With Meghalaya housing over 14,500 schools, the Education Department is considering a restructuring initiative through the clustering of schools to enhance administrative and academic efficiency. Commissioner and Secretary of the Education Department, Vijay Mantri, on Friday called a major review meeting where consolidation of schools was a key agenda.
Addressing the media, Director of School Education & Literacy, Swapnil Tembe, highlighted that the existing school structure is fragmented, leading to duplication in official records and inefficiencies in resource allocation.
“What is happening is that in the same location, a single institution operates as different schools under various sections—Lower Primary, Upper Primary, Secondary, and Higher Secondary—each with its own UDISE code due to funding from different schemes. In principle, they function as one school, but in the system, they appear as four separate entities. If we merge these sections into a single institution, the total number of schools in Meghalaya will drastically reduce. This issue has also been flagged by the Chief Minister,” Tembe stated.
Meghalaya, with a population of 29,66,889 as per the 2011 Census, has 55,160 teachers across 14,582 schools—the highest number of government schools in the Northeast at 7,783. Additionally, 4,172 are government-aided schools, including adhoc and deficit institutions.
“How does a small state like Meghalaya have such a high number of schools? This is one of the reasons we need consolidation. The National Education Policy (NEP) 2020 advocates for composite schools,” Tembe added.
A composite school integrates education from pre-primary to Class 12 under a single institution. Currently, students in Meghalaya often face multiple school transfers—moving from Lower Primary to Upper Primary, then Secondary, and finally Higher Secondary—sometimes across considerable distances. “On average, a student in Meghalaya changes schools four times in their academic journey, which contributes to dropout rates. Clustering schools into a single entity will provide a more stable learning environment,” Tembe explained.
The Education Department has now directed officials to conduct field inspections to identify schools that can be merged and report their findings for further action.