Wooing public to join kids in govt schools

Hyderabad: To increase the strength in the government schools for the blind children and to create awareness about the facilities available in their schools, staff members of government school for the blind children now rely on the WhatsApp message to reach out to the parents.

There are around 7 to 8 blind schools throughout Telangana State, including two government schools in Hyderabad and one each in Karimnagar and in Mahbubnagar. Two blind schools are run by NGOs in Nalgonda and in Hyderabad.

It's very difficult for the school authorities to create awareness about the facilities available in government schools for the blind children and convincing the parents to send their children to the schools. But, now staff of the government school for the blind children in Malakpet has started sending request messages, along with the facilities that they have in their school to the parents through WhatsApp.

Speaking to the The Hans India, M Padmavathi Devi, headmistress at Government High School for the Blind Girls, said, "We have 60 children in our school right now from Class I to X, and we have a hostel facility with a capacity of 75 children, and we need admissions this year because recently 14 children passed the Class X and went out of the school," she said.

"We need some more admissions this year to get the good strength, and it's very difficult for us to get the blind students because we don't know where the blind children are located. We can go and ask door to door to send their children to the schools, but we can't ask the parents that whether they have visually challenged children in their home," she said.

"We have given news item in district levels, and we got some 15 calls from the parents, and we have resource persons in all the districts. So, we have sent the messages on WhatsApp and told them to share in their other groups as well, so that more people would come to know about the facilities available for the blind girl children," she added. "We have not received full strength last year also, and this year, we are trying hard to enroll blind children in the school to give them education and no child should deprive of the education," she added.

After identifying the locations of the children, staff members need to convince the parents to send their visually challenged child to Hyderabad to get them educated. These are all the reasons why the government schools for the blind children are not getting full strength. The government schools for the blind children have all the facilities, including computer training, Braille training and other hostel facilities.

Dr Saibaba Goud, chairman at Devnar Foundation for the Blind, told the The Hans India that they usually create awareness among the people about the schools for the blind children through media, and that their students come from villages. They in turn inform about their schools and facilities to others.