Andhra Pradesh
Education

Primary and secondary school education is imparted by government and private schools, regulated by the school education department of the state. The government decided to stop financial aid to aided schools with history dating to 1870s, forcing them to handover the schools with the aided staff to government or become private in 2021. As per Unified district information system for education plus (UDISE+) report of 2021–22, there were a total of 8,244,647 students enrolled in 61,948 schools. Performance of rural students on reading, arithmetic skills in grades 1–8 declined during 2018–2022 partly attributed to Covid outbreak. As an example, for the reading assessment in Class VIII students, it nosedived 67% in 2022 from over 78% in 2018. However the student enrolment at government schools improved from 63.2% to 71%. In the March 2024 secondary school certificate (SSC) exam 616,615 students appeared in the regular stream. Parvathipuram-Manyam district achieved the highest pass percentage of 96.37 among districts. The overall pass percentage was 86.69%, an increase of 14.43% over the previous year, with 100% in 2,803 schools. In intermediate (higher secondary) examinations held in March 2024, 393,757 students appeared. The pass percentage was 78%, which is an increase of 7% over the previous year.

The state initiated education reforms in 2020 by creating six types of schools: satellite foundation schools (pre-primary), foundational schools (pre-primary – class II), foundational school plus (pre-primary – class V), pre-high school (class III – class VII/VIII), high school (class III – class X), and high school plus (class III – class XII). The transition to English-medium education in all government schools was started in the academic year 2020–2021. It is expected to reach completion by 2024–25. Affiliation of 1,000 government schools to the Central Board of Secondary Education in the year 2022–23 was done as an initial step. The state government went ahead with the English medium based on the parents survey despite protests and court cases. The state initiative is being funded in part by a loan from the World Bank to the tune of $250 million over 2021–2026 through the "Supporting Andhra's learning transformation" project to improve the learning outcomes of children up to class II level.

As of 2023, there are 169 government-aided degree colleges and 55 private-aided degree colleges in the state. National assessment and accreditation council grades were awarded to 66 government colleges and 48 private-aided colleges. There are 85 government-aided and 175 private polytechnic colleges with a sanctioned strength of 75,906 students. In the category of technical education, there are 685 institutions offering diploma, under graduate, post graduate courses, with an intake of 299,608. The AP state council of higher education organises various entrance tests for different streams and conducts counselling for admissions. The AP state skill development corporation is set up to support skill development and placement for the educated. As of 2021, there are a total of 36 universities: three central universities, 23 state public universities, six state private universities, and four deemed universities. Andhra University is the oldest of the universities in the state, established in 1926. The government established Rajiv Gandhi university of knowledge technologies in 2008 to cater to the education needs of the rural youth of the state. NTR University of health sciences oversees medical education in 348 affiliated colleges spanning the entire range from traditional medicine to modern medicine. The public universities, including the legacy universities such as Andhra, Sri Venkateswara, and Nagarjuna, are suffering from a severe fund crunch and staff shortage, managing with only 20% of sanctioned full-time staff. Koneru Lakshmaiah education foundation university bagged the 50th rank, while Andhra university bagged the 76th rank in the overall category of India rankings for 2023 as per the national institute ranking framework of the union ministry of education in which 2,478 institutions, including 242 institutions from the state, participated. The gross enrolment ratio (GER) in higher education for the age group 18–23 for the state was at 35.2% for the year 2019–20, which comparing favourably with the GER for all of India at 27.1%. With a female GER of 35.3 and a male GER of 38.2, the Gender Parity Index was 0.84. The corresponding ratio for India was 1.01.

There were 510 industrial training institutes (ITI) in the year 2020–21 in Andhra Pradesh, with 82 under government management and 417 under private management. The total available seats in 2021 were 93,280, out of which 48.90% were filled. In the year 2020, 10,053 students completed ITI. The state has 2,510 public libraries, including four regional libraries and 13 district central libraries under government management. Saraswata Niketanam at Vetapalem in Bapatla district, one of the oldest libraries established under private management in 1918, is losing its attraction as the Internet spreads. The government is planning to develop digital libraries at the village panchayat level.
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