Guesstimate — Estimate the number of schools in Delhi

Welcome to Day 1/30 of Mastering Guesstimates

This is one of the very first guesstimate that I solved with one of my Senior, Over the time I have evolved the approach of solving this particular guesstimate. Here I’ll be discussing two approaches to solve this particular guesstimates.

Q. Guesstimate the number of schools in Delhi.

As told in the last article, Guesstimates — Why, What & How? The first step in solving the guesstimates involves asking logical questions to scope down the problem.

Clarifying Questions

1. Are we talking about Delhi or Delhi NCR? (this will affect the overall number and our approach as whole, so it’s good to clarify this)
2. Senior Secondary Schools i.e. from Kindergarten to 12th class or Play Schools, or Schools till some specific class or all? (here we are clarifying the type of school)
3. Government Schools or Private Schools or both?

Answer. Consider Delhi for now, calculate for Senior Secondary Schools and take both, Government Schools and Private Schools into consideration

Approach 1

Assumptions:

1. Population of Delhi is 3 Crores.

Solution:

Population = 3 Cr

Age-Wise Splitting of Population

Age-Wise Split

Potential school going population comes out to be 75 Lakhs

Taking into consideration the below poverty households, households against female education, we will be further eliminating a 10% factor from this 75 lakhs, i.e. ~69 lakhs

Dividing schools into 3 types:

1. Heavy Intake: (14 Classes, 7 Sections per class, 30 Students per section) ~2900 students
2. Medium Intake: (14 Classes, 4 Sections per class, 30 Students per section) ~1600 students
3. Low Intake: (14 Classes, 2 Sections per class, 30 Students per section) ~900 students

Taking Average: (2900+1600+900)/3 = ~1800 students per school

Number of Schools in Delhi = Total school going population / Number of students per school

Number of Schools in Delhi = 69 lakhs / 1800 = ~3900 Schools

Approach 2

Assumptions:

1. Area of Delhi is 1500 sq Km.
2. Delhi is divided into about 250 wards.

Solution:

Area of one ward = Area of Delhi / Number of wards

Area of one ward = 1500/250 = 6 sq km

Now, just imagine that in an area of 6 sq km around you, how many schools are there, considering my example there are about 16 schools around me.

Number of Schools in Delhi = Number of schools in one ward x Number of wards

Number of Schools in Delhi = 16 x 250 = 4000 Schools

Note: As per Google, currently there are about 5000 schools in Delhi.

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Stay tuned for Day 2/30 of Mastering Guesstimates, Until then, let curiosity be your guide and let the adventure begin!

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