Outcome Oriented Evaluation of Midday Meal Scheme: Scope of Digitalization to Raise Impact and Accountability
(Study conducted along rural coalmine region of West Bengal)
Krishna Prasad Mukherjee
Veterinary Officer
Govt. of West Bengal
Address: B-6A/12, ARRAH KALINAGAR
District: Burdwan, Durgapur - 713212
E mail:
M: 08001548122, 09474422478
Abstract
It has been a major concern of the governments to take out the poverty stricken households of vicious cycle of poverty. Focus has to be concentrated on strengthening human capital in order to pose challenge to poverty. Therefore, interventions those primarily deal with education and health of individuals deserve prime importance. In this context, mid-day meal scheme (MDMS) is unique in a sense that it has potential to address three important issues, viz., educational achievements, nutritional advancements and social equity, upto a considerable extent. This study analyses different operational issues in respect of MDMS, as well as assesses the impact of MDMS in the rural coal mine belt in Asansol, West Bengal. In the present study, from 37 primary schools and SSKs, 370 students and equal number of parents; as well as 37 teacher-in-charges of MDMS and 37 cooks were interacted. It was felt that, in view of absence of any real time evaluation mechanism; ‘student specific health cum academic performance record’ may be devised to capture micro-data related to health and education of individual students periodically. Digitalizing and sharing such information on public domain is likely to make the whole mechanism more accountable and transparent; apart from providing realistic information on ‘national status of human capital’ from the very school going age onwards. The actual individual specific status may facilitate the task of ‘absolute human capital strengthening’ in an efficient as well as target oriented fashion.
Key words: Poverty, human capital, MDMS, real time evaluation.
Outcome Oriented Evaluation of Midday Meal Scheme: Scope of Digitalization to Raise Impact and Accountability
(Study conducted along rural coalmine region of West Bengal)
Poverty, human capital and midday meal scheme:
Education and nutrition are nonnegotiable factors in relation to human capital, which in turn is indispensible as far as growth of a Nation is concerned. Extreme poverty can be figured out as the single most important factor as to why, poor households utilize their children for earning in whatsoever manner. This results into non-attainment of elementary and thereby higher education; and finally they continue to be in the poverty trap. Access to education is an entitlement to citizens and a vital instrument to accelerate social change through qualitative enhancement of human capital. As stressed in the millennium development goals by the United Nations, all boys and girls should complete a full course of education by 2015 (Choudhury, 2006). Kingdon (1999), taking clue from the World Bank Report (1997) finds a positive association between female education and decline in fertility, infant as well as child mortality. Colclough (1982) indicated that labour productivity is a direct function of the amount of schooling received. He further stresses that, higher education raises cognitive development and also contribute to economic betterment. Rumberger (2001) finds that, school-dropouts are less likely to find and maintain quality jobs that pay them enough to keep them off public assistances. Even such dropout find a job, he earns substantially less than high school graduates; and as a whole such high unemployment and low earnings translate into suboptimum production and low tax income, deteriorating overall economic health of the state. Choudhury (2006) observes that school drop outs in many ways, act as a burden in respect of social stability. Apart from involvement in crime, dropouts have poorer health, low rates of intergenerational mobility and lower rates of political participation. Therefore, target oriented policy measures may be put in place so that effective transition along the route of education, employability and poverty reduction may be achieved in a time bound manner.
Hati et. al. (2012) observes that India is doing better than most of the low income countries in respect of gross enrollment as well as school dropouts are concerned. But in respect of high income countries, we are lagging behind. 100% net enrolment coupled with less than 5% dropout have been evident in case of high income countries; while the same in India, in 2009-10, were 89.5% and 6.4% respectively. Moreover, in case of West Bengal, although enrolment rate is almost comparable to that of national one, in the same reference period, drop out was found to be far worse with 19.6% for boys and 15.4% for girls. Jayachandran (2007) defines drop out as an estimation made from official statistics as ratio of enrolment in class V to that in class I. according to his view, lack of interest of children as well as that of parents, inability to cope with academic demands, need to work for wages to supplement family income, and for girl-children to perform domestic duties appear to be the major reasons of dropout. Ramchandran and Saihjee (2002) have identified factors like income, caste, occupation and educational level of parents to be critical in respect of schooling from access, attendance, completion and learning points of view. For West Bengal, factors viz., parental schooling, household income as well as occupation, caste and religion were found to be influential by Sengupta and Guha (2002).
Poverty directly impacts the nutritional requirement of an individual negatively and thereby restricts physical and cognitive growth of children. Ramchandran et al (2004) observed that malnutrition is rampant among children of poor households. Laxamaiah et. al. (1999) pointed that, poverty not only results into poor nutritional status of children, but leads to higher dropout and less school enrolment. Lack of education, apart from many other adverse effects, affects personality development at later stage of life.
