Evaluating ASER 2024: From Covid-19 to 2024, and from crisis to classroom revival

During Covid-19, in a village in Rajasthan, eight-year-old Anjali sat in her dimly-lit home, struggling to recall the alphabet and numbers. Her father, a labourer, could not afford a smartphone for online classes. School gates remained shut, and Anjali’s reading and arithmetic skills faded. When schools reopened, she found herself unable to keep up.

Anjali’s struggle mirrors the fate of millions of children who faced severe learning setbacks due to school closures. But the latest Annual Status of Education Report (ASER) 2024 paints a picture of resilience and gradual recovery in India’s education system.

A crisis unfoldedSchool closures during the pandemic had a humongous impact on children’s foundational learning, especially where digital access was scarce. By 2022, the learning deficit was clear. ASER 2022 counted only 16.3% of Std III government school children able to read Std II level text – considerably low compared to pre-pandemic levels (20.9% in 2018). Opposite to reading, numbers too were affected: the basic subtraction skill in young children was on a downward trend. Only 20.2% of Std III students in government schools learned at least subtraction in 2022 versus 20.9% in 2018. Enrolment patterns shifted, with many children dropping out.