More than 900 teachers have to be posted in the 281 schools run by the Greater Chennai Corporation (GCC), according to currently available estimates. Currently, there are around 3,800 teachers in GCC-run schools in the city, which is insufficient for all the 281 schools with more than 1.07 lakh students. It is learnt that the civic body is yet to take a decision on posting new teachers.
Following a review conducted by Corporation Commissioner Gagandeep Singh Bedi, officials of the Education Department have started conducting micro-level meetings to identify major issues affecting school education. In a bid to improve education, teachers have been asked to start counselling sessions for parents and improve the quality of homework. More than 5% of the 1.07 lakh students of GCC-run schools have reportedly not attended school as their parents, who are daily wage labourers, have moved to a new address. Some have been said to have migrated to other areas in the State.
At a meeting on Tuesday, teachers were directed to visit students’ residences to check if they needed any assistance to continue their education. Students in zones such as Tondiarpet, Royapuram, Thiru Vi Ka Nagar also have irregular attendance. Teachers have been asked to find the reasons and submit a report in three days. A survey of students who stopped attending school will be completed this week. Teachers who attended the meeting said they would check how many parents had returned to their native villages. “Some parents who were working in the city might have lost jobs and returned to the native villages. We will try to contact them and ask them if they need any assistance for the education of their children. We will know whether there were any major economic reasons for the migration once the survey is completed. We are ready to help the parents educate their children by launching welfare measures,” a teacher said.
As the school infrastructure is being modernised, the civic body has planned to take initiatives to bring the standard of education on a par with the best private schools. With the support of local councillors, the teachers will persuade the parents of ‘out of school’ children to send them to school. The civic body will launch more initiatives to bring them back to school, officials said.
The civic body has directed all schools to ensure that adequate conservancy workers are deployed to keep the premises and toilets clean. A system to report structural weakness or damages in school buildings to GCC has also been launched to rectify defects immediately.
