06-19-2008, 07:49 AM
<b>State teachers should accept CBSE syllabus </b>
By <b>Kancha Ilaiah </b>
<b>The Andhra Pradesh government has brought about a radical reform in the school education system of the state by transforming 6,500 government schools from Telugu medium to English medium at one go.</b>
The government order issued by the government also says that the schools would adopt the Central Board of Secondary Education syllabus.
As of now, almost all the private English medium schools in the state teach only the State Board syllabus which is not written by experts. Nor has it been discussed in any proper forum.
When compared to the CBSE syllabus, our state board syllabus is a substandard one. It is easier to teach a course that is written by experts.
Most of the CBSE material has been drawn from the NCERT text books which have been written by experts known for specialisations in their respective field of study.
At the same time, several teachersâ unions are opposing the GO on the ground that they cannot teach such a high-quality syllabus, that too in English medium.
They also say that the government has imposed the English medium stream without any proper preparation and are complaining about lack of adequate infrastructure in these schools.
In the GO, the education department gave a detailed explanation on how the rural poor â particularly the children belonging to SC, ST, OBCs â are deprived of English medium education and thereby denied employment avenues.
The GO says the intention of the reform was to "make available the option of English medium education to the children of rural small and marginal farmers, agricultural labour, SC/ST/BC families, urban poor and slum dwellers in an equitable manner together with the others."
These English medium sections will be parallel to Telugu medium sections that already exist. The Telugu medium stream is not being closed down as alleged by some organisations. English medium would be a parallel stream but it would move up to Class XII and not end at Class X.
The GO says that all these schools will be strengthened under the central scheme of Strengthening and Universalisation of Quality and Access to Secondary Schools.
It appears that the government is trying to mobilise about Rs 750 crores both from state and Central resources to improve the physical and academic infrastructure of schools by establishing teacher training centres and "English labs," apart from supplying more English books.
There are also proposals to merge high schools adjacent to each other to make them more efficient and also do away with upper primary schools of certain type.
Along with this, the government should also make available school buses to students who have to travel long distances as well as mid-day meal to poor children, even during vacations.
It is also said that every school will get a developmental fund of Rs 1 crore under this new scheme. If that is so the very structural existence of the schools would change. When the government is proposing such a comprehensive educational reform why should teachersâ unions oppose it?
It is understandable if the associations of private English medium schools and private Intermediate colleges oppose it, since this scheme will force them to undergo a radical change.
<b>Both the government and the teachersâ unions should realise that the Telugu medium stream in these schools will not survive for long simply because after a while parents would not prefer to retain their children in Telugu medium.</b>
With the launch of the new scheme, the Intermediate board will also become redundant and the vast number of private Intermediate colleges will have to close down or change into schools.
Once the school education system becomes uniform we should ask for abolition of entrance examinations to all streams as this system has created corporate racketeering institutions. The entrance system is playing havoc with the poor but brilliant students.
One is really shocked and surprised at the opposition of Left teachersâ unions to this systemic reform. They should know many Leftist scholars were involved in penning the NCERT textbooks. Many of them have done a wonderful job of writing good and simple material for every course.
In fact, they should have demanded that we should adopt only NCERT text books and nothing else and should also have sought translation of the same books into Telugu.
By <b>Kancha Ilaiah </b>
<b>The Andhra Pradesh government has brought about a radical reform in the school education system of the state by transforming 6,500 government schools from Telugu medium to English medium at one go.</b>
The government order issued by the government also says that the schools would adopt the Central Board of Secondary Education syllabus.
As of now, almost all the private English medium schools in the state teach only the State Board syllabus which is not written by experts. Nor has it been discussed in any proper forum.
When compared to the CBSE syllabus, our state board syllabus is a substandard one. It is easier to teach a course that is written by experts.
Most of the CBSE material has been drawn from the NCERT text books which have been written by experts known for specialisations in their respective field of study.
At the same time, several teachersâ unions are opposing the GO on the ground that they cannot teach such a high-quality syllabus, that too in English medium.
They also say that the government has imposed the English medium stream without any proper preparation and are complaining about lack of adequate infrastructure in these schools.
In the GO, the education department gave a detailed explanation on how the rural poor â particularly the children belonging to SC, ST, OBCs â are deprived of English medium education and thereby denied employment avenues.
The GO says the intention of the reform was to "make available the option of English medium education to the children of rural small and marginal farmers, agricultural labour, SC/ST/BC families, urban poor and slum dwellers in an equitable manner together with the others."
These English medium sections will be parallel to Telugu medium sections that already exist. The Telugu medium stream is not being closed down as alleged by some organisations. English medium would be a parallel stream but it would move up to Class XII and not end at Class X.
The GO says that all these schools will be strengthened under the central scheme of Strengthening and Universalisation of Quality and Access to Secondary Schools.
It appears that the government is trying to mobilise about Rs 750 crores both from state and Central resources to improve the physical and academic infrastructure of schools by establishing teacher training centres and "English labs," apart from supplying more English books.
There are also proposals to merge high schools adjacent to each other to make them more efficient and also do away with upper primary schools of certain type.
Along with this, the government should also make available school buses to students who have to travel long distances as well as mid-day meal to poor children, even during vacations.
It is also said that every school will get a developmental fund of Rs 1 crore under this new scheme. If that is so the very structural existence of the schools would change. When the government is proposing such a comprehensive educational reform why should teachersâ unions oppose it?
It is understandable if the associations of private English medium schools and private Intermediate colleges oppose it, since this scheme will force them to undergo a radical change.
<b>Both the government and the teachersâ unions should realise that the Telugu medium stream in these schools will not survive for long simply because after a while parents would not prefer to retain their children in Telugu medium.</b>
With the launch of the new scheme, the Intermediate board will also become redundant and the vast number of private Intermediate colleges will have to close down or change into schools.
Once the school education system becomes uniform we should ask for abolition of entrance examinations to all streams as this system has created corporate racketeering institutions. The entrance system is playing havoc with the poor but brilliant students.
One is really shocked and surprised at the opposition of Left teachersâ unions to this systemic reform. They should know many Leftist scholars were involved in penning the NCERT textbooks. Many of them have done a wonderful job of writing good and simple material for every course.
In fact, they should have demanded that we should adopt only NCERT text books and nothing else and should also have sought translation of the same books into Telugu.