In A’bad dist, 28.71% teachers took part in exam; teachers believe test may be used as pretext to remove them from jobs
Empty benches and lone supervisors at exam centres marked the controversial Shikshak Sajjata Sarvekshan on Tuesday.
The ‘preparedness survey’, a first of its kind by the state government, aims to evaluate primary school teachers to improve quality of education. However, against Gujarat government’s expectation that 1.81 lakh teachers would take the exam, only 57,000 appeared for it.
Later, as a face saving measure, the government cited miscalculation and presented rectified statistics as per which 1.51 lakh teachers were eligible (minus CRC coordinators, divyang schools and schools inspectors) for Tuesday’s test. On Monday, Education Minister Bhupendrasinh Chudasama had claimed that around 1.81 lakh primary teachers had agreed to take the exam.
The exam had become a bone of contention between Gujarat’s primary education department and primary teachers’ association. Chudasama had however said that the sarvekshan was not compulsory and would not reflect on the service books of the teachers.
In Ahmedabad district, around 28.71% teachers appeared for 80 mark sarvekshan. AMC schools’ administrator Lagdhir Desai did not respond to calls made by Mirror to learn about the attendance of municipal school teachers in the exam. The exam included questions from across subjects and tested the candidate’s knowledge on NEP; it even asked teachers to recall what was published on a certain page in a specific textbook.
Ghanshyam Patel of the Adhyapak Rashtriya Shaikshik Mahasangh said the Gujarat government may claim 37% teachers took up the test, but not more than 15% appeared for it. “Their claim of issuing more hall tickets was exposed in the minister’s statements. All teachers showed their distrust in the government’s decision to conduct a teacher’s test,” he said.
Mirror visited not less than six primary schools in west Ahmedabad and found out that no teacher was present at a majority of the schools. The test received a lukewarm response particularly from the municipal school teachers in the city.