With a view to enhance enrollment, retention and attendance, as well as to improve the nutritional levels among children, the Government of India, in collaboration with State Governments is running one primary and upper-primary level school-lunch program, known as, Mid Day Meal Scheme (MDMS) in the Country for last eighteen years. Mid day meal scheme launched in 1995 with the aim of universalization of primary education by increasing enrolment, retention, attendance, and simultaneously creating a positive impact on nutrition of the children concerned. MDMS has been to a considerable extent successful in containing abject hunger among children of age group 6-14. Dreze and Goel (2003) have termed the initiative as nutritionist’s dream, as the initiative has potential to tackle illnesses due to protein or micronutrient deficiencies. Anyway, Dreze and Goel (2003)opined that MDM scheme has potential beyond containing classroom hunger, and its scope of imparting nutrition education and personal hygiene are yet to be explored. According to them, MDMS can be visualized from three distinct perspectives: educational achievements, nutritional advancements and social equity.
Present Study:
With a view to understand the operational and outcome issues related to MDMS, an evaluation study was conducted along coal mine dominated rural areas of Asansol subdivision, West Bengal, during January - May, 2014. In this study, from 37 primary schools and SSKs, 370 students (Exactly half being girls; and 41%, 24%, 12% and 8% of sample students belonged to SC, ST, OBC and minority categories respectively) and equal number of parents (50% were women; representation of SC, ST, minority and OBC categories were respectively 48%, 19%, 10% and 7%); as well as 37 teacher-in-charges of MDMS and 37 cooks were interacted. Evaluation system, if any, in respect of human capital status was also explored in this study.
MDMS and social equity
Many researchers have found that implementation of MDMS has narrowed down social distances in terms of caste, class and gender through sharing a common meal, at a common place and cooked by a common cook, who often belongs to the so called backward or dalit classes. This has directly impacted positively the enrolment, retention and attendance of the socially disadvantaged children. MDMS has also enabled parents of the weaker sections to participate in the process to a considerable extent. Dreze and Kingdon (2001) found that the provision of MDM has halved the proportion of girls excluded from schooling system. They figured out that MDMS has been meaningful to overcome social barriers and class prejudices prevalent in Indian society. Moreover, by facilitating to sit together to share a common meal irrespective of caste, gender and economic background, i.e., by instilling the feeling of sharing and togetherness at the budding age, the evils of feudal social norms have been successfully minimized without any so-called mass movement. In the present study it was observed that, 96% of the parents encourage their children to take MDM in schools, however, parents from general category and higher income group constitute a significant chunk of those who do not allow their children to take MDM. More than two third of the parents opined that, MDM has contributed to get children more sociable. It was observed that, 94% of the students take MDM, while 91% take it on regular basis, and 92% eat whatever they are offered. It was informed by 84% of the institutes that more than 90% students are taking MDM in schools, while 89% reported that the students eat together. Similar trend has been reported for Tamil Nadu, where it has been noticed that MDM has been effective to overcome class and caste feeling among children (Khera, 2006). Also, Garg and Mandal (2013) have noticed that MDM intervention has positively influenced the participation of girl children both in terms of enrolment and attendance following 2005. i.e., after introduction of cooked MDM. Afridi (2006) further noticed that the socialization benefits of MDMS have been proved to be substantial, although there happens to be other side of the coin. Two distinct forms of caste discriminations have been reported in respect of MDMS. First one being discrimination against children on the basis of their caste or religion; and discrimination against cooks being the rest one. However, in the present study, it was observed that majority (84%) of the cooks belong to either of SC (49%), ST (22%), minority (8%) and OBC (5%) categories. Moreover, in one of the wildest attempt to discriminate school children on the basis of caste, plates were labeled with the initial of the children’s cast in Bihar. In Rajasthan, children from dalit communities had no right to water themselves, wherein children from other communities had. Also, Afridi (2006) makes an important observation that, a section of parents is dissatisfied with MDMS, as they feel that this initiative necessitates intermingling of children from different castes.
MDMS and education quality
Poverty leaves little alternative but to utilise the manual labour of children to supplement the household economy to ensure minimum sustenance. As older boys and girls are meaningful in labour market, drop out at those stages is quite common in poverty stricken regions. Ramchandran et. al. (2000) underlined that school absentism is an outcome of poor economic condition of parents. Shiv Kumar (2003) indicates that the problem of child labour has its origin in economic as well as food insecurity of households; and therefore enrolment of children belonging to SCs and STs has increased following implementation of MDMS. Parents of such financially disadvantaged households rate MDMS as an incentive, and therefore influential factor in relation to schooling decision of their children. As observed in the present study, 78% of the parents consider MDM to be the most important contributing factor in respect of active participation in classroom and therefore better academic performances. 94% of the teacher-in-charges consider the role of MDMS to be most influential in respect of increase in enrollment and rise in attendance level. Moreover, PROBE (1999) found that although apparently no tuition fees are charged for schooling in Government schools, parents have to incur costs towards uniform, stationery and sometimes travel. Further, there should be no room for undermining the opportunity cost of sending children to schools for such households. In this context, free meal on regular basis, acts as a direct subsidy for parents (Garg and Mandal, 2013). Studies further found that the disadvantaged parents send their children at an early age so as to become entitled for free meal earlier. And this has brought down the average enrolment age to 5-6 years from 8-10 years. However, as per the present study, one fifth of the parents, chiefly from general and higher income category, opine that implementation of MDM affect teaching adversely.
