Page 12 - Education World November 2022

Editorial

GROWING AWARENESS OF HOLISTIC EDUCATION annual field survey stretching over
four months. Every year since 2007,
field personnel of our partner and re-
HE ENTHUSIASTIC RESPONSE OF comes of children. On the other hand, puted market research agency Centre
school promoters, trustees, based on the premise that there’s for Forecasting & Research (C fore),
Tprincipals and teachers to the more to schooling than academics, Delhi, have been interviewing over
12th EducationWorld India School EWISR rates schools on 14 param- 14,000 sample respondents (parents,
Rankings (EWISR) 2022-23 Awards eters of education excellence includ- principals, teachers and senior stu-
conclave which concluded in Gurgaon ing teacher welfare and development, dents) to award scores (100-200) to
(Delhi NCR) on October 12, is proof faculty competence, leadership, infra- schools of which they are aware under
that the tectonic plates of the coun- structure, individual attention to stu- 14 parameters. These scores are to-
try’s moribund K-12 education system dents (teacher-pupil ratio), co-curric- taled to rank schools.
are shifting. Over 1,400 leaders of the ular and sports education, community The objective of detailing the sui
country’s most reputed schools listed service record, among others. generis EWISR architecture and de-
in 24 league tables of EWISR 2022-23 Emphatic approval of the EWISR sign is to drive home the point that
thronged the largest conference hall evaluation methodology is proof that enthusiastic response of school edu-
of the Leela Ambience Hotel, Gurgaon the educators’ community is increas- cators to the recently concluded EW-
to receive trophies, certificates and ingly accepting the basic premise of ISR 2022-23 survey and subsequent
encomiums for topping the national, our rankings surveys that progres- awards function, is acknowledgment
state and city rankings in EWISR sive schools pay attention to several of the imperative of providing chil-
2022-23. parameters of institutional excellence dren well-rounded, balanced prima-
It’s pertinent to note that the ar- to develop the multiple intelligences ry-secondary education which devel-
chitecture and design of the annual of children. ops their multiple intelligences.
EWISR differs radically from schools Moreover unlike other school rank- This is an important mindset
ranks surveys in the US and UK where ing surveys which are subjective or change which is a good augury for
ranks are determined on a single pa- based on the evaluation of small juries, the world’s largest child and youth
rameter of excellence: learning out- EWISR is the outcome of an extensive population.

SPREADING EXTREME DEPRIVATION WARNING meal, bore the brunt.
The plain unvarnished truth that
the establishment and intelligentsia
VEN AS THE PRINT MEDIA AND ity is 3.3 percent and percentage of need to acknowledge is that meagre
television channels are flooded children suffering wasting, i.e, dispro- output growth in terms of food, cloth-
Ewith advertising inviting the portionate body weight to height at 19 ing, shelter, education and healthcare
middle class to purchase luxury goods percent is highest worldwide. services — the consequence of adopt-
and services ranging from smart TVs, Unsurprisingly, the reaction of the ing the inorganic Soviet-inspired so-
consumer durables, SUVs and foreign BJP government at the Centre is out- cialist development model — has been
holidays during Diwali/Deepavali, the rage. In an official statement dated cornered by the country’s 350 million
latest Global Hunger Index (GHI) October 15, the Union ministry of middle class. The remainder popula-
2022 report published by Concern women and child development says tion of over 1 billion citizens ill-served
Worldwide and Welthungerhilfe (Ger- the GHI report is an “effort to taint by the 20 million-strong bureaucracy
many) ranks India #107 among 122 India’s image” and accuses the au- which has stifled wealth generation
countries surveyed. Neighbours Sri thors of the detailed 60-page report by imposing crippling controls on
Lanka (64), Nepal (81), Bangladesh of “spreading misinformation”. Yet business and industry, has been left
(84) and Pakistan (99) are awarded GHI 2022 is not the first internation- to fend for itself, with over 134 million
higher rank in terms of demonstrated al survey to highlight pervasive child citizens eking out precarious lives on
capability to feed their population. malnutrition and stunting in India. less than $2 per day. Yet the political
According to GHI 2022, the inci- For several decades, international and self-serving middle classes are
dence of mass hunger — especially organisations such as the Unicef and unwilling to change the status quo,
child malnutrition in India — is “se- World Bank have been drawing atten- ignoring the piteous cries of millions
rious”. Contrary to official bombast tion to severe child malnutrition and of food, education and healthcare de-
proclaiming the world’s highest GDP stunting here. prived children.
growth rate and its allure for foreign Most recently, a Unicef report This situation cannot endure. The
investment, shining India fares poorly Child F ood Poverty : A N utrition Cri- country’s intelligentsia, if not the
on all four parameters of GHI — un- sis in Early Childhood says that two foolish political class, needs to note
dernourishment, child stunting, child in five of India’s children live in “se- that extreme deprivation in spread-
wasting and child mortality — indica- vere food poverty”. In particular, dur- ing slums of urban India and large
tive of “multidimensional nature of ing the past two years of the Covid-19 swathes of the rural hinterland is fast
hunger”. An estimated 16.3 percent pandemic, 36 million citizens slipped approximating conditions of pre-1789
of the country’s population is under- below the country’s rock-bottom France and pre-1917 Russia that pre-
nourished, 35.5 percent of children poverty line and millions of children cipitated the French and Russian
are stunted, under-five child mortal- denied their free, in-school mid-day revolutions.

12 EDUCATIONWORLD NOVEMBER 2022