National Achievement Survey (NAS)

In News: The Ministry of Education released its National Achievement Survey (NAS) 2021 report

• The objective of NAS 2021 is to evaluate children’s progress and learning competencies as an indicator of the efficiency of the education system, so as to take appropriate steps for remedial actions at different levels
• The survey assesses the health of the school education system in the country through a survey of children’s learning competencies at Classes 3, 5, 8 and 10.
• The survey is conducted every three years, and the last one was held in 2017.
• Nearly 34 lakh students of 1.18 lakh schools in 720 districts from government, government-aided and private-unaided schools participated in the exercise.
• The survey was conducted via an OMR (optical mark recognition)-based achievement test comprising multiple-choice questions along with questionnaires in 22 different languages.
• This nationwide survey was administered by the Central Board of Secondary Education in one single day at the same time.

Key Findings

• A DEEP learning crisis has set in during the Covid pandemic; there is fall of up to nine percentage points between 2017 and 2021 in the performance of students in subjects ranging from maths to social sciences
• The dip has happened across subjects, and grades.
• It is also found that as many as 24 per cent of the students surveyed did not have access to digital devices at home, 38 per cent said they faced difficulty carrying out learning activities at home during the pandemic, while 80 per cent said they learn better at school with the help of peers.
• It found that out of a score of 500, students across various classes performed better in languages but lagged behind in subjects like mathematics and science.
• It also shows that across various subjects and classes, SC, ST and OBC students performed worse than general category students.
• For instance, while general category students in Class 8 scored an average of 260 marks in mathematics, SC students scored 249 marks, ST scored 244 marks and OBCs scored 253 marks.

Previous Year Questions (PYQs)

Q.1) As per the NSSO 70th Round “Situation Assessment Survey of Agricultural Households”, consider the following statements (2018)

1. Rajasthan has the highest percentage share of agricultural households among its rural households.
2. Out of the total agricultural households in the country, a little over 60 percent belong to OBCs.
3. In Kerala, a little over 60 percent of agricultural households reported to have received maximum income from sources other than agricultural activities.

Which of the statements given above is/are correct?

1. 2 and 3 only
2. 2 only
3. 1 and 3 only
4. 1, 2 and 3

Source: The Hindu & Indian Express