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Vocational
Education & Skill Development in Secondary Education in the XII Plan
The aim is to increase the percentage of
the workforce which has received formal skills through vocational education and
training from 12.0 percent at present to 25.0 percent by the end of the Twelfth
Plan. This would mean that about 70 million more people have to be imparted formal
skills in the next five years.
With
a dramatic growth in elementary education enrolments and improvements in retention
and transition rates in recent years, particularly after the enforcement of RTE
Act, the demand for secondary schooling is growing rapidly. Meeting this demand
is critical for three reasons. First, secondary education fulfils large
manpower needs of the semi-organized and the organized sectors of the economy. Second,
it is the supply chain for higher education. Finally, it caters to the needs of
teachers for primary schooling.
Public
expenditure on secondary education has increased from Rs.35,806 crore in
2007–08 to Rs.94,183 crore in 2011–12, leading to an increase in its share as a percentage of GDP from 0.78 percent to
1.05 per cent. Per capita expenditure on secondary education has gone up from
Rs.315 to Rs.784 during this period. The Central Government’s expenditure has
gone up from Rs.2,578 crore in 2007–08 to Rs.13,278 crore in 2011–12, a five-fold increase. There is significant private expenditure as
well. The average private expenditure on secondary education in private schools
is as high as Rs.893 per month as compared to only Rs.275 per month in
government schools. This difference is primarily due to high tuition fees in
private schools.
