Srikakulam dist tops in biometric attendance

SRIKAKULAM: Srikakulam has topped among the 13 districts in the state in implementation of biometric attendance system in government schools when it comes to recording the daily attendance of teachers. As per the officials, the teachers of 72.57 per cent of the schools in the district are registering their attendance through the biometric system, while for the East Godavari and Nellore districts that are ranked second and third, the percentage is 72.65 per cent and 69.88 per cent respectively.

Statistics available with the district education department suggests that of the total 3,006 government schools in Srikakulam, biometric attendance system has been installed at 2,782 schools and the officials say that the rest will have the system very soon.The district ranked third with 92.48 per cent of the schools having been covered, next to Guntur (96.91%) and Krishna (93.15%) districts. As many as 12,240 teachers are working in the primary, upper primary and high schools in the district at present, while the student strength has been put at more than 2.12 lakh.

“To implement the system in full fledge, we have started an awareness drive on biometric attendance. The devices which developed technical snag are being fixed immediately by the trained technicians. Besides, e-Hazar (e-attendance) supervisors have been deployed to keep a strict vigil on the biometric attendance,” said district education officer A Prabhakar Rao.  

As many as 5,591 biometric devices have been installed in 2,782 schools so far, depending on their strength. However, the officials said that the technical snags had emerged as a major barrier, resulting in the poor recording of attendance by the students. At present,  only 5.1 per cent of the total students are recording their biometric attendance in the district when compared to the state average of 1.6 per cent, said the DEO.