Textbook printing hits snags

Official blames ambiguity about uniform curriculum, delay to affect millions of students

LAHORE:

Around three million school students in all districts of Punjab are facing problems because of a delay in the provision of the textbooks.

According to sources in the Punjab School Education Department, the students of sixth to ninth classes have not yet been given the books for the next academic year due to delays in their printing.

The textbooks may not be available till August, the sources said. School teachers warned that the affected students, whose number across the province is estimated at about three million, would be unable to do summer vacation homework and their studies might be affected because of the less available time with the books during the academic year.

Around 600,000 primary school students in the provincial capital have also not received the textbooks for the new academic year, causing concern among the teachers and parents.

A leader of the Punjab Teachers Union (PTU) said the provincial government should immediately take steps to expedite the demand the Punjab government to immediately took notice of this situation and the process of printing books should be started.

The crisis of delay in the printing of the school textbooks appears to have been exacerbated by the ongoing political uncertainty and alleged mismanagement.

There has been no school education minister in the province for the past several weeks and the officials concerned have not been told to give an explanation for the delay.

In addition to some other academic issues, the most serious problem is that the textbooks have not been distributed in the middle and high schools in any district.

The students and teachers fear that in addition to the time already lost, government schools in Punjab will be closed from June 1 for two months for summer vacations. The teachers say they will not be able to assign homework for the vacations to the students.

"There is a delay in the printing of books for classes six to nine and the books will not be available in the coming weeks. The reason is that there has been no meeting on printing the books due to the current political situation as we don't know whether the books will be printed following the Single National Curriculum or the old curriculum," a senior official of the school education department told The Express Tribune.

The official said the incumbent government would have to decide about the curriculum but discussions in this regard had not been held.

"We have prepared 80 per cent textbooks of compulsory subjects class one to five and we are sending those for distribution. However, for classes six to nine we are awaiting the government's instructions," the official added.

He said around 3.8 million books for primary classes had been a printer and Lahore's students would receive them before the start of summer vacations.

"Teachers and parents are worried due to the non-availability of the books. The government should take the matter seriously as it is causing millions of students' time to be wasted". These students will spend two months of summer vacations without the books and there will be a burden on teachers to complete the course afterward," PTU secretary general Rana Liaqat Ali.

He said the chief minister should take notice of the matter. "We need the books before the summer vacations but there is only one week left," he lamented.

Published in The Express Tribune, May 24^th, 2022.