Education woes: Teachers boycott, SED claims grievances addressed

‘Punjab Teachers’ Union does not represent all teachers in the province’.

LAHORE:

Teachers across the province boycotted classes on Friday after a call for a two day-boycott was given by the Punjab Teachers’ Union.

The School Education Department and the PTU had held talks on Thursday afternoon, but PTU officials later said they were not satisfied with the outcome and called for a boycott of academic activities.

SED Additional Secretary General Ahmed Ali Kamboh told The Express Tribune that teachers’ grievances had been addressed during talks on Thursday afternoon. He said union members had had reservations about administrative matters, particularly regarding the implementation of the policy for rationalization of teachers’ strength at schools.

The PTU had staged a protest on Thursday outside the civil secretariat. They had spoken against the rationalisation policy and non-academic duties, among other things.

Kamboh said after the talks, instructions had been issued by the department addressing the demands that were in line with the department’s policy and service rules.

An SED official said the rationalisation policy aimed at transferring teachers from ‘over-staffed’ schools to ‘under-staffed’ schools, and did not take into consideration the teachers’ specialisations. He said the ‘surplus’ teachers were being sent to other schools without any consideration for the subject-wise need for teachers at the under-staffed schools. “An English teacher cannot teach science at an under-staffed school. You need to provide teachers with relevant strengths”, said the official.

An SED notification issued on April 3, directed district coordination officers, executive district officers and district monitoring officers across the province to re-examine such cases and rectify any mistakes in the re-allocation of teachers.

The offices concerned were also asked to provide information on the number of surplus teachers (primary, elementary and secondary), the number of vacant posts in understaffed schools, and the number of understaffed schools in their areas in their areas by April 15.

The PTU claimed however that the talks had failed. Kamboh maintained that no major boycott had been observed. He said most schools and classes had been unaffected, particularly in Lahore.

PTU officials said the boycott had been observed in all primary schools, with 70 per cent of high schools teachers also boycotting classes.

Kamboh also said that the PTU represented only a section of teachers, and was not representative of all teachers in the province. “We keep engaging with several groups as and when a need emerges. For now we have addressed the major grievances”.

PTU General Secretary Rana Liaquat Ali said the SED was threatening teachers with suspensions and fines if they did not return to classes.

PTU officials also said the department’s decision to increase student-teacher ratio, from 50 to on instead of 40 to one, was increasing teachers’ burden.

Ali said teachers were being subjected to undue pressures. “We are already being sent to far flung areas under the rationalisation policy. It does not matter if we are suspended or transferred on top of that because of the boycott”.

Published in The Express Tribune, April 5^th, 2014.