Modull schools

The plight of Model schools, started last year, has once again come to the fore as the teachers were up in arms against the government for its continued neglect both on development of schools as well as taking care of their well being.

A state-wide meeting of Model School Teachers has resolved to take up several issues that have been plaguing the schools immediately with government.

Till date, nearly half of the 355 schools don’t have the requisite number of teachers thereby hampering the academic work seriously. Trained Graduate Teachers (TGT) who were to teach the Classes VI, VII and VIII, were not appointed in full measure. This led to a problem in the division of work. The same teachers, at some places, were forced to at take the Intermediate first year classes in the interest of students.

Government argues that nowhere in the recruitment notification it was mentioned that all the TGTs would be hired at a stretch. “Since in the first year, i.e. 2013-14, only classes VI, VII, VIII and first year Intermediate were started this year, we feel the present intake of teachers is sufficient. We will go on hiring people in phases. As classes IX and X would be started from the next academic year i.e. 2014-15, along with Senior Intermediate, we would recruit more teachers,” a senior official of Secondary Education Department said.

A serious problem that is likely to crop up is that whether the fresh, young, inexperienced teachers are competent enough to teach the new revised syllabus of SSC that would come into force from 2014-15. “They were not specially trained to teach the Class X students. The same issue may confront PGTs who would be teaching the Senior Intermediate teachers. Rigorous orientation classes should be conducted for teachers first else the students would have to pay a heavy price,” Dharma Prakash, a PGT from Prakasham district felt.

“We cannot attract rural students if we don’t impart study that would enable them compete with all their fellow students of urban areas in all national examinations. We should create a competitive environment which is singularly lacking. If this situation continues, no doubt, the model school experiment would fail,” Kalpana, another teacher from Khammam district warned.

Model schools were touted as prestigious government schools; set up to compete with the Kendriya Vidyalayas. In the first phase 355 schools were set up in most backward mandals but the construction activity has been still going on in some of the schools. The tardy pace of work was blamed due to non-release of funds on time, failure of contractors to complete the work on time, non-availability of work force etc.

The Union Government which bears 65 per cent of the cost, on its part, has released the amount for the first phase but the State government has been releasing its share of matching grant in regular intervals. In the meantime, the central government has already notified to start another 364 schools under Phase II and the first installment of amount was reportedly released.

Teachers have their cup of woes. “No DA was paid to them since its inception, no service rules were framed, no leaves, no allowances for PGTs working as in-charge principals and worse, salaries were not paid by the first day of every month. No non-teaching staff at any school till now. We would take up this matter with the government else, boycott work,” A Narsi Reddy, President of United Teachers Forum warned.