Waste of resources

The Himalayan Times

8 December 2016

Waste of resources

Among others, education has been one of the priority sectors of the government of Nepal. Every year, educationalists argue about the amount of budget allocated by the government in this sector. Several educational reform programs were tried investing billions of rupees received from bilateral or multilateral international funding agencies. One of the most ambitious programs is the School Sector Development Plan (SSDP) with an investment of one trillion of rupees “School sector development” (THT, 6 Dec. Page 8). Its main is to make the education from one to eight grades completely free and compulsory. Strengthening access to education of all the school going children thus bridging the dropout rate to zero is one of the ambitious plan of SSDP.

However, there has not been any significant and satisfactory progress in this effort. The main reason behind that seemed to be lack of political commitment, appropriate and reliable plan. Also, lack of proper supervision and weak monitoring system prevalent in the government machinery is another drawback in effectively implementing SSDP. The transformation of four-tier structure of school education into two-tiers comprising the basic level from grade one to eight and the secondary level from grade nine to twelve is another reform approach proposed in the SSDP. It had created hue and cry among both the government and private secondary schools. It took some time to implement. The government was not able to timely amend the bill due to political consensus. Dissolution of Higher Secondary School Board of Examination and bringing it under a National Examination Board has been a long process for the government.

Rai Biren Bangdel

Maharajgunj