Rural community schools under political pressure

Over 2,000 of the country’s community-managed schools, regarded by education experts as the best model for quality schooling in rural areas, are coming under immense political pressure both from the Maoists — who have been waging an armed rebellion against the state for the last 10 years — and the Nepal National Teachers’ Association (NNTA), a union of 80,000 government school teachers. According to reports by local government education offices in rural areas, a large number of community-based schools are being routinely locked up or their classes disrupted. Since 2003, with financial support from the World Bank, the Ministry of Education (MoE) has been transferring the management responsibilities of public schools to local communities, comprising of parents, community leaders and teachers. The government provides a grant of US $1,500 to each community-managed school. Under its Community School Support Programme (CSSP), the MoE, in a bid to make schools independent from government control while improving school efficiency, has handed over 2,292 schools to communities in 62 of the 75 districts in the Himalayan kingdom. Additionally, they have been given the authority to supervise, as well as to hire and suspend, those teachers who neglect their duties or stay absent from class for long periods of time. The United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF) believes that effort has proved successful in enrolling and keeping more children in village schools, where according to the MoE, over 4 million of Nepal’s children under 15 years of age are still not going to school. So far only 6 million, or 82 percent, of children are currently enrolled at the primary school level. But due to inefficient and poor quality public education, less than 67 percent of the children make it to grade five, while less than a third of primary school students manage to enter lower secondary schools. Nepal has one of the highest school dropout rates in the world, with nearly 70 percent of Nepalese children between the ages of six and 10 years of age dropping out due to poverty, lack of teachers and poorly managed public schools. With community schools, however, there is hope of a better public education system amongst poor families in Nepal, particularly in rural areas — where nearly 86 percent of the country’s 27 million inhabitants live. “Handing over the schools to communities is very good and an effective homegrown initiative as it had proved to be a successful education model. There is no credible alternative for the country’s education system,” asserted Rajendra Joshi, a senior education specialist at the World Bank in Kathmandu. Backing up the stance, the bank has also committed more financial support to this programme due to its many positive outcomes. But recently the Maoists have demanded that the government take back the management responsibilities of the public schools given to the local communities, accusing the state of running away from its responsibilities. In addition, the NNTA expressed concerns that the communities were not capable enough to run the schools without government supervision. “Managing schools is a huge challenge, both academically and financially, and local communities are not prepared in both cases. The decision (to hand over schools to communities) can have negative consequences,” maintained NNTA’s General Secretary Baburam Adhikari. Yet government authorities maintain this is nothing but a political motive, with many teachers merely concerned about their own job security. “We should look at the fact that today more poor children are staying longer in schools. This proves that communities are doing a very good job,” Om Sharma, an official from the Department of Education, explained. A recent 2006 World Bank survey of 10,000 households in 33 schools showed that the rate of school dropouts at primary school level had dropped from 13.7 percent to 9.5 percent. “When the political crisis and the insurgency have made development work more challenging, there is increasing evidence and realisation that letting the communities lead the way is the smart approach to sustain development,” World Bank chief in Nepal, Ken Ohasi, was quoted as saying on Friday by the Nepali Times, a national weekly, while referring to the conflict’s impact on the country’s education system.