With a view to teach English to the students, a proposal has been sent to the state’s department of primary and secondary education from the Samagra Shikshan Abhiyan (SSA) to start 1,000 more English medium schools in the existing government Kannada medium schools.The government had last year started English medium in 1,000 schools for class-I students, making the schools bi-lingual.
However, sources said that owing to opposition from pro-Kannada activists, officials are unsure of if the proposal will be accepted. "Last year, the government order came in mid-May which gave little time to pick out schools, advertise to children’s parents and train teachers. Nearly 200 schools ended up having less than the stipulated number of 30 students for English medium. For the next year, the current English medium teachers for class-I will teach the same batch of students going to class 2. We plan to train existing Kannada medium teachers for six days for the next batch of class-I students," a source said.
However, all this is subject to the government’s approval to the proposal and in time. The proposal was sent one and a half months back and the officials are hoping the government order would come by February so that they can begin preparations for the academic year 2020-2021. "The Directorate of Minorities has proposed to start English medium in 400 of the more than 4000 existing government Urdu medium schools that also fall under the department of public instruction. A list of the schools is already made, but the financial modalities are still being worked out," the source said.
Funds for teacher training, preparation of classrooms and teaching-learning material are sought from the directorate, the source said. When we contacted, Umashankar, principal secretary to the department, said,”Proposals made for English medium in schools is still being discussed. None of them has been finalised as yet. We will take a decision soon so that it does not affect the next academic year 2020-21.”
