Education - A field free to all

The quality of Indian Education System was debatable for ages. Private sector can meet the demand, if the current government allows for changes. There is no shortage of private capital or entrepreneurial interest. School education, say professionals, is a $100 billion prospect over the next three years. But what is killing the growth of school education entrepreneurship is absurd regulation. The recent survey conducted by the economic times showed that dozens of education specialists, industrialists, former watchdogs, and responsible parents agree to one common fact. The consensus is that private schools need a few simple logical rules. 

Experts say the government should be a facilitator of quality education, not its supervisor. Allowing the government school headmasters more autonomy will ensure that they are no longer be a simple administrators but also evolve into education leaders.

Regulatory approval should restricted to ensuring the school has enough funds for infrastructure, appointing qualified teachers, getting itself certified or being rated by pre-appointed bodies. Policies shouldn’t be made by thinking of the worst but think of the best. The government should realize that some entrepreneurs do really want to contribute to a better future.
 So you all might ask what the way forward from here is.

Public - Private Partnership (PPP) is a finance model for a public organization project such as a new communication system and in our case education institution, airport or power plant. The public counterpart is represented by the government at a local, state and/or national level. The private partner can be a privately-owned commerce, public corporation or consortium of businesses with a specific area of expertise. There are certain flaws in this system too. One, it involves a massive transmission of resources from the exchequer to private schools. Two, the schools have unlimited freedom in all aspects of governance, including precisely the fees to be charged from the 1,500 students. The prototypical thus allows the so-called “non-profit institutions” to work for, and actually make, profits. Third, the government has little control over these schools. Except to insist that 1,000 students from the underprivileged sections be admitted and that they be charged a certain fee, it cannot do much.

As a result, the model, which claims that it is not for privatization, and that it will not allow the profit motive to enter the field of education, will promote the opposite: privatization and, in practice, a greater grade of commercialization. It is privatization and commercialization with a difference — utilizing public funds. Most significant, the PPP model does not feel the need to view education as being distinct from the production of moneymaking goods and building of organization.