CONCEPT PAPER ON MONITORING AND SUPERVISION UNDER SSA

Copy Right: Department of Elementary Education and Literacy: MHRD, Government of India

 

            Sarva Shiksha Abhiyan (SSA), the first national programme for universalization of elementary education covering the entire country, was launched in 2001with the following goals:

·         All children in school, Education Guarantee Centre, Alternate School, ' Back-to-School' camp by 2003;

·         All children complete five years of primary schooling by 2007

·         All children complete eight years of elementary schooling by 2010

·         Focus on elementary education of satisfactory quality with emphasis on education for life

·         Bridge all gender and social category gaps at primary stage by 2007 and at elementary education level by 2010

·         Universal retention by 2010

2.         Under the programme, the Districts are expected to carry out a realistic assessment of the elementary educational scenario in the district, the reforms required to improve the efficiency of delivery of education, the total requirement of facilities/interventions and the fund requirement for the same. These District Elementary Educational Plans (DEEPS) are expected to be based on habitation level plans prepared by a similar process by each habitation. Based on these plans funds are released to the States to support permitted interventions under SSA. SSA supports a number of interventions in the elementary education sector such as opening of new schools, appointment of additional teachers, teaching learning equipment for the new schools, school grant, maintenance grant, research grant, teacher training, teacher grant, setting up of resource centres, civil works, etc. These plans are appraised by a team consisting of representatives of Government of India and finally approved by the Project Approval Board headed by Secretary (EE &L), Government of India.

3.         The emphasis in the initial years was on preparation of plans and their appraisal and accordingly both the perspective plans and the annual plans have been approved for districts across the country. While the perspective plan is approved at the beginning of the programme, annual plans are prepared and approved every year. With the annual plans of 2001-02 and 2002-03 having been approved in most of the States/UTs, the emphasis needs to shift to proper monitoring and supervision of the implementation going on in the field. Monitoring has to be a continuous process with both the project implementation and outcome indicators required to be monitored on a regular basis. Further, SSA envisages two supervision missions every year, in which a team goes to the districts and gets a first hand knowledge on the status of actual implementation of the programme.

4.         Monitoring under the programme is envisaged as a three tiered one: monitoring at the local community level, at the State level and the National level. Community based monitoring is one of the strengths of the programme. And if not done properly, leads to a major weakness in the entire implementation. The community, through its representative institutions like Village Education Committees, has been entrusted with the primary level of ensuring that the schools are functioning effectively. Most of the qualitative impressions on the school functioning can be effectively monitored only at local level and are difficult to capture either at the State level or the National level. For monitoring the qualitative aspect from the national level, reliance may have to be placed more on assessing the effectiveness of community-based monitoring at the local level and ensuring that this system is functioning properly. In addition at the State and National level, monitoring would focus more on the quantitative aspect of both the status of the implementation of the project and the progress made towards the achievement of the SSA goals.

5.         To capture quantitative data towards these two objectives, two kinds of information systems have been developed. One is the Educational Management Information System (EMIS) under which school level data is collected every year with September 30th as the record date. These would enable measuring of a number of indicators like enrolment, Gross Enrolment Ratio, Net Enrolment Ratio, Retention Rate, Drop-out Rate, Completion Rate, Repetition Rate, Transition Rate, etc. Coupled with the data available from household survey, which has been conducted in every district at the beginning of the programme, the data is also expected to throw light on out-of-school children, etc. The second information system being developed is the Project Management Information Systems (PMIS), in which the emphasis would be on to record the progress made, both in physical as well as financial terms, towards the implementation of the perspective plans and annual plans as sanctioned by the Project Approval Board. Any monitoring system would have to assess the correctness and promptness of data being sent under the two MISs.

6.         While continuous monitoring would be an ongoing process, this would be supplemented through sending of two supervision missions every year to the States. The supervision missions would have representatives of Government of India and funding agency (if any). The supervision missions would be expected to visit individual States and look first hand at the implementation of the programme through visit to select districts of the State. The approach would be a holistic one with emphasis on assessing both the quantitative and qualitative aspects of the implementation of the programme. The Missions are expected also to flag the areas of concern, both in the programme implementation and also in the general educational scenario in the State. These areas of concern would be also one of the foci of monitoring till these are assessed to be suitably rectified by a future supervision mission.

