English medium education for free... Two fans per classroom; purified drinking water; one teacher per class; free notebooks, textbooks, school bag, footwear and colour pencils; nutritious food with egg; experienced teachers, training in chess, yoga, sports and arts; and other benefits.
These are the enticements with which teachers of Erode Panchayat Union Elementary School at Soorampatti Valasu are in the process of attracting parents for enrolment of their children in the English medium section started just two years back.
There are now 382 students from levels I to V in both Tamil and English medium sections.
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For the ensuing academic year, the teachers are literally on the streets campaigning for enrolment to take the strength beyond 400.
“Enrolment last year was 58, and this time around we expect the admissions to be more,” Pon Chitra, a teacher, said, who along with her colleagues N. Nirmala, Prema and Gowri, is on an overdrive to identify students to arrive at the strength that would augur well with the student teacher ratio of 1:40.
The teachers say they would be required to slog hard for admissions since 76 students of standard V will be moving out.
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The silver lining is that parents, most of them daily labourers, are beginning to make a comparison between ill-equipped private schools that charge heavily and well-equipped government schools providing education for free.
The teachers are literally on the streets campaigning for enrolment to take the strength beyond 400 from 382
The teachers are literally on the streets campaigning for enrolment to take the strength beyond 400 from 382