|
When Honorable Vice- Chancellor assumed the charge of this great institution he clearly declared his first priority to improve the schools of the university. After studying the working of the schools he scrapped the manager ship and OSD culture of the schools and appointed a committee under able guidance of Mr. R. P. Singh to suggest about up gradation of the schools.
In the light of expected change in the structure and workings of the schools, I want to say something about the university schools. The aim of this is, to know about the opinion of the people regarding the schools and the model if any they have .By this way we can contribute to some extent in the development of the institution .
1 School Structure. Presently there are five schools namely S.T.High School (Minto Circle),A.M.U.Girls High School, A.M.U.City Girls High School (Qazipara) ,City High School and Abdullah Nursery and Primary School ranging from primary to the secondary level running under the university.
Students from the Nursery and Primary school used to promote to different schools for secondary classes e.g. from ANPS to S.T.High school,City High school A.M.U .Girls High School e.tc. So basically there are four primary/Nursery schools which impart education from nursery and Ist class to 5 th class and later promote to different schools either in the internal or external batches. Here there is scope of expansion and mass education for the university schools.
The university administration announcement to start more schools in different localities have a vision which could be materialized if we start more primary schools in different localities and send the passed out to different schools for secondary education in main schools. This main schools should be a secondary schools starts from class VI th and absorb the students from the university primary schools and other schools on the internal and external basis like the present system of entrance examination.
These secondary schools could be turned into a model school. The present S.T.High School and City High school should be turned into a model secondary schools for boys and A.M.U Girls and A.M.U City Girls High school for girls . By this way the university would not only able to do some educational awakening in those localities but also could get regular supply of young brain for the university.
2 Selection Procedure . Selection procedure in a school should be based on entrance for Nursery/ primary section and for class VI and IX for secondary sections as usual going currently in the university schools. The entrance structure of the schools should be based in keeping in the mind of the special need of the minority community for which purpose this great institution was established. The present new entrance test basis is excellent one based on subjective and objective questions. The need is to make it 50 - 50 subjective and objective basis in the future.
3 The Course of Study. The syllabus of the schools should be same as its going on .But certain subjects should be given special importance .e. g computer, information technology etc. In case of Blind students the course of study should be more career oriented than the traditional one.
The one thing which I found and want to high light is the difference of the subject offered to the Urdu medium students and the English medium students. In English language course B is for the Urdu medium and A for English medium students. why not there also be a Mathematics B and A for those students in Urdu group who don’t wish to go for science stream but want to complete his schooling but fail in Mathematics and discontinue the study. Let have a survey of all those students who failed due to this and decide the matter to save the career of educationally backward community.
4 School Controlling Body. After the winding up of the manager ship there is need of the such body and authority which could look and control the day to day working of the schools. University Schools administration needs full time attention and a separate body to looks after.
In my opinion there should be a Directorate of schools headed by a Director and Deputy- director. This directorate should work under the control of the Vice- Chancellor. There should be powerful body of the directorate comprised on the vice chancellor, Registrar, Director of the school, Deputy-director of school, , Controller of examination, Finance Officer, principals of the schools, one eminent educationist ,one psychologist, one chief medical officer, one councilor ,one career guidance expert, and one language expert of Urdu, Hindi and English.
This body supervise the overall functioning of the schools, formulates the all policy and executing the planning for the schools. There should be a separate budget for schools and academic calendar of the schools.
5 Internal Structure of the Schools. The present internal structure of the schools is needed some changes to make it better to work. There is principal or teacher- in-charge depending on the selection or internal promotion on the seniority basis.
The provision of senior succession as the head of the school politicizing the schools. In the case of senior succession there is possibility of toppling of the appointed principal with the help of internal groups. In case of probation of a principal the matter becomes worse. One hand he has to show his skill in administration to win the heart of higher authority and other hand he has to defend and be humble to internal seniors. In my opinion there should be end of the teacher- in- charge ship and creation of the post of vice principal ship on the basis of appointment.
The system of transfer of teachers from one school to another school should be implemented to give teacher more freedom and a change to the students.
6 Examination . The current pattern of examination is good one and which can be improved by taking some more steps. First the university decides that whether it will conduct own board examination for schools or it will go for CBSE examination for common evaluation of educational standard of the schools of the university. under this system the university can place the university schools under CBSE examination with grant of internal ship to the students.
Under this CBSE system the educational standard of both schools and teaching will improve and will give parity to the university schools with other schools on national level. Other hand if university decides to go for own board examination as the case in present, then there is much to do. In the first step to bring the syllabus ,question and marking system up to the CBSE standard. See a case of marking system the topper of AMU schools even cannot get the admission in any prestigious college of India with such a low percentage.
The standard of teaching , examination and competitive spirit can be developed by introducing the external paper of various subjects in the board examination of the schools. In internal examination the pattern of exam has to change. e.g. with four exams there is need to bifurcate the syllabus of exams with 60 and 40 percent from the exercises and the inside of the chapters. The annual and pre- board examination copies of one school should be changed to another school. The centre of Board examination of the schools should be one for all the university schools. And this should be on neutral centre . In term of the evaluation of the answer script there should be some external checkers from the reputed public schools.
7 Annual School Assessment . The performance of the school should be analysis every year both on internal level and external level. On internal level the board of director see this matter and externally this job should be assigned to an agency which having the expertise in evaluation of the work of the schools.
8 Appointment of the Teachers. The present system of appointment needs to be improved. The appointment system should be based on the written test and interview. Written test should be in qualifying nature while the interview decides the fate of the candidates. Teaching job is basically is transmitting the acquired knowledge in various forms to the students .
The need of the schools should also be in consideration while making appointment. In every school there should be appointment of computer teacher as a regular post but unfortunately in some school this post has not been sanctioned. The post of career counselor, and psychologist should be attached to the Director of the school to look after the needs of the schools. In up gradation of teaching and teachers the role of Education department and UGC academic staff college is important.
The Education department should be given the role in up gradation of curriculum, methodology and child oriented research. while the department of psychology can assist by providing service to solve the psychological problem of the students of the schools. Medical of university can help to see the health problems of the school. Medical can provide the service to the schools organizing camps for the students.
9 Boarding House . In present time there are two schools of university which provide the boarding facility to the students. These are S.T High school and AMU Girls High school. Once upon a time the S.T. High School was famous for the boarding house. But due to some reasons it degraded.
The case of violence particularly the beating of warden, burning of the warden house which went unnoticed and without finding the culprit frightened the good teachers to be a warden there. The need of the time is to restructure the boarding house with well qualified teachers as a warden.
In the last the foremost thing is the culmination of missionary zeal among the attached members of the schools. We can do that by adopting a cooperative attitude towards the schools staffs. There are some genuine demands of the schools teachers which they are raising from time to time to the higher authority, that should be given kind consideration. And we hope that by this way a new era of golden period of university schools will begin.
Mohammad Allam PGT (History) ST High School (Minto Circle) AMU Aligarh |
