Why in the news?

  • The enrolment of students in the age group of 3 to 11 has seen a drop in 2024-25 compared to the previous year according to the latest data of UDISE+ released by the Ministry of Education.

Unified District Information System for Education Plus (UDISE+)

  • What is it?:
    • The Unified District Information System for Education Plus is an educational management information system under the Department of School Education & Literacy, Ministry of Education under the Government of India.
    • It functions as a central platform that enables respective schools to efficiently record and submit data related to its profile (infrastructure & facilities), individual students and teachers’ details.
    • This is done in real-time mode by all recognised schools that provide formal, and special education in any of the school categories (that is, from pre-primary to higher secondary levels) throughout the country each academic year – The data being validated at the Block, District, State and National levels.
    • This makes UDISE+ one of the largest management information systems for credible information collection mechanisms and serves as the official statistics of the Ministry of Education.
  • Launch: Launched in 2018-19 as a revamp of UDISE started in 2011-12.
  • Nodal Ministry: Ministry of Education.
  • Coverage: Collects data from school level (Classes 1–12) across all states/UTs.
  • Objective: To create a comprehensive, real-time, reliable database for planning, monitoring, and policy formulation in the school education sector.
  • Key Features:
    • Real-Time & Online: Transition from paper-based data collection (UDISE) to completely digital and online data entry.
    • Coverage of All Schools: Government, aided, and private recognized schools.
    • School-Level Data:
      • Infrastructure (buildings, classrooms, electricity, toilets, drinking water).
      • Teachers (qualification, training, pupil-teacher ratio).
      • Enrolment (by gender, caste, disability, medium of instruction).
      • Learning outcomes, transition, retention, and dropout rates.
    • Unique School ID: Every school is assigned a UDISE code for traceability.
    • Data Verification: Multi-level checks at school, block, district, state, and national levels.
    • Alignment: Integrated with SDG 4 (Quality Education) indicators.
  • Importance of UDISE+:
    • Evidence-Based Planning: Helps Centre/States allocate funds under schemes like Samagra Shiksha Abhiyan.
    • Equity Monitoring: Tracks gender parity index, SC/ST/OBC participation, inclusive education for Children with Special Needs.
    • Infrastructure Development: Identifies gaps (e.g., lack of girls’ toilets, electricity).
    • Transparency & Accountability: Public dashboard ensures accessibility of school data.
    • Policy Benchmarking: Supports NEP 2020 targets such as universal access, early childhood education, GER (Gross Enrolment Ratio).
  • Challenges:
    • Data Reliability: Though improved, issues of over/under-reporting persist.
    • Quality Focus: Infrastructure gains do not always translate into learning outcomes.
    • Digital Divide: Schools in rural/remote areas face difficulties in online data entry.
    • Unrecognized Schools: Many remain outside the UDISE+ ambit.