Inadequate teaching staff impacts VMC schools
Inadequate teaching staff is plaguing schools run by Vijayawada Municipal Corporation (VMC) in the city.
As many as 131 teacher posts are lying vacant in municipal schools in the city, as there has been no recruitment for the past few years. While the sanctioned strength is 924 teachers, only 793 teachers are working in more than 100 schools run by the VMC.
The sanctioned strength of teaching staff in primary schools is 367 as against the existing staff of 311 teachers. Likewise, sanctioned strength for Upper Primary and High Schools is 557. But, 75 posts are lying vacant impacting the Corporation’s target of achieving 100 per cent results in SSC examinations. Existing fleet of teachers would meet the requirements, sources say.
Till a year ago, the VMC used to manage the show with Vidya Volunteers. Services of about 330 Vidya Volunteers used to fill the gap. The Right to Education Act (RTE Act) has prohibited recruitment of Vidya Volunteers. So, the VMC had to discontinue the Vidya Volunteer system in 2013.
The government had planned to continue the same system with a different name -- Educational Academic Instructors. But, all those posts were not filled up so far. Only 36 part-time instructors were recruited, says UTF Krishna district president S.P. Manohar Kumar.
As many as 23 non-language teacher (school assistant) posts are lying vacant. Of this, eight are mathematics teachers, five are social studies teachers, six physical sciences and four natural sciences teacher posts in Telugu medium schools. 38 Telugu Secondary Grade Teachers (SGTs) and 17 Urdu SGT posts are also vacant. The corporation schools require four PETs, two drawing teachers, a craft teacher and two music teachers, sources say.
The VMC authorities have sent the requirement proposals to the government. They feel that the staff crunch is likely to ease if the State government conducted District Selection Committee (DSC) examination and filled up vacant teacher posts.
(Article in HINDU NEWS PAPER ON 26-11-2014)