Though the new session started on April 1, government schools in the state are yet to receive workbooks under the Mission Samarth.
Consequently, students enrolled under the mission are being taught without workbooks.
Confirming the delay, Amandeep Kaur, director, State Council of Educational Research and Training (SCERT), said the printing process had already started and the books would be available to the students by the end of this month.
When asked what led to the delay in providing the workbooks to the students, Kaur said: “As printing textbooks is a large-scale project, it took time.”
Significantly, the SCERT has been tasked with providing the workbooks to the students under the Mission Samarth which was launched last year in October.
The mission focuses on improving the foundational skills of the students in English, mathematics, and Punjabi for classes 2 to 8.
Under the mission, students are given special classes and study material to help them reach the required learning levels for their age and standard.
A mathematics teacher in Patiala, who is taking the classes under the Mission Samarth, said, “Without workbooks, it seems to be a futile exercise. We are getting teaching material on our phones in the form of PDFs, but the students don’t have workbooks to carry out the assignments mentioned in the teaching material.”
{{/usCountry}}A mathematics teacher in Patiala, who is taking the classes under the Mission Samarth, said, “Without workbooks, it seems to be a futile exercise. We are getting teaching material on our phones in the form of PDFs, but the students don’t have workbooks to carry out the assignments mentioned in the teaching material.”
{{/usCountry}}Vikram Dev, president, Democratic Teacher Front (DTF), said that this delay in providing workbooks speaks volumes of the seriousness of the government towards the mission. “Ideally, workbooks should be handed over to students before the academic session kicks off. Without workbooks, classes under the Mission Samarth are not serving the purpose. This affects teaching,” Dev said. He demanded that these workbooks should be according to the existing syllabus and should not create a parallel curriculum.
Mission on the lines of Delhi’s Mission Buniyaad
The mission was apparently started on the lines of Delhi’s Mission Buniyaad to improve the learning outcomes in government schools. It is the AAP government in Delhi where the programme has been very successful in improving the performance of the students that was depicted in the national achievement survey. Mission Buniyaad was launched by the Delhi government in 2018 to equip the students up to class 8 to strengthen their learning foundation.