Policymakers claim that the benefits households gain from educating their children to primary level are great. But if so, why do so many poor Indian households not take advantage of state schooling? When children from poor households do enrol, they often perform badly, attend irregularly or drop out altogether. Class, caste and gender also help determine which children get sent to school, and which will continue through the system. If Universal Primary Education is to become a reality in India, knowledge on how poor households make schooling decisions is crucial. Education systems should be designed in ways that spur attendance by disadvantaged groups.

The debate about primary education often revolves around getting children enrolled in school. But new evidence from an Open University research study suggests that the decision to send children to school or not is often a fluid one, because of uncertain economic conditions - it is not a one-off decision, and children may be withdrawn from school in response to changing family circumstances. Boys and girls are valued differently, and may have very different roles in the household: this, too, plays a part in decisions on which child (if any) to send to school. The study examined schooling decisions made by households in a poor district of rural Karnataka, India. It found that even though parents are more enthusiastic about enrolling their children, their attendance records were poor. The poorer agricultural households had the worst attendance records, particularly during the migration and harvest seasons. Factors influencing whether children went to school regularly were found to include:

• children's household work: other household members could substitute for children's household work, but while girls could do 'boys' work' like helping in the fields, boys were not expected to do 'girls' work' like household chores
• children's attitudes to school: some simply refuse to go, through fear of teachers or lack of interest, despite parental encouragement
• parent's attitudes: for some parents, education meant a way out of agriculture, others felt that education made children unfit as farmers. Girls are usually married young so that educating them beyond puberty was often (but not always) seen as not worth it, or a risk because of social hostility.

Understanding influences on school attendance gives rise to a number of suggestions for policymakers:

• In areas prone to economic insecurity, school schedules need to be less rigid to allow children to participate and perform their household chores.
• Migration season takes children away from school because parents have no reliable alternative for their care. Arrangements could be made to look after them in this season.
• One solution to parents' presumed lack of interest in education has been to promote community-based organisations. But poorer households even if represented in local bodies, are often disempowered when it comes to participation. Thus care needs to be taken to ensure that such organizations are not dominated by local elites.
• Promoting girls' education requires that perceptions of 'social risk' that reduce girls' attendance and real fears of violence are explicitly addressed through the education process

Source(s):
"If You Build it, Will They Come?" Educational Decision-making in the Context of Economic Uncertainty and Social Risk. IDS Bulletin, 28(3), 1997, 101-111 (R. Subrahmanian, 1997)

Funded by: OU Research Development Committee1995-1998

id21 Research Highlight: 1998-Mar-24

Further Information:
R. Subrahmanian
Development Policy and Practice
Faculty of Technology
The Open University
Walton Hall
Milton Keynes
MK7 6AA
UK

Tel: +44 (0) 1908 274066
Fax: +44 (0) 1908 858581
Contact the contributor: r.subrahmanian@open.ac.uk

The Open University, UK