under the age of five exacerbates the issue of access to clean drinking water, as water-bourne diseases is the largest cause of death in India for children of this age group.[3] A large population of women of child-bearing age requires a focus on access to proper menstrual hygiene management resources, so as to avoid RTIs and other complications. So it is not just the issue of more people on this planet; Rather, the issue arises in giving an increasing number of people the resources needed to survive.

Yet, in the lecture “Why The World Population Won’t Exceed 11 Billion”, statistical analyst Hans Rosling offers an alternative way to regard population growth, and an accompanying solution that involves an increased focus on improving the health and quality of life for youth in developing countries. Rosling passionately states, “the poorest in Africa… they will not use contraceptives as long as they see their children dying, as long as there is no school in the village, as long as they need their children for work.”[4] Here, we see that the emphasis placed on access to family planning, incredibly important in and of itself, is not sufficient without ensuring that families will survive in the poorest of conditions.

So while the Indian government made its FP2020 commitment at the 2012 London Summit on Family Planning, an argument could be made for strengthening efforts to reduce WASH-related diseases - one of the leading causes of infant mortality in India.[5]

-Jayde 

Wash Intern Coordinator 

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^[1] https://www.nhp.gov.in/world-population-day_pg

^[2] https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2690260/

^{[3] [3]} http://www.familyplanning2020.org/entities/76

^[4] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2LyzBoHo5EI

^[5] http://www.familyplanning2020.org/entities/76

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^[1] http://www.worldometers.info/world-population/india-population/

^[2] https://www.nhp.gov.in/world-population-day_pg

^[3] https://www.ohchr.org/EN/Issues/Education/Training/Compilation/Pages/a)TheProclamationofTeheran(1968).aspx

^[4] https://www.nhp.gov.in/world-population-day_pg

^[5] http://rchiips.org/nfhs/pdf/NFHS4/India.pdf

^[6] http://www.familyplanning2020.org/entities/76