According to data collected by the state education department, amidst the pandemic, the academic year has been severely affected as learning moved online but digital access remained limited.
As per reports, over 25,000 children remained out of school in Maharashtra. Of these, the highest share, 10,820, is from Mumbai
Meanwhile, in the first 10 days of March, the state had conducted drives across its 36 districts to identify students who have fallen out of the formal education system during the pandemic year. There are 1.7 crore children aged between 3 and 14 in Maharashtra.
The data further shows that 7,806 children in the 6-14 age group had never been enrolled in school and 17,397 had been counted as dropouts due to irregular attendance in the year 2020-21.
Therefore, it can be ascertained that the effect of the COVID-19 pandemic has been extremely detrimental to academic education. Moreover, these closures not only impact students, teachers, and families but have far-reaching economic and societal consequences.
Furthermore, the impact was more severe for disadvantaged children and their families, causing interrupted learning, compromised nutrition, childcare problems, and consequent economic cost to families who could not work. In addition, the lack of interaction between teachers and students have also led students to feel less passionate about the integrity of their work. This leaves students to turn in half-completed assignments, get the answers from their friends in class, simply because education has become less important due to the outbreak of the coronavirus.
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