Day after BSEH results, Panchkula educationists play blame game

“The performance of Panchkula students has indeed been poor. The vacant posts in some schools also affected the results. Even if one subject teacher is not in school, students of that subject suffer, and they get re-appear. We have also learnt, that there was an imbalance in the student-teacher ratio,” said District Education Officer (DEO), Savitri Sihag. Apart from teachers, there is also a shortage of staff.

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“There were a few schools, which did not have en English teacher for Class-XII, and students got re-appear,” said Block Education Officer (BEO), Barwala, Satpal Kaushik, adding that they have brought the issue to the notice of authorities many times in the past.

“The problem is more in rural areas, especially in upper hilly areas. Shortage of teachers is a persistent problem,” said BEO Morni, M S Sandhu. The imbalance in student-teacher ratio is another concern.“We have sent the proposal to fill a total of 90 vacant posts of teachers across schools in the district, and also proposed rationalization, to ensure that teachers in schools are appointed as per the requirement,” added Sihag.

The state of education in government schools has been poor since last few years, with low pass percentage being recorded each year. Last year, 45.51 per cent students passed the Class-X exam, while, in 2013, only 35.61 per cent students managed to pass, and in 2012, the pass percentage was 54.17%.

“The change in government education policies is also one of the reasons, mainly, the non-detention policy under RTE, which compel the school to pass students till Class-8th, even if they have not learnt anything. The Class-8th board examinations were scrapped, or else, students, teachers and parents used to get serious towards studies in Class-8th. Now, they are complacent. Ab koi darr nai hota unhe,” said Indu Bala, a former Principal of a government school in Panchkula.

There is not much difference in the pass percentage of rural and urban students. While, the pass percentage in rural area is 40.74 per cent, it is 43.02 per cent in urban areas in the state. Though, private schools have fared somewhat better than government schools.

Sharing close proximity with Chandigarh, where the students of government schools have been performing fairly well in Board examinations, the performance of government schools has been dismal in Panchkula.

When questioned, Sihag said, that the proximity to Chandigarh, has instead been a disadvantage. “We lose our best students to Chandigarh, as they prefer taking admission in government schools there after Class-9th, keeping the reservation for Chandigarh students in mind during college admissions,” she added.