How Delhi govt transformed its schools, and the challenges it faces

Delhi’s schools have been hogging the headlines in recent months. On August 16, The New York Times published a feature titled ‘Clean Toilets, Inspired Teachers: How India’s Capital Is Fixing Its Schools’. 

Two weeks later, there was a spat between Assam Chief Minister Himanta Biswa Sarma and his Delhi counterpart Arvind Kejriwal on the comparability of their respective state-run schools.

Earlier, in April, Tamil Nadu Chief Minister MK Stalin, on a three-day visit to Delhi, made it a point to visit a state government-run school and expressed his desire to “take the Delhi school model to Tamil Nadu”.

Also read: Punjab to replicate Delhi’s education model

What is it regarding Delhi’s state-run schools that attracts so much attention from politicians and media? Well, an answer to that question requires a closer look at what the Delhi government has attempted to do with its schools.

Two broad categories

Delhi’s school reforms fall into two broad categories. First, in making changes in the learning environment and second in the learning process itself.

Also read: Govt school challenge: Education ministers of Delhi and Punjab spar

In terms of the learning environment, the most visible change is in infrastructure. The Delhi government has improved, and in many cases transformed, the schools’ infrastructure so well that there is a total image makeover. The schools are cleaner, and more inviting for both students and teachers.

A report titled “Delhi Government Performance: 2015-2022” claims that over the past seven years, nearly 21,000 new classrooms and 47 new schools have been constructed. Swimming pools, synthetic tracks, and AstroTurfs – which one doesn’t expect to see in state-run schools anywhere in India – exist in government-run schools in Delhi. Auditoriums and laboratories have been modernised, offering dignified schooling spaces for underprivileged children who go to state-run schools.

High budgetary spend

How has this been made possible? Well, the Delhi government spends a lot on education. Its budget of ₹75,800 crore for 2022-23 has a good 21% – ₹16,278 crore – allocated for education, spent on infrastructure, salaries, and administrative expenses. 

Last year, even in absolute terms, Delhi, a tiny state, had a bigger kitty for education compared to vastly bigger states such as Telangana, Punjab, Jharkhand, Uttarakhand, and Himachal Pradesh. In percentage terms, Delhi’s education spend, accounting for close to a quarter of the budget, has consistently been the highest in India among all states in recent years.

Also read: Delhi Model vs Kerala Model: State education leaders in war of words

Secondly, beyond budget, there have been significant structural changes for the better in the way schools are administered. For instance, the School Management Committees (SMCs), which involve parents, have been both empowered and made accountable. The SMC members are also trained to deal with the tasks they handle. SMCs have organised events such as Reading Melas and have helped in ensuring the attendance of irregular students. An SMC app helps schools, parents, and decision-makers connect easily.

‘Happiness Curriculum’

A third component in changing the learning environment for the better involves streamlining the admission process in schools. Given the visible improvement in the image, Delhi schools are bound to face increased pressure for admission through recommendations from politicians, bureaucrats and a variety of influencers. This has been eliminated through a computerised lottery. The admission process is also centralised. Children are tracked through the admission process with unique IDs. Overall, there is little scope for manipulation.

In terms of effects on the learning process itself, several steps have been taken.

Initiatives such as the ‘Happiness Curriculum’, focused on elements such as mindfulness, self-expression, and reflection, have attracted a lot of attention. The ‘Happiness’ classes happen every working day for 40 minutes for students from Nursery to Grade 8. 

Other states have taken a cue. Andhra Pradesh and Uttarakhand are preparing to implement the curriculum in their state-run schools. Beyond India, Nepal, and the UAE have shown interest in the Happiness Curriculum.

Also read: Kejriwal launches virtual school for students across the country

Upping the sports game

Sports has been pushed up in importance. The government has set up a Sports University, which will oversee a fully residential ‘sports school’. The school would have infrastructure and facilities to train for 10 Olympic sports such as archery, athletics, badminton, boxing, tennis, shooting, swimming, wrestling and, of course, weightlifting, the sport of the university’s vice-chancellor, Olympic Medallist Karnam Malleswari. 

The school would admit students from all over India. There will be talent scouting across the country to spot potential students. This is the first formal attempt to offer sports education formally, in a structured manner, anywhere in India.

Business programme

Another initiative is ‘The Entrepreneurship Mindset Curriculum’. It is a compulsory but non-graded subject, for 40 minutes every day. All students from Class 9 to Class 12 are given ₹2,000 to “develop an entrepreneurial mindset.” About 25,000 students from 100 schools will be tracked over four years on their ideas. Some would be shortlisted for the Delhi government’s ‘Business Blaster’ programme. Guest speakers are invited regularly to interact with the students.

In the core academic areas of reading, writing, and arithmetic, the government has floated ‘Mission Buniyaad’ aimed at improving students’ academic performance in classes 3-8.

Challenges ahead

What about the challenges that loom ahead? There are several. Take, for example, the ‘language’ challenge.

According to 2011 Census data on migration, Delhi has the second highest population of inter-state migrants in India, after Maharashtra, which is much larger. More than 63 lakh people, nearly 40% of Delhi’s population  are migrants from other Indian states.

Also read: When should I come to see your govt schools: Kejriwal to Assam CM Sarma as Twitter spat grows

As a consequence, most of Delhi’s classrooms are multilingual if you go by what children speak. In some classrooms, children speak as many as 11 different languages, often vastly different from one another such as Punjabi and Odia. And many kids are not comfortable comprehending Hindi as well as subjects taught in Hindi.

Communicating with these kids would be an impossible challenge for any teacher. However, pedagogical methods can be devised to facilitate peer learning and to help children learn languages and content from each other. This requires a thoughtful and sustained effort.

Now, trying to transform the education system with the existing teachers and officials is a daunting challenge for any government. Neither capacity building nor changing the mindsets is easy.

That said, reforms in education take time to be effective, and to produce desired results. The only way the quality of learning outcomes can be enhanced substantially is to go for long-term planning and efforts. If the Delhi government focuses on the long-term benefits, then we will have a model that other states in India and other developed countries can surely look up to.

(The author consults in the education domain. He can be reached at srihamsa@gmail.com)