The education of millions of children in India was gravely impacted due to the closure of schools following strict lockdowns during the pandemic. Now, it has emerged that after the loss of two consecutive academic sessions due to the COVID-19 pandemic, around 30% of students have not returned to schools in Odisha.
The worrying trend was revealed when the State Government reopened schools and started checking attendance sheets. The School and Mass Education (SME) secretary, Bishnupada Sethi, weighed in on the issue and said that students were not attending school despite the government making provisions for a midday meal and implementing a learning recovery plan.
“On analysis of the daily attendance figure provided by the District Education Officers, it is seen that about 70% students are attending the classes. However, on detailed analysis the figure, it is seen that the attendance in Class-I to Class-V in case of districts like Malkangiri, Boudh, Gajapati, Sambalpur and Nuapada is less than the State average,” Bishnupada Sethi was quoted as saying.
Sethi noted that the students may have dropped out due to a lack of interest in academics or because they moved out along with their parents.
According to the SME department, in the secondary wing, the attendance in schools in districts like Gajapati, Balangir, Bargarh, Sonepur, Nuapada, Cuttack, Khordha, Koraput, Ganjam, Boudh, Malkangiri, Keonjhar and Sambalpur is behind the State average.
Similarly, the overall attendance in higher secondary classes is very low in Gajapati, Sonepur, Baragarh, Kandhamal and Nuapada.
It is worth noting that these abysmal findings come after the State Government introduced a Learning Recovery Plan (LRP) to help students recover the learning loss. To compensate for the learning loss, the State Government even curtailed the summer vacation and rescheduled school timings from 6.00 a.m. to 9.00 a.m.
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