Ignite - Education

Himanshu Nigam
IIM Kozhikode
Email : himanshun12@iimk.ac.in
Phone: 91 9946501244
Despite sizable Govt. spending, results in the Rural segment are limited

• Close to 72% of India’s population resides in Rural areas

• The Government has brought in various schemes over the years

like Sarva Shiksha Abhiyan and has sanctioned a sizable
expenditure on Education

•Government school education, which is currently the major

source of education for the rural masses, is valued at less than
1/8th of what it costs the exchequer*

• Despite the efforts, 41% of the population in Rural India is

illiterate

*Source : AC Nielsen ORG MARG

Percentage of adults and youth who are literate

Source : ASER survey 2008
Poor education quality being provided is the reason behind current state
However, the findings of Public report on Basic Education(Submitted
Traditionally Accepted to the government of India clearly mentions that these are not the
factors for dropouts reasons for dropouts

82.3 % of rural parents feel that it is necessary for their

Lack of parental
Motivation children to receive elementary education**

Children
preferring to work
rather than going
to school The most prominent reason for the high dropout rates is the poor quality of
education offered in rural schools

** Source : Public Report on Basic

Education(PROBE) - 1999

•Level1 : Ability to read small paragraphs

•Level2: Ability to read stories Source : Annual status of Education Report :-Pratham
Rise of private education in Rural areas

Reasons attributed to lack of quality in Govt. schools :

Lack of quality teachers in rural schools, mainly due to poor accessibility of villages and low
salaries of teachers.

Poor access to resources in terms of books, laboratories and reference material. Almost 20
% of students in rural schools do not even have access to the prescribed text books

Libraries and Laboratories are non existent in the schools of rural India

Inefficient teaching methodologies

This is one of the main reasons behind growth of Private schools in Rural areas

Other Reasons :

• Increase in number of private schools

•A perception that private schools are better than government ones
• Improved or enhanced disposable incomes

Thus it is not necessary that private schools are

providing better education quality in all cases, and a
*Source : ASER survey 2008
lot of times it is due to other factors
The Idea
• As high as 28% of Rural households in India prefer to pay for private Education rather than Government
schools which offer cheaper education
• With the Cabinet Advisory Board on Education (CABE) stressing on the need to take serious measures to
improve the standard of primary and more importantly secondary education in the country, the
Government is looking for opportunities in Public-Private Partnership (PPP) to meet its goal of universal
elementary education.

This opens up a window of opportunity for private enterprises to venture into the rural education market

Eg: The Rajasthan Education Initiative launched at the India Economic Summit in November 2005 with the
World Economic Forum, Confederation of Indian Industry (CII) and the Global eSchools and Communities
Initiative of the UNICT task force (GeSCI) as partners promises
Any solution that aims at capitalizing on the rural education sector will be effective and profit making only
when it has the following attributes

Economical for the end consumer (student) Supported by results

Technology driven to make it reliable and cost-effective Constantly upgraded

Localized to meet the needs of the community Novel approach to the delivery system
Proposed Model

• Integrating the above mentioned features, it is advisable to start a Public Private Partnership in order to
provide quality education at affordable prices.
• The Government has the basic infrastructure in place, there is a need to provide better educational
support services to the end customer(Student)

Proposal to bring together :

Video
 Qualified Teachers Lectures
 Rural Consultants
 Child Psychologists Evaluation Resource
 Software professionals assistance material

The proposed private package can offer

a combination of the following:

Interactive
The pricing of the Awareness
Software
Programs
package will have to be Modules
lesser than the full time
cost of a teacher

Aptitude Animated
testing Laboratory
material sessions
The initial implementation will involve targeting select regions

• Initial target states :

• Kerala
• UP
• Punjab
Reasoning : These states have the highest
Percentage Increase of Private enrollment

• Ground Operations : The private partner can Source : ASER survey 2008
supply the packages to schools at regular
intervals through a network of coordinators/
distributors and using basic technology
(computer + video projector) to deliver the
educational support to students
Basic Technology
•Proposed •Final educational
Support package Delivery
•Computer
•Video Projector

Supplying to
schools through Students
coordinators
Target segments and estimated costs

• Present market in these regions can be classified

into the following segments for easiest
implementation in the beginning
Reasoning : The places having already present
infrastructure will be easiest to target in the
beginning Government
Private Schools with
Schools with computers
Computers
While there are philanthropic ventures in this domain
which are aiming to achieve a similar aim, none of
them have achieved the reach and penetration
required to accomplish success Government
Schools without
computers

Estimated Costs

Only Package : INR 25,000

Package + Hardware(computer & video Projector) : INR 40,000
Retaining customers and exit strategy

• Retention is tough because of the following reasons :

– teachers would have access to a fraction of the resource material after using our services for a year

Given that our service goes beyond the contents of our resource material, the probability of retaining our
clients is considerably high. With the use of expiry software, piracy can also be eliminated

Exit Strategy :

• The low cost computers can also be sold as independent units since they have an untapped market of their
own.
• Using the networks that would have been built for the model, a business can be built around these
computers which can be used for both private and commercial purposes in rural areas.
• The private partner can act as a mediator for CSR activities of organizations and help them channel their
funds for the transformation of the rural education scenario by supporting our services
Thank You