The Government of Andhra Pradesh's proposal to take over aided schools and merge them with government schools continues to draw flak from parents and management. Instead of a merger, the government should constitute a recruitment board and fill the vacant teacher posts in the aided schools to benefit the students, teachers association leaders opined.
A couple of months ago, the government had directed the management of aided educational institutions to either run their institutions on their own or hand them over to the government. According to the information provided by the state education department officials, there are around 2,203 private-aided schools across the state with 1.96 lakh students in total, apart from 6,700 teachers. When it comes to aided junior colleges, the state has 182 of them and as many as 71,035 students are pursuing their education in them. Over 2.50 lakh students are studying in 116 aided degree colleges.
READ ALSO : Govt not forcing any aided educational institutions to be taken over by them: AP Education Minister
''Most of the private aided schools in the state were founded post-independence by Christian missionaries and religious organisations. The state government provides salaries for teaching and non-teaching staff at aided institutions. Since 2004, promotions for existing staff and filling of vacant posts has been stalled. Steps should be taken by the government for filling up the vacant teacher posts in the aided institutions instead of seeking consent for merger with the government,” said Municipal Teachers Federation’s (MTF) President S Ramakrishna.
The same is the case with Andhra Pradesh Patasala Parents Association (APPA) and they have also asked the government to stop the Amma Vodi scheme for students in aided schools and allow them to function as usual by filling up the vacant teacher posts. P Chandram, President, APPA, said, ''Already, several parents have approached the judiciary opposing the government's proposal to merge aided schools. The High Court, after going through the petition, has directed the state government not to stop the release of grant-in-aid to government-aided schools in case they are unwilling to merge with the government. Taking the students' future into consideration, the government should recall its proposal and allow aided schools to function as usual by filling the vacant teacher posts to maintain the teacher-pupil ratio properly."
Meanwhile, Education Minister Adimulapu Suresh made it clear that the state government is not forcing any aided educational institutions to merge with the government. More than 137 degree colleges have responded positively, of which, managements of seven colleges have agreed on paper that they are willing to give up their staff along with their properties, 124 colleges have agreed to surrender only their staff, not the property, and run them as private colleges.
The minister said that out of 122 junior colleges, five junior colleges have opted to surrender their properties along with their staff while 103 junior colleges opted to surrender their staff too. When it comes to schools, 1,200 out of 1,988 of them have agreed on paper to surrender their staff and 88 schools opted to surrender properties along with their staff. ''In case private educational institutions are willing to hand over their schools to the government for better management, we are ready to improve the infrastructure under the Nadu-Nedu programme and fill the teaching vacancies to ensure better education for students," the minister said.
