With several government and Zilla Parishad schools on the verge of closure following low enrolment of students due to advent of private English medium schools in various parts of the district, the district administration had decided to launch special drive of enrolment of students into government schools by opening English medium schools following the demand from the parents.
The enrolment of students into government sector had declined considerably from 2.62 lakh in 2012-13 to 2.10 lakh in the 2015-16.
Student strength
The authorities fear that the enrolment would further come down in the government schools forcing closure or merge with other schools that have student strength.
Statistics available with education department says that against a total of 2,936 government schools in the district, there are 160 primary schools and four upper primary schools with less than 10 students’ enrolment. Similarly, there are 317 primary schools and seven UPS with less than 20 students’ enrolment.
There are 943 primary schools with less than 20 to 60 students, 158 UPS and 49 high schools. There are 99 government high schools with the enrolment of 61 to 90 students and 91 to 120 students’ enrolment in 120 high schools. There are only 20 high schools with the strength ranging from 401 to 500 students.
In this backdrop the district administration decided to launch “Badi Bata” programme from June 7 to 13 on massive scale by organising various programmes to enrol maximum number of school going children into the government sector schools and compete with their private counterparts.
Campaign
The school teachers would conduct door- to- door campaign for the enrolment of students into the government sector, conduct mass Aksharabhyasam, distribution of books and highlight importance of government education.
District Educational Officer S Srinivasa Chary told “The Hindu” on Sunday that “we have set a target of increasing the enrolment of students into government sector by at least five percent through the “Badi bata” programme in the district”. He also said that they had decided to convert a total of 768 schools as English medium schools to provide education from nursery to fifth standards following the demand by the parents.
