Students of Thurasanampalayam village near Bargur have petitioned the district administration to upgrade the Panchayat Union Middle School into a High School.
The students petitioned the district authorities on Sunday during the conduct of Bargur cattle exhibition. They said there are over 250 students in the school, and that most of the learners who are unable to go to high school located at Bargur, a few
km. away, simply drop out. “We have to walk every day to school from our hamlet. It is an ordeal. By upgrading the middle school at Thurasanampalayam, the Education Department will be able to stop child marriages,” said a student of VIII standard. The students said a few of their friends were married off in recent years by their parents even before completing VIII standard.
A village elder, however, said that while early marriage was not a taboo among people living on the hills, such occurrences had become rare due to increasing awareness levels among the students.
According to residents of Thurasanampalayam village, the students were studying with a sense of self-esteem owing to the freebies they get under government schemes. But, there was a dire requirement for an additional building to house a few more classrooms, they said.
