Mid-Day Meal in Schools (MDMS)

Objectives

• Improving the nutritional status of children in Classes I’VIII
• Encouraging poor children, belonging to disadvantaged sections, to attend schools throughout the country more regularly and help them concentrate on classroom activities
• Covers government, local body and government aided schools, and EGS/AIE centres
• The Mid-Day Meal scheme was launched in 1995 to support Universalization of Primary Education (UPE) by enhancing enrolment, retention, attendance and simultaneously improving the nutritional status of primary school children.
• MDMS was universalised in September, 2004 by providing hot cooked meals to all children in primary classes. It was extended to upper primary (classes VI to VIII) children in 3,479 Educationally Backward Blocks (EBBs) in October 2007 and then universalised at elementary level in 2008-09. MDMS is the biggest programme of its kind in the world that provides cooked mid-day meals to the children and covered about 11.19 crore children during 2008-09 at elementary level.
• Social audit has been introduced to monitor the scheme, including testing of food samples by NABL/CSIR/FSSAI- accredited labs. The scheme is being monitored by the MDM-MIS web portal which has scope for integrating with the interactive voice response system (IVRS) for real-time monitoring through community participation.
• The National Sample Survey (61st round) results (2004-show that the impact of MDMS has been significant, particularly in rural areas. It is reported that MDMS has covered 73.1 per cent of rural population in the age group of 6-14 of the rural population in 2008-09.

Mahila Samakhya (MS)

Objectives

• To enhance the self-image and self-confidence of women
• To create an environment where women can seek knowledge and information which empowers them to play a positive role in society.
• Mahila Samakhya endeavours to create an environment for women to learn at their own pace, set their own priorities, seek knowledge and information to make informed choices. MS has expanded from 83 districts in nine states at the beginning of the XI Plan period to 130 districts in 11 states (counting Telangana and Andhra Pradesh as separate states) and has specialised inputs for vocational and skill development as well as educational development of girls and adolescent girls in particular.

Secondary Education

Introduction

Secondary Education deals with Classes IX-XII and serves as a bridge between Elementary and Higher Education preparing young persons in the age group of 14-18 years for entry into Higher Education. Following the RTE and success of SSA, it has become essential to move towards Universalising Secondary Education. e Government has set its vision on making secondary education of good quality available, accessible and affordable to all young persons in the age group 15-16 years.

There are 1.69 lakh secondary schools in the country of which 63 per cent are under private management. The share of private unaided secondary schools has increased from 15 per cent in 1993-94 to 35 per cent in 2006- 07.

There is considerable scope for Public Private Partnership (PPP) in this sector. Public sector should concentrate on opening new secondary schools in unreserved and difficult areas, organising second shifting thickly populated areas and upgrading existing upper primary schools into secondary schools, particularly in States like Uttar Pradesh, West Bengal where educational institutions at secondary level have remained largely with private sector. Secondary education reforms should include dismantling entry barriers, revision of land norms and procedural changes. All unrecognised schools that meet the prescribed norms should be considered for recognition.