Adivasi - v50_No.1-2

Abstract

There are many impediments to the spread of tribal education particularly to the education of tribal females. The time has come to look at the situation of educational development and see how the objectives of the constitution, National Policy and Planning in this regard has been realized and asses if the achievements commensurate with the quantum of investments made so far and find out the constraints and impediments in this regard. A large number of Educational Institutions and Infrastructure numbering 1599 have been created and being created across the length and breadth of Odisha state for promotion of education among STs and SCs and by now there are 319 High Schools including 8 Higher Secondary Schools are functioning under of ST & SC Development Department besides several others for higher learning. Yet, the literacy rate of the Scheduled Tribes in the State has improved from 7.36 % in 1961 to 37.37 % in 2001. As regards the ST females the situation is not very encouraging as it has come up from only 1.77% to 23.37% between 1961 to 2001.

This Institute (SCSTRTI) has undertaken several empirical studies, conducted seminars and workshops at different points of time to diagnose the situation and submitted reports to Government suggesting remedies. In this Special Issue of Adivasi which is dedicated to the theme "Education for Tribes of Odisha we are presenting two of our reports based on two such empirical studies conducted between two decades i.e in the year 1999 and 2009 captioned as Study of Dropouts among Tribal Children and A Diagnostic Study on The Low Performing Schools of ST & SC Development (SSD) Department respectively. It gives a comparative picture of the state of tribal education in Odisha then and now. Both the reports are based upon case studies of 12 High Schools, both boys and girls schools (2 in one district in 1999 and 10 in five districts in 2009) running under ST & SC Development (SSD) Department and located in relatively backward and tribal dominated Tribal Sub Plan area of Southern Odisha.While the first study analyses the causes and impacts of school dropouts. the second one identifies the factors responsible for low performance of tribal school children. I hope interested readers will find these studies useful.