With exams round the corner and arts and cultural fests having receded to the background, school campuses in the district are now gearing up for ‘academic fests.’
Launched last year by the General Education Department covering Classes 1 to 7 in aided and government schools, the concept of academic fest has twin major objectives — students exhibiting their academic skills before society in a festive atmosphere and thereby attracting more students, especially to those schools facing shortage of students.
No competition
“This year the fest is being planned in a wider scale and cover upto Class 9, and students will don the roles of both organisers and participants,” said George Bastin, district coordinator, Kerala Education Rejuvenation Campaign.
The idea is to create a platform whereby students can exhibit their acquired knowledge and skills independently and interact with the larger society.
Guidelines for the academic fest strictly direct that it should not be an exam-centric initiative and that students should not be compelled to mug up or undergo constant training. It should neither be a competition nor a platform to compare students.
“Every school will observe a day as academic fest day when various experiments and programmes based on languages and subjects acquired by students will be held in corners either on the school campus or outside. They will strive to convince parents and society that they have in-depth and solid knowledge going beyond the mere need of performing well in exams,” said Mr. Bastin.
Preparations are under way under the aegis of Samagra Shikhsa Kerala to turn academic fests, set to begin in the second week of the month, into popular people’s fests.
An organising committee comprising local self-government members, academic experts and representatives of panchayat education committees, school management committees and parent-teacher associations have been formed for the purpose.
Training for the fest got under way at 15 block resource centres in the district on Wednesday. Apart from a 35-member resource group, a module has also been created for the organisation of the fest.