MDMS and nutrition
Garg and Mandal (2013) made an interesting observation that, in ST children, nutritional intake is more on a school day than in a holiday. For all other social strata including SC, OBC and General, the scenario is opposite. Though, in SC students, the gap between the two is extremely low. Another major issue is: whether MDM is a substitute or supplement for home food. Garg and Mandal (2013) have found that for the poorest households, MDM is a better substitute of home meal in terms of nutritional content. In the current study, as much as 74% of the students reported to eat before coming to school, yet 62% do not eat after reaching home from school, before dinner; while 73% ask for a second serving. Nevertheless, in case MDM acts as substitute, there remains chance of negative nutritional impact, if it is of suboptimum in terms of quality or quantity. Some studies reflect that the quantity of food offered by schools under MDMS does not meet the norms prescribed by the Supreme Court (Khera, 2006). Further, the nutritional need differential among students across classes in Primary section has not been taken into account while fixing the quantity norms across classes. 26% of the parents, interacted during the present study, irrespective of socio economic strata, do not consider MDM as substitute for home made food. Although, a good majority (62%) of them feel that the intervention has resulted into weight gain of their children, while almost one third of the parents are dissatisfied with the quality of MDM and do not consider it to be nutritious. No systematic arrangement however was noticed in institutes to make any empirical inference about health-impact of MDMS. The research team found that the appearance of food cooked under MDMS was good only in 27% of the cases observed, while it was found to have good taste and good smell in only 18% of the institutes. As far as menu preference is concerned, 65% of the students were found to like either of egg, chicken, posto[1] or soybean; and 57% dislike anything among brinjal, cauliflower, papaya, pumpkin, soybean and radish. Only 3% of the students were observed to bring lunchbox to school; while, only 13% of the students have ever been asked about their choices of menu by the school authorities.
Evaluation of MDMS in respect of human capital formation
In the current study, frequency of monitoring was found to be only once annually in 41% of the institutes, while quarterly in 43% of the cases. In 82% of the institutes an inspection book was noticed. Moreover, only 67% of the institutes have arrangement to display vital MDMS related information on public domain. Anyway, it was found that empirical evaluation mechanism of human capital status (achievements in terms of health and education) is outdated, and do not provide any real time as well as specific information about important parameters of health and education, be at level of individual or collective. However, it was argued in the working group report on elementary education and literacy for the 12th five year plan (2011), that under MDMS, children should be regularly weighed and height should be measured for identification followed by counseling of the weaker ones. The report apart from recommending material support to carry out such measures; advocates for school health card and incorporation of the same within academic progress report to assess progress of an individual both in terms of selected health-indicators and education through a common report. Keeping in view the interrelation among education, employability and poverty; and absence of any formal instrument to gauze human capital status of individual children, this recommendation may serve as a pointer. In context of no-detention till class VIII level, the moot issue appears to be: how much correction or improvement of human capital is possible if deficiencies are detected at an age of fifteen years or more; i.e., during or after class IX level. In 60th Central Advisory Board of Education (CABE) meeting[2] held on 8th November, 2012 in New Delhi, Arun Kapur, Member CABE & Director, Vasant Valley Foundation indicated that “society is becoming over-schooled yet under-educated, so emphasis on quality is also crucial.”
Recommendation: Evaluation of ‘National Human Capital Status’ through ‘Student Specific Health cum Academic Performance Record’ & HCI
It has been felt that there should be some smart evaluation mechanism to periodically assess the status of outcome in terms of human-capital. This study recommends use of ‘Student specific health cum academic performance record’ to capture micro-data related to health, education and employability of individual students quarterly. Periodic evaluation of students from Class I onwards, by some reputed independent agency, having close industry interface, may be put in place to ensure proper and market linked evaluation of individual students. Such mechanism is likely to have the sole motto of detecting human capital status from an age of five years, so that issues related to employability are properly taken care of. The said card would reflect individual and collective status on body mass index, parasitic loads, eye-sight, gender sensitivity, hygiene-awareness, academic performance, computer proficiency, communication ability, in particular. Further, separate score card for institutes may be devised to assess the institution-level preparedness in terms of evaluation of student specific parameters pertaining to human capital.