Firsthand accounts of how education reforms from 2015 onward have impacted teachers in Delhi.

In 2015, the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) was elected to govern Delhi promising to improve public services, including education through government schools that would be equal to private-school provisions. Media reports, along with the party’s re-election in 2020, suggest strong public confidence that the AAP is delivering on that promise, but this success has little evidence in the schools themselves. Delhi’s Education Revolution offers a critical evaluation of the AAP’s education reforms by exploring policy and practice through the eyes of a key group: the government-school teachers tasked with making the AAP’s pledge a reality. Drawing on 110 interviews, this volume uses first-hand accounts from teachers to explain how reforms have changed their profession and practice, and whether education really has improved for children of all backgrounds. This study paints a more qualified picture of success than suggested elsewhere and makes a valuable contribution to the understanding of education reforms in India, especially in Delhi.
 

A study of how the fraught relationship between India and Pakistan is taught to students in both countries.
 
The rivalry between India and Pakistan began with the British withdrawal from the British Indian Empire in 1947 and the sudden partition of India immediately afterward. Seventy-five years later, it remains powerful. While the countries share a long history and considerable socio-cultural affinity, relations since Partition have been marked by three wars, constant border skirmishes, and a deep distrust that permeates both societies. In each, teaching about those relations is weighted with political and cultural significance, and research shows that curricula have been used deliberately to shape the understanding of new generations.
 
This book explores the attitudes and pedagogical decision-making of teachers in India and Pakistan when teaching India–Pakistan relations. Situating teachers in the context of reformed textbooks and curriculums in both countries that explicitly advocate critical thinking and social cohesion, Kusha Anand explores how far teachers have enacted these changes in their classrooms. What she finds is that while there is progress towards the stated goals, teachers in both countries face pressures from the interests of school and state, and often miss opportunities to engage with multiple perspectives and stereotypes in their classrooms.