Tamil Nadu: Will formation of School Management Committees help parents trust government schools again?

One of the major problems that government schools are grappling with is the lack of trust among people in schools run by the State. The provision in the Right to Education Act, 2009, which mandates the formation of school management committees with powers to monitor the functioning of schools, can help change that. According to the RTE Act, 15 of 20 members of the SMCs will be parents.

The formation of these committees, however, never took off in Tamil nadu with only a handful of schools having active SMCs. This might change in the next few years as the School Education Department is taking the initiative to create awareness about the SMCs and reconstitute them through the Nam Palli Nam Perumai scheme. More than 23 lakh parents participated in awareness meetings on School Management Committees held in 37,558 schools across the state on March 20.

Currently, the reconstitution of SMCs is underway in schools in four phases. Chief Minister MK Stalin participated in a function to reconstitute SMC at Lady Willingdon School in Chennai on April 20.

"Since the committees have not been functioning for a long time, it will take time to institutionalise them. The involvement of parents in school's activities will create a sense of community ownership which would help to improve school infrastructure,” said Samagara Siksha Abhiyan (SSA) officials who are taking the initiative for reconstituting SMCs.

“We are aware that the reconstitution of SMCs and making parents spend time discussing the development of schools will not happen overnight. The consistent effort of the department is required for the next five years to ensure that the Nam Palli, Nam Perumai scheme is fully successful. We have now taken the first step towards it,” they added.

Natraj, who runs an NGO and was awarded by the government recently for spreading awareness about SMCs, said, “Taking serious steps to institutionalise SMCs could be one of the important measures in increasing the trust of parents in government schools. This becomes even more important now as enrollment in government schools has increased post-pandemic. We have seen how active SMCs have contributed to the development of schools. This is as important as spending crores of rupees on school infrastructure.”

For the first time, the State Education Department also conducted a digital Out of School Survey through a mobile app, creating a centralised and transparent process where 33,791 surveyors, including teachers and Block Resource Teacher Educators (BRTEs) identified the children who have either dropped out of schools or were never enrolled in any school.

The government also announced Naan Mudhalvan scheme under which career guidance will be provided for more than 10 lakh students from Classes IX to XII annually. The government has spent Rs 3.09 crore on the project so far.

Apart from this, the government is also concentrating on improving facilities at hi-tech labs in schools. Currently, there are 10 computers in each computer lab at 3,090 government high schools and 20 computers in each lab at 2,939 government higher secondary schools. In order to strengthen digital literacy, the government has now planned to create hi-tech labs for middle schools as well.

"In the first phase, hi-tech labs will be created for 1,784 middle schools at a cost of Rs 114.17 crore, which would help bridge the digital divide," officials said.

These labs are also being used to provide Information and Communications Technology (ICT) training to the teachers.