7.         As it is seen, the task of monitoring and supervision is a mammoth one requiring considerable effort on a continuous basis. It is felt that, instead of carrying out this centrally and having a large establishment for this purpose, it would be more fruitful to involve professional institutions in this task. These institutions would be allocated individual states with whom they will develop long-term partnerships. They would not only carry out the task of supervision and monitoring but also act as partners of the States in the implementation of the programme. Accordingly, a list of institutions needs to be identified for individual States. Following principles may be followed in selecting the institutions:

i)                    States with 25 districts or less may have a single institution attached to them. States having more than 25 and upto 50 districts may have two institutions attached and States having more than 50 districts may have three institutions attached to them. Some States may have an additional institution attached to them if it is felt necessary due to problems peculiar to the State. Thus, while UP will have three institutions, Bihar, Karnataka, MP, Maharashtra, Orissa, Rajasthan and TN would be having two institutions each. Other States and UT of Delhi would have one institution each. Other UTs, except Delhi, need not have separate institutions and the institutions attached to neighbouring States may also be attached to the UT. For States having more than two institutions attached to them, one of the institutions would be made the lead institution, which would be primarily responsible for collating data for the entire State and computing various indicators for the purpose.

ii)                   While arriving at a pool of institutions, Central Universities, ICSSR institutions, University Departments of Education and other professional institutions having expertise in this areas may be relied on. The emphasis would be on the institution having a competent and committed set of personnel oriented towards carrying out similar work in the social sector.

8.         As far as monitoring is concerned, the selected institution(s) would be expected to carry out the following tasks, on a quarterly basis:

i)                    Get reports on the implementation of the approved plan every quarter and send a consolidated report to GOI/ State Government.

ii)                   Get reports on progress made in achievement of some key outcome indicators like enrolment, out-of-school children, access to accessless habitations, etc. every quarter and send a consolidated report to GOI/ State Government.

iii)                 Make a quarterly visit to select districts and make an assessment of the following:

a)      Effectiveness of community level monitoring and functioning of local level institutions such as VEC/SMC/PTA at the village level and BLEC/BRC/CRC at the Block/Cluster level.

b)      Reliability of data being sent under PMIS and EMIS as verified through test checks.

c)      The functioning of the EMIS so as to ensure that the EMIS data is collected on the record date of 30th September and report sent to the State level within a month’s time.

d)      Progress made on areas of concern highlighted by the supervision missions.

iv)                 For the quarter ending 31st March 2002, an assessment would have to be given both for the quarter and the entire year. For other quarters, assessment upto the year along with the quarterly report needs to be given.

v)                  At the end of the year to calculate the specified monitoring indicators of SSA such as GER, NER, out-of-school children, drop-out rate, completion Rate, transition rate, repetition rate, etc.

vi)                 In case of States having two or more institutions attached, it would be the responsibility of the lead institution to consolidate the reports at the State level and arrive at the entire picture in the State on all the parameters listed above. The other institutions attached to the State would send reports not only to the GOI/ State Government but also the lead institution of the State.

9.         As already stated, the institutions would also be expected to launch two supervision missions per year in the months of September-October and April-May. The team (for States with single institution attached) may be a three-member team - two from the institution and one from panel of experts prepared by the GOI from different fields such as civil works, pedagogy, etc. In case of States with more than one institution attached, the lead institution would contribute two members and other institutions an additional member each to the team. In these States too there would be a member from a panel of experts provided by Government of India. Thus States with two institutions attached would have a four-member team and States with three institutions would have a five-member team. The external funding agency, if any, would also be expected to contribute a member to the Supervision Mission. After the mission, the lead institution for the State would have to give a report and present it at a wrap-up meeting at Delhi.

10.        Apart from the above activities, the institutions would also be expected to carry out/coordinate research studies pertaining to the areas of concern in the States. Some of the issues requiring studies may be community mobilization, involvement of VECs/PTAs/MTAs, teacher absenteeism, classroom processes, etc. These studies would be expected to find the reasons for some of the problems encountered in the field and suggest solutions to tackle the same. They may also be in nature of evaluation or impact studies to study the effectiveness of any specific intervention

11.        At the national level the coordination of the institutions would be done by the national institutions like NIEPA and NCERT. The division of activity between NCERT and NIEPA would be functional rather than spatial. The quality aspects would be looked after by NCERT, while other parameters would be the responsibility of NIEPA.. Certain quality related formats, would be evolved in the national meet, in association with NCERT. Capacity building of institutions on this aspect would be done by NCERT in the regional workshops being organized by NIEPA in January-February. The reporting by institutions for these formats would be to NCERT, who would analyse the same to give the state and national picture. Reporting for all other formats would be to NIEPA who would analyse the same to give the state and National level picture. In addition a copy of the entire report should also be send to Ed Cil where it would be maintained for reporting purposes. While this would give a centralised system of monitoring the performance of the institutions, there needs to be one central agency to combine the data received from the States to arrive at a common national level picture. NIEPA would be the designated nodal agency for this task and would liase with NCERT to get details from all the States.

