CHENNAI: The school education department will soon conduct an impact assessment survey of the Illam Thedi Kalvi (ITK) scheme, an initiative that was touted as the largest volunteer-based door-to-door education programme to bridge the learning g ap caused due to the pandemic.
The department has invited tenders from private firms to conduct the assessment. ITK has more than two lakh volunteers in two lakh centres across 92,000 habitations of the State. Volunteers impart daily lessons for Classes 1 to 8 in Tamil, English, Maths, Science, Social Science and Environmental Studies after school for 1.5 hours (between 5 pm and 7 pm).
Improvement in learning outcomes of the students and factors behind the participation of volunteers will be assessed. Students’ progress and learning competencies in Tamil, Maths and English in Classes 3, 5 and 8 and improvement in their reading and writing skills will be assessed, apart from the initiative’s impact on the existing school systems in terms of retention, absenteeism, enrolment and others.
For assessing the learning outcomes, National Achievement Survey 2021 will be taken as the baseline data. The department will also study and document the perceptions of the volunteer community and parents’ engagement and empowerment, specifically for women volunteers. It will be conducted for a period of eight months from October 2022 to April 2023.
School education officials working for the scheme said that the impact assessment is being done to ensure that the drawbacks of the scheme are corrected and the scheme is continued. “The scheme will be continued to ensure supplemental education is provided to the students,” said an official.
However, several teachers opined that the scheme has become irrelevant as regular classes resumed. “It is difficult to maintain the momentum of the volunteer-based training programmes and the government should instead take steps to improve the quality of education provided in schools. It is also unnecessary to teach the students the same subject again for another 90 minutes,” said a government school teacher, on condition of anonymity.