Education System in Nepal: Focusing towards EFA/MDG goals

- By Narayan Krishna
Shrestha

Country Context

Nepal is a land-linked country surrounded by India in the east, west, and

south and by China in the north. It has 147,181 square kilometers of its
area and is situated between 26o 22' to 30o 27' north latitude and
between 80o 4' and 88o 12' east longitude. It is characterized by significant
geographical and social diversity. The recent population is estimated as
27 million, which comes from about 101 cast/ethnicity groups and speak
92 language and dialects (CBS 2001). There are three distinct echo zones:
the mountains, the hills and the terai plains – running north to the south
and five east-to-west development regions. The population is not
distributed evenly based on the ecological zones. For example, the
mountain areas covers about 35 percent of land, but only about 7.5
percent of people live in the terai but the area covered in terai is about 23
percent (CBS 2004). Nepali language is considered as an official language.
However, each language spoken all over the country has been renowned
as national language.

After a decade long internal conflict and insurgency, people's moment-2

has brought a significant political and social transformation through a
peace process in the country. By the result, Nepal has been declared as
the federal democratic republic. The Interim Constitution-2006 has been
issued ensuring inclusive participation of all sectors in the society. With
this transition, Nepal is at the verge of being transformed from a
constitutional monarchy to a republic state. During this transformation
process, keeping in view people's aspirations and spirit for a republic
nation, the elected Constituent Assembly Members now are drafting a
new constitution to build a New Nepal. At the same time, as per the
interim constitution, Constituent Assembly is functioning as an interim
parliament in which executive prime minister as president as the head of
the state are elected by the parliament.

There is a high aspiration from the ongoing political transformation for

social change towards greater inclusion of marginalized and excluded
section the society. There is a great hope that this aspiration for greater
inclusion will be reflected in the new constitution by focusing in
developing a federal structure with decentralized framework (GoN 2007).
Educational Context

Modern education in Nepal began with the establishment of the first

school in 1853 AD by the name of durvar High School. However, there
was no access of education in this school for the general people. This was
only for the members of the ruling families and their courtiers. Schooling
for the general people began only after 1951 AD when a popular moment
ended the autocratic Rana regime and initiated a democratic system. In
the past fifty years, there has been a dramatic expansion of educational
facilities in the country. As a result, a number of educational institutions
have been established throughout the country and educational access to
all people has been increased dramatically.

Beginning from 321 schools and two colleges with about ten thousands
students in 1951, there are now 31,156 schools, 1,976 higher secondary
schools, 781 colleges five universities and two academies (NAMS and
BPKHS) of higher studies (MoE 2009). More than 8 million students are
enrolled in those schools that are served by about 300 thousand teachers
(DoE, 2009). Adult literacy 15+ of the country was reported to be 54.1%
(out of it, female: 42.8% and male 65.5%) and 6+ years' 62% (at the end
of 10th FYP-200708).

The interim constitution of Nepal has ensured education as a right-based

approach. So, Nepal has adopted the policy of free and compulsory basic
education ensuring equitable access to all of the children. Nepal has
made its commitment implement the World Declaration in Education for
all and attain the Millennium Development Goal by 2015.

Structure of Education

Basically, education in Nepal has been splited into two major blocks,
namely school education and tertiary education. Under the school
education, there are four segments, such as primary – grade 1-5, lower
secondary – grade 6-8, secondary – grade 9-10 and higher secondary –
grade 11-12. Before entering into the formal schooling children have an
opportunity of a 2-year of early education or pre-primary classes.

Recently Nepal has initiated a single and integrated approach to school

education to ensure the equitable access to, quality and relevancy and
social inclusion in education. It is termed as School Sector Reform (SSR),
which introduces school education as two major sub-sectors namely –
basic and secondary. Basic level comprises of grade 1 through 8 and
secondary level from grade 9-12. Basic level has been implemented
throughout the country from 2009 after an intensive model building
exercises in three districts representing all eco-zones the Mountain, Hill
and Terai. Secondary level will be implemented from the year of 2012
onwards. Fundamentally, the SSR initiative is a continuation of Education
for All programmes. There is a provision of one year ECD/PPC programme
for the children with 4 years of their age. It can be conducted either by
community or school.

Higher education consists of bachelor, master's and Ph.D. levels.

Depending upon the streams and subjects, bachelor's level may be of
three to five years' of duration. The duration of master's level is generally
of two years. Some universities also offer programmes like M.Phil. and
post graduate diploma.

