NEW DELHI: Under the Samagra Shiksha Abhiyan (SSA), the education department of the Delhi government has launched a survey to identify ‘out-of-school children’ (OoSC) between the ages of 6 and 14 years for enrolling them in the schools.
The details of the children who have either dropped out or were never enrolled in the schools will be collected during the exercise.
For the purpose, the department has set up 235 teams for all 13 districts. The survey will continue till January 15 for which teachers of Special Training Centres (STCs) running for OoSC and Cluster Resource Centre Coordinators (CRCCs) hired under SSA have been roped in.
Officials aware of the development said that as online classes being held by STCs are suspended during winter break, it had been decided to collect numbers and information about OoSC. “Under Samagra Shiksha Scheme, teaching and learning are being conducted through online classes and the schools are closed due to the present pandemic situation of COVID-19.
The online classes will remain suspended during winter break till January 15. The survey will be conducted for identification of Out of School Children for enrolling them in nearby schools for education. The survey teams will report their daily survey records to the concerned District Urban Resource Centre Coordinators (DURCCs) and the same record will be mailed to STC Cell at Samagra Shiksha, Headquarters daily by 5 pm,” said an official.
The survey has already begun from Monday. Given the density of population and potential presence of ‘out-of-school-children’, the number of teams formed for each district.
The national capital is divided into 13 districts for administrative purposes.
The northeast district has the highest number of survey teams (28) while the New Delhi district has only two.
In a similar survey conducted in 2019, 11,306 out-of-school children between the ages of 6 and were identified. The highest number of out-of-school children (1,981) was recorded in Northwest A district in which several slum clusters and resettlement colonies — Jahangirpuri, Bawana, Bhalswa, Azadpur, Narela and Holambi Kalan—fall.
Other districts, where the presence of a significant number of OoSC was identified were Northeast, Southeast and South districts. The fresh survey is being conducted under supervision of district project offices (DPOs) or DURCCs.