Education in Nepal has achieved significant progress in access to school, but there are still problems in equity and quality of education.

95% of primary school age (5-10 years) children are enrolled in Primary level (Grade 1 to 5). Nearly 80% of children in Nepal go to public schools while 20% of children are in private schools.

However, of children enrolled in school, the disparities between Districts, income, ethnic groups, and children with disabilities continues to be a serious concern.

A nation-wide sample study of grades 2 and 4 by DFID, reveals that there are students in grade 4 who have not mastered even the Nepali alphabet (at least 10%) and cannot recognize the double-digit numbers (at least 25%).

The National Assessment of Student Achievement tested grade 8 students in Nepali, Mathematics and social studies. The assessment found that average student of grade 8 cannot read and write well enough to manage higher level studies. Students are found to be poor in analytical ability, application ability, logical ability, generalization ability, justifying ability and the ability to transfer learning from one context to another.

It is no wonder then that almost half of the students tested in grade 10 for School Leaving Certificate (SLC) fail the exam every year.

Sarthak Shiksha (Meaningful Education) is a non profit, non governmental organization, established by group of education development professionals in Nepal to address this deteriorating condition of quality of learning in schools.