Structure of Education

The following figure depicts the existing structure of education on Nepal

1
7
Higher Education

1
6
1
5
1
4
1
3
1
EducationSecondary

2
1
1
1
0
9

8
Basic Education

7
6
5
4
3
 2
1
Pre-Primary/Early childhood
Ag 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 2 2
4 5 6 7 8 9
e 0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 0 1
Source: SSRP 2009

Legally, there are two types of school in the country: community (public)
and institutional (private). Community schools receive regular
government grant whereas institutional schools are funded by schools'
own or other non-governmental, private sources. Institutional schools are
organized either as a non-profit trust or as company.

School Education

Current Status of School Education (2008/09)

Level No. of School Student No. of Teachers

Enrolment
ECD/PPC 23,659 881,247 NA
Primary 30,924 4,782,313 143,574
Lower Secondary 10,636 1,466,852 37,068
Secondary 6,519 715,378 26,925
Higher 1,976 337,014 NA
Secondary
Source: Educational Statistics 2009

Major Achievements in School Education

There has been a visible gain on education system especially on access

and participation throughout the levels. For instance, Net Enrolment Rate
(NER) at primary level has reached to 92 percent, primacy cycle
completion rate to 76 percent (DoE, 2008). Similarly, access to and
participation in secondary and tertiary education and technical education
and vocational training has also been increased substantially (MoE, 2009).
The overall increment in enrolment has contributed to reduce gender and
caste/ethnic disparity in education. The Gender Parity Index (GPI) in the
primary education reached .97 in 2008, which was .87 in 2003 (DoE,
2008). Similarly, the enrolment of backward communities like Dalits,
Janajatis and marginalized people has been increased substantially.

Based on global commitments on EFA from Dakar 2000, Nepal prepared

an EFA National Plan of Action, 2001-15. The first phase of which is
completed in 2009. School Sector Reform (SSR) has been emerged in the
form of continuation as second part of EFA.

Summary of Key Achievements by Indicators

Indicators Unit Year

2007/08 2008/09
1. Share of Education budget in: %
GDP 2.0 2.1
GNP 3.5 3.6
2. Share in Education Budget %
Basic Education 70 71
Secondary Education 9 9
3. Grade 1
New Entrants with ECD % 33 36
experiences
4. Gross Enrolment Rate %
ECED/Preprimary 60 63
Basic Education 116 123
Secondary Education 36 40
5. Net Enrolment Rate (NER) %
Primary Education 89 92
Basic Education 71 73
Secondary Education 20 21
6. Teachers with required %
qualification and training
Basic Education 62 66
Secondary Education 74 77
7. Teachers with required
certification
Basic Education 90 91
Secondary Education 90 91
8. Pupil Teacher Ration Ratio
Basic 44 43
Secondary 42 39
9. Repetition Rate %
Grade 1 28 18
Grade 8 13 11
10. Survival Rate by cohort %
method
Grade 5 54 58
Grade 8 37 41
11. Coefficient of efficiency Ratio
Basic 0.46 0.49
Secondary 0.30 0.33
 Indicators Unit Year
2007/08 2008/09
12. Learning Achievement % Average Score of
Students in core
subjects in grade 5 &8
Grade 5 50 53
Grade 8 44 46
Source: SSRP 2009

Problems and Challenges

Despite such examples of success, there are problems and challenges in

education in Nepal. Educational management, quality, relevance, access
are some of the critical issues of education in Nepal. Societal disparities
based on gender, ethnicity, location, economic class, etc. are yet to be
eliminated. Resource crunch has always been a problem in education.
These problems have made the goal of education for all a challenges for
the country.

• Resource constraints

• Access (there are still 8% school age children out of the opportunity
of school education)

• Relevance and quality

• Sustainability (high dropout and repetition rate and low cycle

completion rate)

• Institutional capacity

• Diversity

• Equity and inclusion

Major Policy Focus on Education

The interim constitution of Nepal (GoN 2007) guarantees that every citizen
will have right to free education up to secondary level and that each
community shall have the right to get basic education in their mother
tongue. The following are the main focus areas of educational policy in
Nepal:

• Free and compulsory quality basic education and free and easily
accessible quality secondary education;
 • Literacy to all the citizens by ensuring access to all and extension of
continuing education opportunities;

• Employment oriented education;

• Research oriented higher education and production of competitive

human resources;

• Equitable and inclusive educational environment

• Decentralized educational management with community participation;

• Sustainable financing in education;

Higher education

Modern higher education in Nepal does not have a long history. It was only in
1959 that Tribhuvan University (TU) was established in Kathmandu. Before
the establishment of TU, Trichandra College was established in 1918
affiliated with Patna University. After the establishment of TU, both the
government colleges and the community managed colleges got affiliated to
it.

