Do not burden us with non-academic duties: Teachers

A group of teachers from across the state, in a letter, have urged chief minister Uddhav Thackeray to exempt them from nearly 50 non-academic duties that they perform

A group of teachers from across the state, in a letter, have urged chief minister Uddhav Thackeray to exempt them from nearly 50 non-academic duties that they perform through the year.

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“Recently some teachers, who refused to perform the booth-level officer (BLO) duties, citing shortage of staff in their schools, were issued notices by the government. Besides teaching, we are asked to perform census duty, election duty and other tasks like filling data for different schemes among other things. This majorly eats into the time that can otherwise be spent on teaching,” stated the letter.

The state education minister Varsha Gaikwad had recently assured the teachers that the government would not ask them to take part in any non-academic work. However, the teachers claim that their issues are far from resolved.

The education department has also asked teachers to celebrate Pariksha Parv, an initiative by the National Commission for Protection of Child Rights (NCPCR).

As part of the initiative, schools have to organise activities for students to help them cope with exam stress.

“Examinations are a stressful period for school students and teachers. Schools attempt to help students in all possible ways before the examinations. But, introducing something like this just adds to the burden,” said Uday Nare, a teacher at Hansraj Morarji Public School in Andheri.

Officials from the state education department said that the guidelines from the Central government were passed on to schools by education inspectors.