Har subah sirf utho mat Jaago Re TATA TEA

In an education system marred by high school drop-out rates, poor access to learning material, inadequate infrastructure coupled with rampant corruption in the admission process, quality education seems to be a huge challenge confronting prospective students.

"Households pay for more than one-quarter (28%) of the costs to send their children to primary and secondary school. These fees pose a very real barrier for the children of poor families," said the 'Global Education Digest 2007', released by UNESCO's Institute for Statistics. Innovation in education is the key to India's transformation. What can serve as a saving grace is cooperation between the public and private sector towards enhancing quality and access of innovative educational content.

The Public-Private Partnership Model (PPP) would not just be for building new institutions but also revamping existing establishments in terms of infrastructure, services, operations and management. It is hoped that this partnership extends to optimizing the class environment making it experiential and not the traditional by-rote method. Attempts have been made to incorporate technology integrated support systems that enable multimedia-rich course content and provide a rich learning experience.

Further, the onus of quality education should not just be in the hands of the government but the people as well. It is time for students, teachers, parents to awaken and demand better learning concepts and methods. Co-creation of education is the need of the hour. There needs to be active system between educators and the learners.

Another initiative that can be looked at is extending an education voucher that helps the government to fund students instead of schools and that the money would follow the student and get paid to whichever school that the child chooses to enroll in.

Story telling has been the basis of all new learning methods and tools devised. This learning-by-doing gets even more pronounced as a person grows older and becomes a ‘voluntary learner’. Therefore, the practice of experiential learning evolves. Aristotle once said, "For the things we have to learn before we can do them, we learn by doing them." Quality through learning by doing: it is this approach that would save India’s education system.