The Colonial Ghost -1

Dr.K.N. Anandan

My friend Mr. Kaladharan and myself had the pleasant experience of visiting a Government school which had been selected for the reality show by virtue of a number of activities of excellence that it was able to carry out. At the same time the experience was equally unpleasant to us for a different reason. The visit gave us an opportunity to witness how a primary school managed by the government can carry out activities that can bring down the academic standards of the learners who are destined to learn there. What was more unfortunate was that the school authorities were not able to realize this. It won’t be academically honest on my part if I don’t share my experience with the parents and teachers of our State.
It may be noted that going by the most popular notions of a ‘good school’ this school will be easily rated as a place of excellence. This is testified by the fact that this school has a roll strength of about 500 students where as the adjacent unaided English medium school (which is there just on the other side of the compound wall) has only 200 students in it. This is commendable and the teachers of the school take pride in saying that even the children of teachers of this school are studying in the government school which has contributed in getting goodwill from the parents.
In the coming blogs I would like to tell my readers what we experienced at the school. I would prefer to serialize it under the title ‘Colonial Ghost’. The title calls for a wide range of predictions from the part of my readers, doesn’t it?