Kerala - Thiruvananthapuram   

Methodical teaching paid dividends: Baby

THIRUVANANTHAPURAM: Education Minister M.A. Baby has attributed the increase in the pass percentage in the SSLC examination to improvement in the standard of education.

In an article released to the press on Wednesday, he said that to begin with, monthly clusters were held methodically. At these one-day meetings, the teachers discussed how the lessons to be taught could be handled in a better manner.

The meetings also came up with practical solutions to overcome the problems being faced. The teachers discussed each month’s lessons in detail and shared their experiences and ideas.

Expert teams were deputed in each educational sub- district to provide the academic backing. On Site Support Teams (OSST) led by the DEOs visited high schools. They demonstrated how classes should be engaged and cleared doubts. The subject councils of schools were strengthened.

A new culture of functioning was the speciality of the year. Some teachers’ organisations that had initially viewed these activities with suspicion, started cooperating when they began producing results.

All these activities influenced the learning at the classroom level. These academic activities, which were implemented without any publicity, provided clarity and inspiration to teachers.

The Minister contended that the ultimate result of the entire exercise was methodical learning in each institution. It was only natural for it to reflect in the results. He wanted issues to be viewed in their totality instead of delinking them from their background.

The monthly review meetings of the officials held last year had tremendous impact. Officials from the level of DEOs had participated in these meetings. It was a novel get-together of leaders.

These meetings led to the percolation of the government’s will power to the level of officials.

The observance of the ‘Efficiency year’ was not confined to slogans but translated into reality through an action plan. The gains of it would become more pronounced in the coming years.

He pointed out that the pass percentage had been increasing by over 10 per cent every year. It increased from 58.49 in 2005, to 68 the following year, 82.29 last year and 92.09 this year. This year’s pass percentage was not a miracle which took place all of a sudden. He wondered why this fact was being concealed. To protect whom was the progress in the field of general education being ridiculed, he asked. Prior to that period, from 2000 to 2004, the SSLC results were announced with big moderation marks.

The actual pass percentage and the pass percentage after moderation were 42.89 and 56.18 in 2000, 43.58 and 56.22 in 2001, 49.91 and 60.82 in 2002, 52.52 and 64.85 in 2003 and 56.69 and 70.60 in 2004. Instead of encouraging the trend of awarding marks in that manner, an attempt was made during the period after that to produce good results by improving teaching.

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