Jagan Aims to Elevate Government School Education

VIJAYAWADA: Chief Minister Y.S. Jagan Mohan Reddy has directed the school education department to initiate all requisite steps to ensure that the quality of education in government schools is better than that in private schools.

Quality must be ensured in both teaching and the amenities being provided to students in government schools, he said while chairing a high-level review meeting on school education here on Thursday. Chief Secretary K.S. Jawahar Reddy and senior officials were present at the meeting.

Jagan Mohan Reddy said the government had introduced English as a medium of instruction and took up digitalisation of classrooms under the Nadu-Nedu programme. He called for the formulation of guidelines to introduce the International Baccalaureate syllabus in government schools so that the level of education would be higher. “There is the need to take up a study on the launch of the IB syllabus in a phased manner,” he said.

He also asked for the formulation of guidelines for the integration of the current syllabus with the IB syllabus to ensure an easy and smooth transition to the combined syllabus for government schools.

The CM directed the officials to ensure Internet connectivity to the schools having IFP and smart TVs by December to make available to students the online lessons from their textbooks.

Officials informed the CM that they were providing the same content in smartphones, phone SD cards, YouTube channel, IFP, authorised websites and e-school DTHs. In the first assignment held in August for students from classes three to nine, nearly 91.33 per cent of students appeared for the exams in English medium, they said.

The Chief Minister enquired with them about the preparation of students for TOEFL and felt the need to provide at least half an hour every day to train them.

The officials informed the CM that the students were being trained for three days in three periods.

Efforts were on to teach artificial intelligence (AI) as a  special subject to the students from Class 6 onwards in government schools in addition to reaching out to the nearby engineering colleges to provide teaching and training on AI to the students.

“We shall introduce a new app to teach lessons on AI soon,” they said.

As for the special drive to find out how many students were pursuing their studies by attending schools promptly, the officials informed the CM that the full quota of students was attending schools in primary education, 96.94 per cent in the senior secondary wing and 74.9 per cent in the higher secondary wing. Some 83.52 lakh students from classes 1 to 10 were attending schools in the state.

Later, the CM enquired with officials about the progress of works taken up under Mana Badi Nadu-Nadu and said the government was according top priority for providing tasty and nutritious food to the students. He asked officials to focus on weak students and those suffering from anaemia, during the Arogya Suraksha programme, and provide them with nutritious diet and medicines.