But there was a big change in education policy in 2028 BS (1971); the New
Educational System Plan was introduced and all the community colleges
were nationalized and brought directly under TU. The government adapted
the policy that education was the responsibility of the state and this policy
had a tremendous impact on the nation.

After the end of Panchayt system, and restoration of Democracy in 1990,

National Education Commission had recommended a multi-university
concept. As a result, five universities were established along with one private
university. The higher education was restructured as 3-5 years of bachelor
and 2 years of Master's level depending upon the subject or stream. The
certificate level education was suggested to phasing out from universities
and to go to higher secondary schools with the establishment of the Higher
Secondary Education Board in 1990.

Current status of higher education in Nepal

Universitie No of Colleges Std. Enrolment No. of teachers

s 2006 2008 2006 2008 2006 2008
Total 621 781 186452 207680 6808 8780
Tribhun U. 476 621 163956 176200 5970 7950
Nepal 29 31 2164 3339 507 560
Sanskrit U.
Kathandu 19 18 6392 7596 242 166
U.
Purvanchal 71 85 8884 15185 43 54
U.
Pokhara U. 26 26 5056 5360 46 50
Source: Educational Statistics – 2009

Objectives of Higher Education

Some principal objectives of higher education are as follows:

• To impart higher education to the people as per the need of the

country;

• To preserve and develop the historical and cultural heritage of the

nation;

• To promote social and economic justice;

• To alleviate poverty;

• To produce man power competent enough in the global context;

• To accumulate, advance and disseminate knowledge;

• To encourage and promote research in the fields of arts, science,

commerce as well as vocational education;

• To help the university students build their character through the

medium of higher education.

There are five Universities and 781 colleges in Nepal. Except one, all
universities/academies are publicly managed and are supported by public
source fund through University Grant Commission/UGC. However, public
universities also provide affiliation to private colleges. One of the two
academies of higher education is National Academy of Medical Science, Bir
Hospital and the other is B.P. Koirala Academy of Health Sciences, Dharan.
These two academies are single college institutes whereas other universities
have constituent and affiliated colleges across the country.

Major Challenges in Higher Education

• Policy and programme related challenges

 o Despite the government's effort from time to time, no concrete
policy has been framed on higher education so far

o Political instability

• Organizational and management related challenges

o Over burden of students

o Decentralization practice has not been materialized

• Resources gap

• Quality and relevance Related:

o Academic quality in hi8gher education is a big challenge

o The central system of examinations

o Limited opportunities of capacity development to the human

resources in the universities

Policy and programmes in higher education (based on TYIP 2007/8 to

2009/10)

• Policy to offer graduate and post-graduate studies in universities will

be adopted.

• Improve the quality of higher education will be conducted along with

making higher education easily accessible.

• Emphasis will be given to the monitoring and evaluation of universities

along with the implementation of accreditation programmes for the
legitimization of universities.

• Mobilize students of post-graduate levels in community development

services launched.

• Provide scholarships, free studentship and student's soft loans to the

talented students who are deprived of higher education due to
economic reasons.

• Establish one university in each development region along with the

conduction of feasibility studies on agricultural university and technical
university.
• Provide scholarships to 12,600 girls for higher education.

• Distribute loan and grant to 4,500 students from the deprived groups.

• Establish Open University and operate it.

• Make provisions for grant to three small universities based on formulas

The Way Forward

Despite the progress on expansion of educational access to all children,

there are still lots of efforts to be exerted towards equity and
inclusiveness in education to address a number of questions and issues
on quality of public education services.

The following are some of the steps to be taken to ensure the right-based
approach to quality education as envisaged in the Interim Constitution of
Nepal.

• The present situation and challenges show that our future efforts
should be focused on improvement of equity and inclusive
participation in education.

• Harmonization, coordination and cooperation with various

stakeholders and development partners including donors, local
governments, communities, I/NGOs as well as private sectors.

• Strengthen and continuation of pooling mechanism through Joint

Financing Arrangement (JFA) as was done during EFA.

• Implementation of enhancing effective resource mobilization and

harmonization.

• Capacity development in local level ensuring participation and

ownership development,

• More targeted interventions for the equitable access to, quality and
inclusion in education.

• Utilization of public private partnerships to improve quality of,

access to and participation and inclusion in education.
References:

MoE (2009). Education at a Glance. Kathmandu. Author.

DoE (2008). Flash Report. Bhaktapur. Author

CBS (2001). Statististice of Nepal. Kathmandu. Author

CBS (2004). Statististice of Nepal. Kathmandu. Author

DoE (2009). Educational Statistics. Bhaktapur. Author

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