Super Dull, Dull...Bright or Super Bright?

RAMANATHAPURAM: Despite the Tamil Nadu School Education department’s ban on schools holding classes during summer holidays, private schools in Ramanathapuram district are doing just that. Worse, in classes being held for those starting Plus Two, students are being ‘graded’ as per their SSLC exam marks.

“We are split into five groups: Super Dull, Dull, Medium, Bright, Super Bright, in our school, based on marks we scored in SSLC examination,” said one student on condition of anonymity. If you thought the classes were aimed at helping the ‘Super Dull’ you’d be wrong.

“Special classes are being conducted for the 90 students who fall under Bright and Super Bright categories. If we take leave, teachers put us in the Dull group. We pay `900 for the classes,” said the student. It has been learnt that similar grading is done at other schools as well.

On May 8, the School Education Department issued its annual notice to all Chief Educational Officers (CEOs) asking them to ensure private schools did not hold classes during the holidays.

But sources said students whose parents opposed special classes were threatened with expulsion forcing the beleaguered children to turn to the Childline helpline. On May 10, district Childline officials wrote to Ramnad CEO R Murugan urging him to take action. “We have received several phone calls to our toll-free number from students of different private schools that are conducting special classes... We have received complaints about as many as 10 private schools across the district,” reads the letter.

It’s bad enough that private school students are being grouped by their marks and forced to attend classes despite school education department directives, but at one private school in the district, classes were shifted to a hospital run by the school management to avoid detection from the authorities.

“We feel like patients. Even my parents do not agree with the school management, but they are scared to question them,” said a student of that school who was attending special classes. When contacted, the school authorities admitted that the classes were being conducted at a hospital but said the school had made it clear that the classes were optional. “It is the parents who want to bring the children for the classes,” a school official said.

“Students have become vulnerable to communicable deceases with the special class being conducted in a hospital. Are they patients or students? Secondly, splitting the students into best and worst groups is totally illegal. It’s actually discrimination. That is the reason the School Education Department dropped the ranking system last year. Private schools are conducting special classes for the bright students to ensure they get better results for the school,” said a local school education department official. When contacted by Express, CEO R Murugan said that he would look into the issue.