Principal Secretary of School Education Praveen Prakash said innovative steps need to be taken in order to bridge the gap in academic performance between students of government and private schools.
Students of government-run schools scored around 20% lesser marks on average as compared to their private school counterparts in the recently-concluded Board examinations. Expressing concern over the gap in performance, Mr. Praveen Prakash innovative steps by teachers of government schools would help improve the quality of education.
Calling for a “disruptive intervention” to break the cycle of low performance, Mr. Praveen Prakash said teachers should think of emulating the best practices being followed by the public sector educational institutions in countries like the United States and Australia. Citing the policy of home visits by teachers in the two countries, he said every class teacher there visits the homes of students twice in an academic year. The first visit is in June, at the beginning of the academic year, and the second one in January, after the half-yearly exams. The first visit is to create a personalised annual academic programme for the students and the subsequent one is to make course corrections in the plan.
“Ahead of the new academic year, beginning from June 24, 2024, this is time for introspection. We need to take a long, hard look at our students’ performance in the last public examinations, identify the gaps and take corrective measures,” the Principal Secretary told The Hindu.
He said the ‘Parent-Teacher Home Visit’ programme is a tried and tested formula for improving the quality of education. “Implementation of this programme by the two countries has helped them increase the academic performance of their students by 13% and attendance by 24%,” he informed.
Mr. Praveen Prakash said since every class teacher had to handle only 25–30 students, 60 visits in a year was a feasible proposition and the teachers need not have second thoughts about it since it was bound to motivate students to do better. “The world today is looking for quality manpower. There is no dearth of job opportunities for a candidate equipped with quality education,” he said, urging the teachers to voluntarily take up the home visit programme keeping in view the larger interests of their students’ future.
Giving top priority to the education sector, the YSRCP government had rolled out reforms by dividing schools into six categories, introducing English as a medium of instruction in all government schools in the State, printing bilingual textbooks to facilitate smooth transition of students from Telugu to English-medium and introducing CBSE syllabus in 1,005 of its schools as part of a plan to replicate it in all schools in phases, Mr. Praveen Prakash said.
The government claims to have spent ₹63,000 crore on reforms and to revamp the 45,000 State-run schools through welfare measures. The idea was to enhance the quality of education in government schools on a par with private institutions, he said.
Published - May 22, 2024 07:21 pm IST
