Skip to main content

Public schools failing our future generation



Every time I pass by Durbar School opposite to Rani Pokhari, the sheer magnificence of the building amazes me. Last week I took a detour and walked inside the compound for the first time. I knew it was neglected but didn’t realize to what extent. It’s a pity. Durbar School isn’t an exception and there are many public schools that need some serious monitoring to check whether the children are receiving quality education or not. It is time the government takes stringent measures towards restoring and protecting historical architecture including the monitoring of public schools that are in dire needs of students mainly due to their depilated conditions. The rate of admission in our public school is minimal which should be of serious concern.
Although the drive to upgrade secondary schools to higher secondary (HS) seems like a right thing to do. I was lucky to visit some public schools and I noticed many public schools in Kathmandu and other districts are facing more serious and bigger problems – students aren’t enrolling themselves to the public higher secondary schools. So where are they going? 

I spoke to few school teachers in Kathmandu, Chitwan and Bardiya and although they were quick to respond to my questions, every one requested their schools names be withheld. This is ridiculous I thought, but then nobody wants trouble. One of the HS Schools in Sanepa has managed to receive only fifteen students in grade XI this year. Last year they received only six students. It’s a pity that these students from grade XI and XII do not have a dedicated class teacher. The Education Department does not ensure that schools have teachers assigned to teach various subjects. In the meantime we have schools being registered haphazardly by District Education Offices without proper verification to ensure that they meet minimum government criteria. One of the graduates Sikha (name changed) of the school was approached by the school’s teacher to help.  Sikha agreed but she does not receive any salary for teaching these two grades and she is considered a paid volunteer – NPR 150 per day. There are four paid volunteers in this school. 

The HS School in Madi, Chitwan and another HS School in Jagatpur, Chitwan have resorted to similar fates. The maintenance funds allocated to each public school is minimal to the extent that schools are forced to seek exam and admission fees despite the fact that all public schools cannot charge a single penny to the students. There are students whose parents cannot afford to pay the admission and exam fees which force many students to drop. 

Principal, HS School, Chitwan said, “We are doing everything we can to keep the students in school. But we also have to charge minimal admission and exam fees otherwise we won’t be able to pay our teachers.”

A Lower Secondary (LS) School in Banghusri, Padnaha VDC, Bardiya is facing the wrath of funding problems. “One of the main reasons we have been able to attract students is because of the lunch money we provide through the day meal program initiated by the government – 12rs per day,” said one of the members of the school board. Although LS School is a public school, it also faces similar problems – lack of teachers for all classes. The school is forced to hire part time teachers who are paid through the community fund and the forest user’s group fund. 

It is illegal to charge students’ admission and exam fees but schools have to hire private tutors and the burden ultimately falls on the students. 

One of the students studying in HS School, Chitwan said, “We have all managed to pass the SLC with great difficulties. My parents cannot afford to pay the admission fees for grade XI so I will either go to Malaysia or Qatar. My future is sealed.”

The Principal nodded in agreement and added, “We have lost many students because they know even if they study through high school they won’t get a proper job so their parents prefer foreign employment for their children. And many families are building concrete houses with their boys sending them money from abroad.”

With more than half of the potential high school students leaving for foreign employment, public high schools will continue declining enrollment rates. It reminds me of the HS School in Sanepa which managed to enroll only fifteen students this year. 

I asked Sikha why there isn’t a dedicated teacher for grades XI and XII and the reason for the drop in enrollment, and she answered, “There are many reasons. This school in Sanepa falls in the route where none of the public vehicles ply but because there aren’t any dedicated teachers for the higher grades, and classes are irregular. Almost all teachers are affiliated to one or other political party and hence no one cooperates. The children suffer and those who can afford will by all means go to a private high school.”

While the parliament members are struggling with the much delayed constitution writing process, the state is overlooking a crucial gap – quality education for our future generation is still farfetched.

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

A letter to my future teenage daughter

My dear daughter, you are only seven today but you will soon be seventeen. And when you become 17 I know the world will no longer be the same for you and I. We will be together in the same house but we will be distant apart in our heart and head. I was once 17 you know. And like everything else nothing is constant so before you grow up too fast I am writing a letter to you and the million other 17 year olds just like you. Love life - you are going to fall in love - hard. So hard that you are often dizzy with love. A love that is insignificant but withholds you from achieving all your dreams. Dreams that you dreamt when you were barely ten. Dreams that your parents dreamt for you when they first held you in their warm loving arms. Dreams that your mother dreamt for you when you were just a tadpole in her growing tummy. You are 17 and you have just graduated high school. At the verge of becoming an adult. You think you are big enough to make decisions and that you know the best f...
14 comments
Read more

#mymetoo

The first time I saw a picture of vagina was when I was in grade three. The vaginas would always show up in our bathroom walls. Drawn with coal, often the pubic hair sprouting in every direction. I went to an all-girls boarding school and the only males we had in our school were cooks and bera dais. There was also this son of a housekeeper in charge and an unknown lunatic who would flash his nuts from the back of our dormitory which was situated right below the pine trees, occasionally. Of course, we never saw his face or the fact that he was never caught didn’t surprise me even back then. These were the kind of things I believe weren’t considered dangerous. I was too young to think about the perpetrator. I had never thought about those vaginas scrawling for almost three decades and suddenly I now realize that those drawings were in many ways the first kind of sexual assault for me or for my friends. I and my friends would stare at the scrawling quickly and never talk about it l...
Post a Comment
Read more

Leave the girls alone

Recently I read an article written by an Indian woman on how she forgot to raise her son well while she paid particular attention to raising her daughter to be an equal citizen. When we talk about gender equality we often focus on girls. How we should raise them - encourage them to fight for their right; admit them to the best schools; never tell them ‘they can’t do it’ and raise their expectations rather too high. I am a mother to a six year old girl and I often cringe every time I tell her – she can do anything if she wants. While we focus too much on raising our girl’s right we forget to pay attention to our sons.  I lived all my life in a boarding school, the first ten years in an all-girls school. Life wasn’t smooth. We felt foreign to the other gender. We giggled and burst out crazy if a boy approached us. We acted nonsensical at times. We didn’t know how or what they were. They were exclusive – all we saw was the other gender – foreign - boys. We lived in our own b...
Post a Comment
Read more