India’s debate on education reform often begins too late. It starts in secondary school, in skills training programmes, in employability dashboards and workforce projections. But decades of evidence from economics, cognitive science and public health point in a different direction: the largest returns on education investment accrue much earlier, particularly for children who begin life at a disadvantage.
First-generation learners — children whose parents have not completed formal schooling — sit precisely at this intersection of early disadvantage and high potential returns. How India supports them will determine not only individual mobility, but the productivity and equity of its future workforce.
This is not a moral claim. It is an economic one.
Disadvantage compounds early
Human development is not linear. Skills build on skills. Early cognitive and socio-emotional capacities make later learning more efficient; deficits, once entrenched, are costly to remediate. This principle, long established in developmental economics, has particular relevance in India, where a large share of children enter school without exposure to language-rich environments, structured play or stable nutrition.
For first-generation learners, the starting line is not the same. Parents value education deeply, but lack the institutional knowledge to support it. The result is not disinterest, but fragility — learning that is easily disrupted by illness, migration, household stress or climate shocks.
Data from India’s Annual Status of Education Report (ASER) consistently shows that children from households with lower parental education levels fall behind early in foundational literacy and numeracy. Once these gaps open in the primary years, they tend to persist into adolescence.
From an economic perspective, this is a warning sign. When foundational skills are weak, later investments in schooling yield diminishing returns. The system ends up spending more to achieve less.
Why first-generation learners offer the highest returns
Economic models of human capital formation suggest that interventions targeted at disadvantaged children in early and middle childhood generate the highest benefit-cost ratios. These returns are not confined to test scores. They include improved health outcomes, higher lifetime earnings, reduced reliance on social protection and stronger intergenerational mobility.
For first-generation learners, the marginal return on investment is especially high because the counterfactual is steep. Without support, many will remain trapped in low-skill trajectories. With timely intervention, the gains multiply across a lifetime.
This is why early remediation, mentoring and socio-emotional support matter. They do not merely help children “catch up”; they change the efficiency of all subsequent investments.
The limits of late-stage correction
India’s policy architecture still places disproportionate emphasis on secondary and tertiary interventions: scholarships, skilling programmes, STEM labs, digital credentials. These have value, but they often arrive after foundational gaps have hardened.
From a cost-effectiveness standpoint, this is inefficient. Remediating learning deficits at age 14 is far more expensive than preventing them at age 7. Yet the system repeatedly chooses the former.
First-generation learners pay the price. They are expected to absorb advanced content without the scaffolding that makes learning cumulative. Predictably, dropout rates rise, confidence falls and the returns on public and private investment decline.
Where CSR has quietly aligned with evidence
Despite its uneven quality, CSR engagement in education has often gravitated — sometimes unintentionally — toward interventions that economic evidence supports for first-generation learners.
Three patterns are notable.
First, a focus on foundational learning.
Many CSR-supported programmes prioritise basic literacy and numeracy through remedial education and small-group instruction. This aligns closely with what evidence shows works: short-cycle, targeted interventions that meet children at their current learning level.
Second, integration of non-academic inputs.
Nutrition support, health check-ups and psychosocial counselling are frequently embedded in CSR education programmes. From a human capital perspective, this is essential. Cognitive development is inseparable from physical and emotional well-being.
Third, sustained engagement rather than one-off exposure.
Where CSR programmes commit to multi-year engagement, they mirror the economic insight that capability formation requires time and continuity, not episodic inputs.
These features matter because they raise the productivity of education spending overall.
Smile Foundation and capability formation through education investment
Smile Foundation’s education work offers a practical illustration of these principles in an Indian context.
Through its Mission Education programme, the Foundation works with children from low-income communities, many of whom are first-generation learners. The programme emphasises foundational learning, remedial support and individual attention, particularly in the early and middle grades.
Crucially, education is not treated as a standalone input. Health services, nutritional support and counselling are integrated, recognising that learning outcomes are shaped by multiple, interacting constraints. This reflects a core insight from human capital economics: isolated interventions yield limited returns when complementary inputs are missing.
By engaging families and communities, such programmes also address a less visible but critical factor — the transmission of aspiration and self-belief. For first-generation learners, confidence is not an add-on; it is a prerequisite for persistence.
Attendance, not enrolment, as the real metric
Another area where CSR initiatives often outperform formal systems is attention to attendance. Enrolment figures are a weak proxy for learning. Attendance, by contrast, captures the cumulative exposure required for skill formation.
First-generation learners are more vulnerable to absenteeism due to household responsibilities, health shocks and migration. CSR programmes that track attendance, provide transport support or address menstrual health barriers are effectively protecting the rate of return on education investment.
From an economic standpoint, reducing absenteeism is one of the most cost-effective interventions available.
What accountability should look like for education investment
If first-generation learners represent the highest-return segment of education investment, accountability frameworks must reflect that reality.
This requires shifting metrics from outputs to outcomes: from classrooms built to learning gained, from beneficiaries enrolled to skills retained. It also requires independent evaluation and longer funding horizons.
Short-term pilots may generate visibility, but they rarely alter life trajectories. Capability formation unfolds over years, not quarters.
CSR actors willing to commit to this timeline can play a stabilising role, particularly in contexts where public systems face capacity constraints.
The broader implication
India’s demographic advantage is not guaranteed. It depends on whether today’s children acquire the skills and capabilities that make growth inclusive and sustainable.
First-generation learners are central to this equation. Supporting them early is not charity; it is economic prudence.
CSR’s most valuable contribution lies not in innovation theatre, but in reinforcing what evidence already tells us works: early, sustained, holistic investment in children who start with less.
Conclusion
Education debates often oscillate between ambition and anxiety. But the economics of human development offers clarity. When societies invest early and wisely in their most disadvantaged children, the returns compound across lifetimes and generations.
First-generation learners embody both India’s risk and its promise. CSR initiatives that recognise this — and align their strategies accordingly — are not merely filling gaps. They are strengthening the foundation on which future growth depends.
The challenge now is to ensure that such approaches are not exceptions, but the norm.
