City rounds up runaway students

Despite being the capital of the state, Hyderabad’s effort to attain RTE objectives has been beset by a lack of coordination between the education department and the Rajiv Vidya Mission (Sarva Siksha Abhiyan).  While authorities pat themselves on the back for identifying runaway students and sending them back to school, their failure to make private schools adhere to a uniform fee structure has been criticised. V N Mastanaiah, project director of Rajiv Vidya Mission (Sarva Siksha Abhiyan) says RTE achievements in Hyderabad have been considerable if not spectacular. As many as 12,000 out-of-school children have been accommodated in various schools in the district last year. ‘’It may not be a great achievement, but we are serious about RTE.’’ The mission aims at sending at least 15,000 out-of-school children back to their text-books this year. The district administration has set up 16 new schools and 11 special education centres dispensing bridge courses. ‘’We have set up teams of special officers to educate parents to send their kids to schools,’’ Mastanaiah added.  One of the factors militating against keeping poor children in school is migration. Migrant labourers tend not to stay in one place for a full academic year with the result that their children are pulled out of schools as and when they have to move out. To facilitate their readmission to other school s, the authorities plan to issue such children certificates of study.  While achieving a modicum of success on curbing dropout rate, the education authorities have proved powerless in reining in private school managements, who have ignored the deadline set for rationising their fee structure. Collector Natarajan Gulzar made a deadline to these school managements to fix single fee structure by June 28.

By Mouli Mareedu

moulimareedu@gmail.com