Gujarat says AI system helped prevent 1.67 lakh school dropouts last year

Gandhinagar: Implementation of Artificial Intelligence (AI) based advanced technology has yielded massive success in preventing school dropouts in Gujarat. The state education department, which has set an ambitious target of achieving zero dropout rate, has implemented an Artificial Intelligence (AI)-based Early Warning System (EWS) at the Vidya Samiksha Kendra in Gandhinagar to prevent school dropouts.

This system identifies in advance children who are at risk of leaving school. Last year, through the EWS, 1,67,446 children who were at risk of dropping out were prevented from leaving school. With the help of the Education Department’s Child Tracking System (CTS), approximately 90,212 children who had dropped out of school were brought back.

According to state government sources, EWS is an innovative initiative that predicts the likelihood of dropouts among students studying in primary schools (Classes 1 to 8) by analysing data such as student records (age, gender, disability, etc.), academic performance, attendance and assessment records. The system generates alerts to facilitate timely intervention and preventive action. The Gujarat government, it is learnt, has also begun integrating CTS with EWS to enable the above trends.


Using algorithms to identify patterns in data, the system detects children who are likely to drop out, enables authorities to focus special attention on students at risk and take timely action before they leave school.

Key factors contributing to student dropouts include prolonged absenteeism, poor academic performance, health conditions and physical disabilities, behavioural issues, and similar indicators. Additionally, school-related information such as the type of school (government, aided, private, etc.), multigrade classrooms, infrastructure facilities available in schools, as well as family-related information such as economic condition, migration status, perceptions and attitudes towards education, number of children in the family and demographic details, are also used to identify children at risk of dropping out.

Once identified, these children are provided with targeted support through preventive response strategies and interventions designed to address their specific needs, helping them remain in school.

This year, the system has identified 1,18,234 children who are potentially at risk of dropping out, and timely measures will be undertaken to prevent them from leaving school.

CTS is an online platform developed by the Gujarat Government’s Education Department and Samagra Shiksha for managing and tracking the educational information of every student in the state. The primary objectives of CTS include ensuring school enrolment of every child in the state, identifying and re-enrolling dropout students, monitoring student attendance, progress and migration, ensuring that education-related government schemes reach eligible students, and maintaining educational records of every child.

CTS includes a database covering more than 54,000 schools and over 1 crore students across the state. Through this platform, students are tracked from Balvatika to primary education