12.        To make the above system operational, initially a tripartite MOU would be signed between the GOI, State Government and the institution. In case of ICSSR institutions, there would also be a separate MOU between the GOI and ICSSR, along with the tripartite agreement with the specific ICSSR institution. This would be followed by five workshops by NCERT & NIEPA in the Northern, Eastern, Southern, Western and North-eastern regions with the institutions and the State Governments. These are likely to be completed by January 2003. These workshops would, apart from exposing the institutions to the programme, would also delineate the specific roles of various partners to the agreement. The payment to the institutions would be on the basis of the mandays employed, as indicated in Annex 'A' and 'B' for monitoring and supervision, respectively. Apart from the payment for mandays, additional payment would be there for the overheads (as fixed percentage of the total outgo on mandays) and an initial payment to the institution for developing infrastructure (as given in Annex 'C'). The travel cost to Delhi/ State would be based on the actuals, a rough estimate being given in Annex ‘D’. The local travel and hospitality would be borne by the State Implementation Society. Similarly, payment may be given to NCERT and NIEPA for the central role to be played by them. The details are given in Annex 'E'. The total cost would come to Rs 61 lakhs non-recurring and Rs 86.34 lakhs recurring per annum, as shown in Annex ‘F’. These costs would be firmed up at the time of signing of the MOU. Costing of any specific study commissioned separately would be on a case-to-case basis and would be decided at the time of commissioning of the study. The entire monitoring and supervision mechanism should become operational by April 1 2003, with the first report for the Year 2002-03.


Annex ‘C’

Funds to institutions for infrastructure development

1.       Essential Requirements

i)                    Computer with accessories: Rs 70,000-

ii)                   Office equipment like photocopier, fax (with phone connection): Rs 50,000/-

iii)                 Others at institutions discretion: Rs 30,000/-

iv)                 Total: Rs 1.5 lakhs

2.       Total for all 38 institutions: Rs 57 lakhs

Annex 'B'

Supervision

Calculation for one mission

 

A)           Team Composition

 

The Supervision mission team (for States with single institution attached) would be a three-member team - two from the lead institution attached to the State and one from panel of experts prepared by the GOI from different fields such as civil works, pedagogy, etc. In case of States with more than one institution attached, the lead institution would contribute two members and other institutions an additional member each to the team. In these States too there would be a member from a panel of experts provided by Government of India. Thus States with two institutions attached would have a four-member team and States with three institutions would have a five-member team.

 

B)            Elements of Expenditure (mandays, etc)

 

i)                     Team leader mandays - 10 (5 full days on tour of the State and 10 part days for discussion and report writing). In case of States with two institutions, totally 12 mandays and for states with three institutions, totally 14 mandays may be required. In case of UTs with less than 5 districts, 8 mandays may be sufficient.

ii)                   Other team members: 16 mandays for States with single institutions @ 8 mandays each (5 full days for tour and 6 days part-time deskwork). In case of States with two institutions the total number of mandays will increase to 24, and in case of States with three institutions the number of mandays will be 32. In case of UTs with less than 5 districts, 14 mandays may be sufficient.

iii)                  Travel to the State: Actuals

iv)                 Travel and Stay within the State: To be borne by the State Implementation Society

v)                   Overheads: Paper, computer hours, local travel, printing charges, secretarial assistance, documentation.

 

C)            Costing

 

Costing for the above would be as follows:

 

i)                     Team leader @ Rs 1500/- per day

ii)                   Experts: @ Rs 1000/- per day (This is the approved amount for SSA and DPEP).

iii)                  Travel to the State: Actuals by air/train IInd AC (where no air link available)

iv)                 Overheads: 33% of total amount under (i) and (ii) (rounded off to nearest thousand)

 

                The total cost involved, apart from travel cost, in the above system would be Rs 15.27 lakhs as follows:

