Education Status in Uttarakhand :

Education in Uttarakhand is provided by various public and private institutions. Uttarakhand had a long tradition of learning and culture.The department of education in Uttarakhand is basically a vast structure which incorporates within its fold primary education, secondary education and the state council of educational research and training. Uttarakhand Sabhi Ke Liye Shiksha Parishad has also been put in place to implement education for all in the state which boasts of a very high literacy rate, much higher than the national average. The government has introduced necessary steps to make the children school-bound and also to attract the drop-outs back to their schools.

In Uttarakhand there are 15,331 primary schools with 1,040,139 students and 22,118 working teachers (Year 2011). Literacy rate of the state was 79.63% with 88.33% literacy for males and 70.70% literacy for females.The language of instruction in the schools is either English or Hindi.

There are mainly government and private schools and institutions including primary schools, high schools, inter college, degree colleges and technical institutions. The main school affiliations are CBSE, CISCE or the State Government syllabus defined by the Department of Education of the Government of Uttarakhand.

The Uttarakhand board of schools and examinations functions under the aegis of the Directorate of School Education and provides wide employment opportunities within the state. Uttarakhand contains some of the premier institutes of education in the country, headed by the famous Indian Institute of Technology at Roorkee. To encourage the spread of education at Uttarakhand, the government is ensuring that poor but brilliant students in its rural areas receive free and first rate education at the Rajiv Gandhi Navodaya Vidyalaya residential schools. Mid-day meals and co-curricular activities are some of the ways that have been introduced to popularize education in the state.

Uttarakhand education received a fillip after the government introduced Information and Communication Technology (ICT) in secondary education. The department of education, Uttarakhand, has attained the target of computerizing all 1,700 government high schools and government inter-colleges (GICs) in the state, providing at least four computers per school. The government has also implemented training and orientation programs for the teaching and administration staff serving these schools, in collaboration with Microsoft India.

Universities in Uttarakhand :

University of Petroleum and Energy studies (UPES), Uttarakhand Open University, Graphic Era Deemed University, Graphic Era Hill University, Himgiri Nabh University, Himalayan Institute Hospital Trust University (HIHT), Doon University, Sridev Suman University, Uttarakhand Technical University, Dehradun Institute of Technology University, Uttaranchal institute of Technology University, ICFAI University, Uttarakhand Ayurvedic University, Dev Sanskriti University, Patanjali University and Residential University at Almora.

According to the 2011 census, the state of Uttarakhand has a literacy rate of 79.63% with 88.33% for males and 70.70% for females. The literacy rate has increased from the last census. The state has Government and private schools, primary and high Schools, Inter collages, Degree collages and other Technical institutions. The medium of education is either in English or Hindi. The schools are affiliated with CBSE, CISCE or the State Government Syllabus defined as per the Department of Education, Uttarakhand Government.

Present Status :

According to ASER learning assessments are conducted in the household, Children in the age group 5-16 are assessed.The type of school in which children are enrolled (government or private) is also recorded.  among children in Std III, 4.6% cannot even recognize numbers 1-9, 22.4% can recognize numbers up to 9 but cannot recognize numbers up to 99 or higher, 40.7% can recognize numbers up to 99 but cannot do subtraction, 23.9% can do subtraction but cannot do division, and 8.4% can do division.

Many government schools in the state are at the mercy of a single teacher. As many as 39,000 students in 1,689 primary schools in the state's 13 districts see only one teacher each day at school, records of the state education department show.The issue is not that of staff crunch, really. Many teachers posted in the interiors and hilly regions are reluctant to turn up.The state education department has suspended many teachers in the past. Surprise inspections are being carried out to deal with teacher absenteeism.

Uttarakhand, known for school education mostly imparted by public schools, has emerged as a hub of universities, but experts and activists have raised questions about the quality of education.