Mixed response to Vijayawada Municipal Corporation English medium schools

Vijayawada: The corporation schools under the Vijayawada Municipal Corporation (VMC) had successfully completed formative assessments (FA) unit tests without the government supplying the complete set of textbooks.

With the introduction of English medium (EM) forcefully in education curriculum, it is not a smooth sail for the students and teachers. In all, 400 students from 28 municipal schools within VMC forced to study in English medium for this academic year. Most parents stopped their children from sending to English medium schools and joined their wards in some other school where there was Telugu medium.

On the other hand, teachers find it difficult to teach the high school children in English medium as the teachers training programme for English medium was delayed indefinitely.

The government says the students of English medium had an upper hand in the results when compared with Telugu medium and even when the students join professional courses, engineering and medicine they have an edge if studied in EM.

The Hans India spoke to teachers of VMC at SKRMRMC high school and BSRKMC high school, where they said if the government introduces EM from Class IX, the students would come up well unlike introducing EM right from primary to Class IX, which was difficult for the student to understand the English terminology.

Most parents are unhappy with the change into EM as the students did not understand what the teacher teaches and the parents are totally blank and very few parents feel great that their children are studying in EM. They further said that they could manage the FA-1 unit test with the new old textbooks.

Meanwhile SFI leaders are against the closure of government schools in the name of rationalisation and introducing EM in municipal schools. SFI state secretary Noor Mohammed said all the students’ unions had protested the decision of government for scrapping TM and introducing EM without proper infrastructure and trained teachers.

He blamed the government for introducing EM without foresight and added that till now textbooks were not distributed to all the students. He alleged the government was favouring private and corporate institutions by closing the government schools.
Deputy Educational Officer K Ravi Kumar rubbished the allegation of SFI on introducing EM and said there was huge response after the government had introduced EM in all civic schools from Class I to IX.

The student strength had increased remarkably by 3,600 students and added that about 1,600 students took admissions in aided schools. Most parents from BPL families want their children to study in EM so that they would have a bright future. The delay in supply of textbooks was mainly due to large number of students joined EM, he added.

By C Pradeep