Call centre to help harassed students

Parents of a class V student, studying in a corporate school at Khairatabad dialled the call centre and complained their child Sanjana (name changed on request) was harassed by her class teacher. In another call, this time from a Class X student brought out how 250 students studying in the government high school were facing problems due to lack of proper facilities like toilets, blackboards and others.  With a number of cases reported from different schools on sexual harassment, persistent attacks on students and other academic related issues, the Hyderabad district educational officer has set up a call centre with two different 10-digit numbers to receive grievances from parents, students, teachers and school managements.  In a different case, a senior faculty member of an international school expressed her displeasure over the management failing to give increments since the past two years. she requested the staff to forward her complaint to higher officials for further action. Interestingly, the call centre staff receive a number of complaints from parents on teachers giving corporal punishments in private schools, while students call about lack of proper facilities in government-run primary and high schools.  “Ever since we set up the call centre five days ago, we received as many as 120 calls on an average per day. We set up this to address problems of parents, teachers and managements. We have also trained zonal officials to tackle problems,” said P Suseendhra rao, district educational officer.He added that it was necessary to keep track of what was happening in all the district schools. “Once we receive a complaint from respective persons, we invite them to the nearby zonal office and take complete details of the case. then, we initiate counselling to the person who defaults. If any school is found guilty of giving corporal punishments to students, we will not hesitate to cancel their recognition,’’ he warned.  Rao said most students failed in coping up with their academics due to lack of attention from parents. “I have personally dealt a case where both parents are It professionals. they fail to give time to their only child studying in a corporate school. parents complained that the class teacher had punished their kid as their daughter had not done her homework. reason: parents never ask about their kid’s home work due to their hectic work schedule. this kind of attitude causes problems for most students,” Rao added.  Parents, teachers and school managements can lodge their complaints with the district educational officer at the following numbers: 9346283557 or 9346284556.   

By Mouli Mareedu

moulimareedu@gmail.com