VIJAYAWADA: Education Minister Botsa Satyanarayana said on Monday that schools in the primary level in AP have been merged to lay a solid foundation for students in AP.
The government has undertaken revolutionary reforms in the education sector with the aim of preparing Telugu students to compete at the global level, he said.
Addressing a press meet here, the minister pointed out that the merger was done as part of the implementation of the National Education Policy. Along with LKG, UKG, classes I and II are arranged in one place and under the supervision of two Anganwadi teachers and two other teachers.
The curriculum is being designed and taught in such a way as to lay a solid foundation for the students at the basic level.
The minister said the government is always positive about solving the problems of teachers. “Recently, many teachers' unions have brought the problems of teachers to our attention. The government took appropriate measures to resolve them immediately,” he said.
He said that two teachers were given to a school instead of one teacher, while the 49 periods were shortened to 36. Principals and PDs were also given to high schools.
There will be continuous training programmes for teachers. While mapping 5,800 schools in the state, objections were received from 268 schools. Joint collectors have been assigned the responsibility to look into the problems of those schools, he said.
Satyanarayana said that in the past, private schools deviated from the government syllabus and used to prepare textbooks in the form of guides and sell them at high prices. As directed by the government, the books have been printed without changing even a single letter. “We are giving the books free of cost in government schools and we will give them to private schools too if they ask for it.”
The shortage of textbooks has arisen because the owners of private schools have not given details of the requirements. All the private schools should hand over the correct invoices to the government, and 660 printing presses in the state have been temporarily under the government's control to print them immediately, the minister said.
He said the government will also provide the newsprint for printing textbooks. Within a fortnight, all the required textbooks will be handed over to the private schools, he said.
