English medium in 740 civic schools: Botcha Satyanarayana

Vijayawada: Minister for Municipal Administration Botcha Satyanarayana said here on Thursday that Chief Minister Y S Jagan Mohan Reddy is keen on improving the standards of education in all the government schools.

He was participating in a State-level workshop on bringing about radical changes in improvement of educational standards in Municipal schools. The Minister recalled that the government has been giving a top priority to provide basic infrastructure in all the schools throughout the state.

As part of the Naadu-Nedu programme, as many as 740 municipal schools in the State would be provided with necessary infrastructure under "Transformation of Municipal Schools Project."

Satyanarayana underlined the importance of capacity-building for the teachers to enable them to guide the students to improve their reading and writing skills. The Chief Minister had taken a decision to introduce English medium from Class 1 to 6 in government schools. This would be implemented in 740 municipal schools out of 2,110 in the State, he said.

Rebutting the charge that Telugu language was neglected, the Minister asserted that Telugu is a compulsory subject in all the government and private schools. He underlined the importance of English language to compete in the world and at the same time Telugu was necessary to protect the culture and heritage.

He said that 99 per cent of the students in municipal schools are from middle-class families. "With the introduction of English medium in government schools, parents are likely to admit their children in these institutions. It may lead to parents thronging to the government schools to admit their children and they may also demand recommendations from the Ministers and MLAs to facilitate admission of their wards" he said.

G S R K R Vijayakumar, Commissioner and Director of Municipal Administration, Special Secretary Ram Manohar, Municipal Commissioners Prasanna Venkatesh and Srujana and Municipal Commissioners from all over the State, teachers' union representatives, teachers and others were present.