Education is one of the most crucial components of human development and change for sustainable development. Increased and systematic use of modern information and communication technologies (ICTs) is advocated for education sector for improving teaching/learning processes in educational institutions, educational planning and policy-making and monitoring of educational attainments. The Government is responsible for providing quality education to all the children in the age group of 5-14 years. Quality can be ensured only through transparent and qualitative assessment of schools on various indicators. Hence, there is a need to develop and deploy a tool like School Score Card to assess the performance of schools.
As a result of Education Policy 1968, there has been a considerable emphasis on expansion of educational facilities throughout the country. While these achievements are impressive by themselves; the problem of access, quality, quantity, utility and inadequacy of financial outlay accumulated over the years have now assumed serious proportions. In order to promote equity, it will be necessary to provide equal opportunity to all not only in access but also in the environment for achieving the target.
Andhra Pradesh, the state in southern India, will not be just a literate society, but a 'Knowledge' society, capable of meeting the present day challenges. It will be a state in which every person will be able to realise his/her full potential through access to educa-tional opportunities, regardless of the region to which he/she belongs.
To achieve this vision, the primary goal for the state will be to steadily increase overall literacy levels from the current 60.5% (2001) of the population to over 90% by 2010. To reach this target the state will have to significantly improve the literacy levels of groups with traditionally low levels – rural women, minorities, Scheduled Castes, Scheduled Tribes and Backward Classes. This will call for the strengthening, transforming and expanding of elementary schooling, including the revamping of their management, curricular and teaching methods.
To create knowledge databases at mandal (zonal) level on access to schools, infrastructure facilities, enrolment, retention, availability of teachers, their performance, their regularity, training, conduct of tests, performance of students, monitoring and supervision, participatory appraisal by school committees, supply of text books and other incentives is another objective. “School Score Card” is a front-end interface for children, parents, teachers and administrators to know the status of schools and their grading, that is, how they compare with other similarly placed schools in the district. This tool adopted colouring scheme to grade the schools, so that user can easily identify status of the school. Dark Green represents “Excellent”, Yellow represents “Good”, Orange represents “Average” and Red represents “Poor”. This application is an administrator's tool to know status of school on various parameters.
Objective
School Score Card is a web-based application developed by Centre for Good Governance with the following objectives:
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To convert available data into information to assist planning and policy making;
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To assess status of schools based on indicators relating to enrollment and retention of students, infrastructure facilities, student-teacher ratios etc.;
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To assess the quality of each school in comparison with other similarly placed schools in a district.
Measuring the achievement levels using 'School Score Card'
Score Card Indicators
In School Score Card basically 5 parameters are used to analyse the school performance.
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Enrollment ratio
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Pupil attendance
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Performance of students
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Availability of teachers
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Infrastructure facilities
According to the enrollment of the students or number of students registered for the current academic year the school is given a different score in this section. The attendance of the students also plays a major role in giving a grade to the school. And the results or performance of the students is also considered as a prime factor in giving a grade a school. Performance of students is dependent on the availability of teacher and depending on the infrastructure provided by the school. Calculating all the above parameter an overall grade or score is given to a school. A Score Card is generated for a particular school by the department.
Grading of Schools using 'School Score Card'-Methodology
1.Enrollment Ratio
2. Attendance School Level
Data required :
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Total enrollment
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Number of students with more than 50 % attendance in the month.
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Number of students with less than50 % attendance in the month.
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Number of students not attended at least one day in the month.
3. Performance
School Level: Data required
Total enrollment
Number of students with more than 80 %
Number of students with more than 60% and less than or equal to 80%
Number of students with more than 35 and less than or equal to 60% result
Number of less than 35% result
Tanzania covers an area of more than 900,000 square kilometres and has a population of about 45 million. Most of the people, 70-80%, live in rural areas; have almost no income and very little education. Official language is Swahili, but teaching language in Secondary Schools is English. There are about 3 million subscribers of mobile telephony, about 150,000 fixed line subscribers and only 6% of the population has access to electricity. Access to Internet in rural areas is very scarce and of low capacity. 
To maximise the benefits of ICT, the schools need to be connected to Internet. This is a major financial challenge in Tanzania, as bandwidth there is expensive. In most cases the schools will be connected via satellite (VSAT). Economy of scale and buying bandwidth in bulk for all schools and the management of bandwidth assignments to each school by the Ministry itself, lower the cost considerably. Thin client computers lower the equipment, maintenance and systems management cost per computer. Wireless networks are not yet fit for many (20+) computers in a classroom environment, so it needs to be wired networks. When there is no power grid within access of a school, solar panels will be the solution. Then 12-volts computers will be more energy efficient.
Infrastructure
Because Policy is Judged by Results, not Intentions
In the use of ICTs in school education, there is a clear pattern across a large number of developing countries. Primary and secondary data from these countries give no indication that effective interactions between policies and practices are very common. The impact of ICT use on learning outcomes is still unclear, and is open to debate. But ICTs are being increasingly used in education, even in difficult circumstances. And 'scaling up' of those initiatives is common. But the models for scaling up are varied and few of them are based on monitoring and evaluation data. The best practices and lessons learnt from them are rarely recorded for policy analysis. The rhetoric and rationale for using ICTs focus on the potential of the technology for bringing about changes in the teaching-learning paradigm. In practice, ICT-uses in schools are, at best, add-on activities that have little consequence on teaching-learning. Prevalent ICT uses do not help classroom practices adopt new technology tools. By and large, ICT efforts are restricted to procurement of equipment and getting connectivity for school computer labs. In other words, building infrastructure is the primary activity, when it is not the only activity.
This does not transform teaching-learning into an engaging and active process connected to real life nor does it prepare young people for tomorrow's workplace. This general picture in nearly a hundred countries (India not included) makes a strong case for a feedback mechanism for mutual adjustments between the policy and practices everywhere.
Look outside the school boundary. At the turn of the new millennium, there were 113 million out of school children throughout the world. Out of them, 110 million were from developing countries. One hundred fifty million did not complete the primary school. ICT offered them little. Yet, the expectation is still very high. “We recognise that while ICT May be a luxury for the rich, for us, the poor countries, it is a vital and essential tool for fighting poverty and ensuring our survival”, says Prime Minister Meles Zenawi of Ethiopia (2005). Kofi Annan appeals, “we must ensure that information and communication technologies are used to unlock the door to education” (2005). In the context of developing countries, these expectations can be translated into tangible outcomes, like increase in the access to education through distance learning, integration of the technology into the educational processes to meet larger goals, rather than using it in isolation or as something nailed onto the education system. Enabling a knowledge network for school goers, training of teachers, increasing availability of quality education materials, enhancing the efficiency and effectiveness of educational administration – there are many ways to enhance educational opportunities and enrich learning experiences using the technology.
The question of priority is vital. Back home, Shastri Bhawan's advice to the Planning Commission (July 2006), asking the latter to plan for universal secondary education and forget a laptop for every child, was based on a singular decision of the Human Resource Development Ministry.
If policy advice related to ICT use in education is to be realistic, it needs to be backed up by a rich database of lessons learnt. So it is important that monitoring and evaluation of all efforts are undertaken, involving all stakeholders