West Bengal performs above national average across all classes in National Achievement Survey 2021

For class VIII, it was 44.6 per cent for West Bengal compared to 41.9 per cent national average. And for class X, it was 38 per cent for the state and 37.8 per cent for the national average.

NAS was conducted on November 12 last year in which 3,110 schools; 14,959 teachers and 98,694 students took part. Out of total schools that took part, 49 per cent was state government schools, 37 per cent were private schools, 10 per cent were central government schools and 3 per cent were government-aided schools.

Out of the total students, 52.9 per cent were girls and 47.1 per cent were boys. While 70 per cent of the participants were from rural areas, 30 per cent were from urban area. While 52.4 per cent were from general category, 20.9 per cent were from OBC, 19.1 per cent were from SC and 7.5 were from the ST categories.

In terms of performance, West Bengal performed better in every subject. In Language subjects, the state average was 61 per cent while the national average was 57 per cent. In Mathematics, the state average was 43 per cent compared to the national average of 42 per cent. In EVS, the state average was 57 per cent while the national average was 53 per cent. In Science, the state average was 39 per cent while the national average was 37 per cent. Even the gender-wise performance of the students in West Bengal was also better than the national average.

In terms of performance by location, students in the urban areas performed better than their counterparts in the rural area.

The purpose of the NAS is to gauge the health of the school education system and assess learning outcomes in students by conducting an evaluation of their learning competency at Class III, V, VIII and X. The NAS was last held in 2017.

According to the NAS results, the state also fared better than the national average in learning outcomes parameters. For example, in the Language subject, the state average of class III students was 64 per cent compared to the national average of 58 per cent under the ‘Reads printed scripts on the classroom walls: poems, posters, charts etc.’ section.

Under the ‘Reads text with comprehension, locates details and sequence of events’ section for class V students, the state average is 59 per cent compared to the national average of 55 per cent. Under the ‘Read textual/non-textual materials with comprehension and identify the details, characters, main idea and sequence of ideas and events while reading’ section for class VIII students, the state average was 57 per cent compared to the national average of 53 per cent.

In terms of districts, students in North 24 Parganas, Murshidabad, Jhargram, Kolkata and Purbo Medinipur performed better than their counterparts in rest of the state. On the other hand, students in Uttar Dinajpur, Dakshin Dinajpur and Jalpaiguri performed the worst.

The survey also showed that the learning outcome drops rapidly as the age of the student advances. The NAS survey also recorded responses from students, teachers and headmasters on the facilities available in schools, hurdles during learning, resources available during the pandemic and etc.