Minister for School Education, Hajj and Auqaf and Tribal Affairs, Chowdhary Zulfkar Ali, today ordered de-clubbing of government educational institutions that had earlier been clubbed due to less enrolment.“Education, being an effective instrument for creating a progressed and prosperous society, is receiving special focus of the present dispensation and all the schools are being equipped with modern infrastructure and highly qualified staff to make these institutions centres of excellence”, the Minister maintained.The Education Minister said this while chairing a review meeting of education sector of Jammu, Samba and Kathua districts.Minister for Health and Medical Education Devinder Kumar Manyal, Minister of State for Education, Shakti Raj Parihar, Legislators Priya Sethi, Devender Singh Rana, Choudhary Sukhnandan Kumar, Rajesh Gupta, Rajeev Sharma, Jeevan Lal, Dr Krishan Lal, Kuldeep Raj, Charanjit Singh Khalsa, Vikram Randhawa were also present in the meeting.The meeting reviewed functioning of constituency wise institutions, student enrollment, literacy rate, staff availability including teachers, principals, lecturers, ZEOs, Headmasters and others, overall result for the year 2017-18, financial and physical status of ongoing construction works, proposed capital expenditure budget for the current session, approved works under TAMEIR plan, mid day meal scheme, model schools, proposal for up-gradation of schools, Financial and physical progress of construction works under Swachh Bharat Swachh Vidyalaya Abhiyan, Rashtriya Madhyamik Shiksha Abhiyan and others.The Minister was informed that a total of 91415 students are enrolled in government schools in Jammu districts with zero percent dropout rate as per UDISE 2017-18. The total literacy rate of Jammu district is 83.45 %.The Minister directed the Director School Education to expedite the recruitment process for the post of Class 4th in a time bound manner.
Taking strong cognizance of poor performance of some of the schools, the Minister instructed the Director to take action against the erring officers and teachers who have registered zero percent result. He also asked for ascertaining the reasons behind poor academic performance of students so that requisite measures are initiated to improve the results.The Minister said that elementary education is of immense importance for laying a strong foundation for students' future which is being taken care of by the present government. “Qualitative improvement in the education system in government schools and filling up of infrastructural gap is the top priority of the government”, he asserted.The Minister said that the government and people have high expectations from the teaching community as they are the real architects of future. He asked the teaching fraternity to engage children in objective learning through latest teaching-learning methods to improve quality of primary education in the government schools.The Minister stressed upon the need of effective working of Village Education Committees as these play significant role in micro-planning and prepare the school development plan including requirement of buildings, toilets and drinking water facilities,” he said.All the legislators highlighted various issues of their respective constituencies which inter alia include formulation of long term policy to improve the overall quality of education in the state to further perk up the literacy rate, rationalization of staff to maintain the student- teacher ratio, infrastructural up-gradation, sanitation, incentivizing rural postings, appointment of subject specific teachers, capacity building programmes for teachers, posting of Zonal Education Officers (ZEOs) and Chief Education Officers (CEOs). The government has approved engagement of 20,000 watch-and-wards in schools for security and safety of students and educational infrastructure as well” he asserted.
The Minister asked for making Urdu language, being official dialect in the state, as compulsory subject in government as well as private institutions upto primary level. He called for exempting teachers from all non-academic duties in the larger interest of the student community. The Minister directed the concerned officers to provide desks to Government Higher School Ghagwal and fill the vacant post of ZEO at Khour. He also directed to expedite the process of construction of Auditorium at Akhnoor.The Minister directed the concerned authorities to vacate all the unsafe school buildings so as to avoid any untoward incident on this account.The Minister exhorted upon the teaching fraternity to uphold the dignity and sanctity of this noble profession by discharging their duties with utmost sincerity and devotion as the onus of shaping the nation’s future lies on them.The Minister welcomed the suggestions of the Legislators and assured them that the same would be incorporated to streamline the functioning of the department.The Minister urged upon the legislators to keep a strict monitoring over the functioning of schools in their respective areas to ensure that these institutions of education served their best. He also asked them to pay frequent visits to these schools so that they could project the needs and requirement there like infrastructure, staff, teachers and others.Minister of State for School Education Shakti Raj Parihar, said that education department have a great role in shaping the future of students who are builders of a strong Nation. With the introduction of various reformative initiatives in education, the sector has shown notable improvement in its functioning.Among others, Secretary School Education Farooq Ahmad Shah, Deputy Commissioner Kathua, Rohit Khajuria, Additional Secretary, Joint Director Planning, State Project Directors SSA and RMSA, Director School Education, ADC Samba, ADDC Jammu, Personal Officer Directorate School Education Jammu, Chief Education Officers, Zonal Education Officers, Principals of DIET and other senior officers of the department attended the meeting.