Leaders of Andhra Pradesh United Teachers’ Federation (APUTF) on Tuesday called upon teachers across the State to participate in large numbers in the proposed demonstration at the office of the Director of School Education at Ibrahimpatnam, on April 12 and make it a success.
In a statement, federation’s State president N. Venkateswarlu and general secretary K.S.S. Prasad said the teaching community was bogged down by several issues.
Like every other sector, the outbreak of COVID-19 pandemic had an adverse impact on the education sector too. Schools were closed down, exams were cancelled and students had no access to education. Though the government tried to reach out to them through online classes, a large number of students remained outside the realm of the new mode of education as they did not have access to Internet or even smart phones.
The schools were reopened after the first wave of the pandemic saw a considerable decline. But there was a surge in the number of apps introduced by the School Education authorities, burdening the teachers with a plethora of non-teaching activities. They said there were separate apps for attendance of the students and teachers, for schemes like Jagananna Vidya Kanuka, Amma Vodi and for distribution of dry ration to students, among others.
They said the situation was worse in schools that were being run with single teachers, who were barely left with any time to teach the students. Teachers who were given transfers were deprived of salaries for the past few months and there were many other issues that were needed to be addressed on a war-footing, they said.
