As schools strive to improve their performance, often it’s the children who suffer. Managements are asking the parents of students who obtain poor grades or marks in the final exam to take a transfer certificate (TC) and move to another school.
While this practice is rampant in high schools that want to show 100% results in the class ten exams, parents have complained that it is now being followed for students in class two as well.
On Thursday, a group of parents, whose children attend a private CBSE school in Jalahalli, protested the management’s decision to single out their children. Over a half dozen parents had been summoned by the management on Thursday and urged to take a TC as their children were not performing well in class.
A parent of a class five student said that she was asked to take a TC and shift her child to a State syllabus school. “It is already March. Most schools will not entertain admissions for Class six. Moreover, my daughter likes her peers and would find it difficult to adjust in another school,” she said.
Another parent said that they would file a complaint with the Block Education Officer if the school does not relent.
A management member, however, pointed out that it was only a ‘suggestion’. “We will only issue TC if the parent places a request after we announce the results at the end of the month,” the member pointed out.
Officials of the Department of Public Instruction said that they would initiate action against the school management if parents submit written complaints.
This phenomenon, however, is not restricted to a single school. Shivananda Nayak of Awake Foundation, which works with students with learning disabilities, said that this academic year he had come across 10 such instances in several schools. “But when parents show certificates that the child is a slow learner or has a learning disability, schools tend to oblige and urge parents to ensure that they take corrective measures,” he said.
D. Shashi Kumar, general secretary of the Associated Managements of Primary and Secondary Schools in Karnataka, said that they condemn such practices. “Schools are probably resorting to this as they cannot detain students till class eight. With the central government amending the RTE Act, which will allow schools to detain students in higher primary classes, these instances may reduce,” he said.
