Odisha Moves Up A Few Rungs In Niti Aayog’s School Education Quality Index

Bhubaneswar: Odisha has registered a significant improvement in the field of school education, according to Niti Aayog’s SEQI (School Education Quality Index) which was released on Monday (September 30).

SEQI serves as a useful tool to assess the success of India’s school education system. The index comprises indicators that will help steer a State/UT’s efforts to improve the delivery of quality education.

Odisha and four other states — Haryana, Assam, Uttar Pradesh and Gujarat – registered high rates of Improvement in their overall performance score between 2015-16 and 2016-17.

According to the report, Odisha which had registered 47.8 in Base Year Rank (2015-16) showed a significant increase in percentage figure in 2016-17 with 60.2%. Thereby Odisha, which was placed in the 13^th rank in the Base Year 2015-16, moved up to 7^th position in Reference Year 2016-17.

Among 20 large states in the country, 18 have improved their overall performance between 2015-16 and 2016-17. Odisha is the fourth best state in terms of improvement. It has also shown a significant increase in Performance on the Governance Processes Aiding Outcomes category, the report said.

While Kerala topped the SEQI Ranking, the overall performance has declined in Karnataka and Uttarakhand. All seven Union Territories have shown an improvement in their overall performance score. West Bengal did not participate in the Niti Aayog exercise.

In the launch event, Amitabh Kant, CEO, Niti Aayog, Dr Rajiv Kumar, Vice-Chairman Niti Aayog, Rina Ray Secretary Higher Education were present along with other dignitaries.

The CEO said, “The objective of the index is to bring an outcomes focus to education policy by providing States and UTs with a platform to identify their strengths and weaknesses and undertake requisite course corrections and policy interventions.”