Process starts to fill 12000 posts of teachers
CHANDIGARH: Punjab Education department has proposed to start Common Entrance Test (CET) for admission into JBT colleges and
discontinue the Teacher Eligibility Test(TET) which is taken at the time of recruitment into government service. This was revealed by Education Minister Dr. Daljit Singh Cheema in an interview with Satinder Bains Editor of Punjab News Express. He also said that his department would soon recruit 12, 000 teachers to fill the vacancies.
Dr. Cheema said that TET has failed to serve its purpose in the back drop of mushrooming of JBT colleges in many states where no standards of education are being maintained. He said that these colleges were producing an army of unemployed every year. Only 10 percent of them are able to clear the TET which is pre-condition for entry onto government service. He said that the purpose of starting entrance test was to check the intelligence level of students at the time of admission into JBT colleges. The rest of the students who are not fit for teaching may go for other professional courses or take up skill learning courses.
"More than 80 applications for opening new colleges were lying on my table when I took over the department. The first thing I did was issued an order to put blanket ban on new colleges" he stated.
Dr. Cheema who has earned goodwill of his department and people for his systematic improvement of the education system said that his first aim was to streamline the primary education. The dual system of eduction department and Panchayat department running parallel schools in the villages was leading to wastage of resources. After the merger of Panchayato Raj schools into Education department and rationalization of posts, about 6500 teachers were spared who were appointed in rural schools. He said that about 257 schools were closed where there were no children or fake admission were shown by some teachers to maintain their posts. He said that no riral school is closed as such and one school is merged into the other where two schools were operating in neighborhood.
Dr. Cheema said that about 12000 vacancies of teachers were lying vacant in the schools. The department has already moved the file to fill 12000 posts of teachers and primary and secondary level schools. He said that almost all eligible candidates who had cleared the TET would get the jobs. He also said that steps had been taken to eliminate contract system from education department. There will be no contractual recruitment on future but system of fixed pay recruitment of teachers for three years would be leading to automatic regularization of jobs after three years.
Dr. Cheema further said that he had taken the initiative of reintroducing the examination at primary and middle standard level. He said that it was unfortunate the previous UPA government at center had introduced 'No-detention' claise in the Right to Education(RTE) Act. It had ruined the education standards and children were not able to go beyond 8th class. He said that he had taken up the issue with the Union Minister of Human Resource Development who agreed in principal. All other states also supported the demand. "In any case amendment is not made in the RTE, Punjab would go ahead with its own examination system in 5th and 8th class", he added.
Dr. Cheema said that he was shocked to see the poor standard of teachers in schools. Recently during a direct interaction with the teachers from all over the state, he found that only 20 percent of them can correctly spell the English words used in routine working. "We are going for orientation programme for such teachers", he told.
Dr.Cheema said that he had also changed the policy of giving state rewards to best performing teachers. He said that earlier teachers were asked to submit their names for getting reward. No sincere teacher would request the government of give him reward. So this time we have asked to District Education Officers to recommend the names of good teachers for best teacher award and also allowed others to submit their applications. It would encourage the good teachers, he added.