 

i)                     UTs with less than 5 districts (6 UTs):

a)       Team leader: Rs 12,000/-

b)       Experts. Rs 14,000/-

c)       Overheads: Rs 8,000/-

d)       Total for one UT: Rs 34,,000/-

e)       Total for 6 UTs: Rs 2,04,000/-

 

ii)                   States/UTs with one institution (21 States):

a)       Team leader: Rs 15,000/-

b)       Experts. Rs 16,000/-

c)       Overheads: Rs 10,000/-

d)       Total for one State: Rs 41,000/-

e)       Total for 21 States/UTs: Rs 8,61,000/-

 

iii)                  States with two institutions (7 States):

a)       Team leader: Rs 18,000/-

b)       Experts. Rs 24,000/-

c)       Overheads: Rs 14,000/-

d)       Total for one State: Rs 56,000/-

e)       Total for 7 States: Rs 3,92,000/-

 

iv)                 States with three institutions (one State):

a)       Team leader: Rs 21,000/-

b)       Experts. Rs 32,000/-

c)       Overheads: Rs 17,000/-

d)       Total for one State: Rs 70,000/-

 

v) Total for one mission: Rs 15.27 lakhs (excluding travel cost to the State/Delhi which would depend on the actuals and travel & hospitality in the State which would be borne by the State Society)

 

Total cost for two missions in a year:

 

Total cost of two missions as per norms above =Rs 30.54 lakhs  (excluding travel cost to the State/Delhi which would depend on the actuals and travel & hospitality in the State which would be borne by the State Society)

Annex 'A'

Monitoring

 

The costing of monitoring would be in two parts:

i) Collection of data and its processing

Since each district data would have to be processed separately, each district would have certain costs. Hence the costing for an institution would depend on the number of districts attached to the institution. The approximate cost per district per quarter would be as follows:

a)       No. of mandays at office: 0.5 per district (1 part day)

b)       Cost of above mandays at Rs 1000/- per month: Rs 500/-

c)       Overheads (at 50% of above amount)= Rs 250/-

We may fix an amount of Rs 750/- per district per quarter for the monitoring. So the entire cost per annum would be as follows:

a)       Cost per district  = Rs 750/- per quarter for four quarters = Rs 3000 per district per annum

b)       Total cost for 598 districts = Rs 17.94 lakhs

ii) Verification of data: One visit per quarter by a two-member team. Costing would be as follows:

a)       No. of mandays per institution per quarter: 12 (6 field days plus 12 part days for desk work)

b)       Cost of above mandays at Rs 1000/- per month: Rs 12000/-

c)       Overheads (33% of above): Rs 4000/-

d)       Total per institution per year: Rs 64000/-

e)       Total for 38 institutions: Rs 24.32 lakhs

iii) Additional remuneration to lead institution @ Rs 10000/- per state for 35 States: Rs 3.5 lakhs

iii) Total for monitoring = (i)+(ii)+(iii) = Rs 45.76 lakhs (excluding travel cost to the State/Delhi which would depend on the actuals and travel & hospitality in the State which would be borne by the State Society)

Annex ‘E’

Assistance to National Institutions

1.                   Elements of Expenditure

i)                    Two research fellows @ one research fellow each @ Rs 12000/- per month: Rs 2.88 lakhs

ii)                   Overheads @ 33% of above: Rs 96000/-

iii)                 One time infrastructure (computers, fax, photocopy) @ Rs 2.0 lakh each: Rs 4 lakhs

iv)                 Addl assistance to NIEPA for part time research work in its role as the nodal agency @ Rs 10000/- per quarter: Rs 40000/-

2.                   Total

Recurring: Rs 4.24 lakhs per annum

Non-recurring: Rs 4 lakhs

Annex ‘D’

Travel cost on GOI account

            Since the selected institutes are generally located in the States, the cost for internal travel would be borne by the State Implementation Society. Only cost involved would be that to Delhi for the team leader at the end of two supervision missions. Taking an average cost of Rs 10000/- per mission (the cost would average out for near and far States), the total cost for two missions for 29 lead institutions (for 6 UTs it would be one of these institutions only who would be associated and so no extra travel cost would be there) would be Rs 5.8 lakhs per annum.

Annex ‘F’

Total Cost on GOI account

Non-Recurring

1.                    Monitoring institutions: Rs 57 lakhs

2.           National Institutions: Rs 4 lakhs

3.           Total: Rs 61 lakhs

Recurring (per annum)

1.                   Monitoring:        45.76

2.                   Supervision:       30.54

3.                   National Institutions:      4.24

4.                   Travel on GOI account  5.8

5.                   Total:  Rs 86.34 lakhs

 
 
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