(a) Discuss the steps to be taken to reduce the incidence of school dropouts among deprived groups. (15 marks) (b) Discuss the…

(a) Steps to reduce school dropouts among deprived groups

Dropout among SC, ST, minority and poor children is a push-out as much as a pull-out: poverty, discrimination, language gaps and hopelessness about the future act together. Steps therefore have to work at several levels. Step 1: Remove cost barriers. Enforce the Right to Education Act, 2009 (Article 21A), with free textbooks, uniforms, PM POSHAN midday meals and post-matric scholarships. Conditional support works: Bihar's cycle scheme raised girls' secondary enrolment (Muralidharan and Prakash, 2017). Step 2: Make schools reachable and safe. Hostels, Kasturba Gandhi Balika Vidyalayas and Eklavya Model Residential Schools, safe transport and separate toilets for girls. Step 3: Bridge learning gaps. Special training under RTE Section 4 for out-of-school children, remedial classes and mother-tongue based teaching for tribal children. Step 4: Remove discrimination. Sensitise teachers about caste and gender bias; Rosenthal's work shows that low teacher expectations lower performance. Step 5: Build psychological resources. Dweck's growth-mindset training, mentoring and career counselling counter learned helplessness and stereotype threat. Step 6: Involve parents and the community through School Management Committees and tracking of absent children. Who acts: teachers and school psychologists, local bodies, and the state. Dropout falls when finance, learning support and a sense of belonging are provided together.

(b) Psychological strategies for handling intergroup conflict

Intergroup conflict arises from social categorisation (Tajfel's minimal-group studies), competition for scarce resources and stereotypes, so strategies target each cause. Strategy 1: Contact. Allport (1954) held that contact reduces prejudice when status is equal, goals are shared, cooperation is present and authorities support it. Strategy 2: Superordinate goals. In Sherif's Robbers Cave study (1954), joint tasks ended hostility between rival camps. Strategy 3: Recategorisation. Gaertner and Dovidio's common ingroup identity model moves "us and them" to a shared "we", for example national or school identity. Strategy 4: Cooperative learning. Aronson's jigsaw method makes students depend on each other. Strategy 5: Dialogue and mediation. Kelman's problem-solving workshops correct distorted perceptions; Osgood's GRIT proposes small, reciprocated conciliatory steps. Strategy 6: Perspective-taking and extended contact: knowing that an ingroup friend has an outgroup friend reduces prejudice. Indian illustration: Mohalla committees formed by police at Bhiwandi in 1992 brought leaders of both communities together to prevent riots. Limit: contact can backfire when it is unequal or competitive, so conditions matter.

(c) Achievement motivation and the role of family and culture

Achievement motivation is a learned disposition to strive for success against a standard of excellence (Murray's need for achievement, 1938; McClelland, 1961). High achievers prefer moderate risks, want feedback and take personal responsibility. Atkinson's model (1957) states that tendency to approach success = Motive for success × Probability of success × Incentive value (1 − P), which is highest at moderate difficulty. Family factors: Independence training: Winterbottom (1958) found that mothers of high-achieving boys expected self-reliance earlier. Parenting: Rosen and D'Andrade (1959) found that parents of high-achieving sons combined warmth with high expectations and did not dominate; Baumrind's authoritative style gives a similar result. Modelling and attribution: parents who praise effort rather than ability (Dweck, Weiner) build mastery orientation; Bandura's modelling transmits values. Cultural factors: Weber's Protestant ethic and McClelland's Achieving Society (1961) link achievement imagery in a society's stories to its economic growth. Individualistic cultures reward personal success; in India achievement is often socially oriented and tied to family honour and mobility aspirations. Caste and class opportunity structures also raise or limit aspiration. Evidence that it can be taught: McClelland and Winter's Kakinada experiment (Andhra Pradesh, 1964) trained entrepreneurs, who later showed more business activity than controls. Limit: culture and family set the climate, but opportunity must exist for motivation to become achievement.