School Improvement

Background

The public school in Chinnaboinapally village of Eturnagaram block was in a very bad state. Only 16 students were enrolled with medium of instruction as Telugu. There was only one teacher and classes were from first to fifth standard. The school was on the verge of closure.

Intervention

A 12 to 20 member committee, called as School Management Committee was formed by the parents of the children studying in the school. Five members from the committee and the school Headmaster opened a joint account in a bank. The power to issue cheques rested with these 6 members. All grants from the Government and companies, and contributions from parents were managed by these committees. This ensured that there were sufficient checks and balances and neither the SMC Chairman nor the Headmaster misused the funds. Once in a month, a parent-teacher meeting was arranged to assess the progress of the students; all the work done; amount spent by the School Management Committee was discussed with everyone present. Plans were also prepared for further activities to be taken up.

The parents and teachers were taken to the best private school of the District for an exposure visit and they studied the facilities available there. Based on this experience, they drafted a list of 57 items, necessary to take this Government school to that level. This was the vision/dream conceived by the parents for their children’s school and they started working towards it, one step at a time. District administration sanctioned `10 lakh from available funds to the School Management Committee to take up developmental activities under community participation method.

Impact

A reverse brain-drain from private schools to government schools began in Chinnaboinapally of Eturnagaram block and is likely to continue throughout the District. And the school is slowly and surely on its way towards the one dreamt of by the parents and teachers after the exposure visit to the private school. The following developments took place:

• Construction of additional classrooms in record (15) days (Cement/brick walls & AC sheet roof)
• Repairs to the existing classrooms
• Purchase of dual desks
• Borewell for drinking water
• School furniture and white wash with colours
• Classes – Nursery to seventh standard
• Number of teachers increased
• School strength increased from 16 to 240 in a month’s time.

Source : Aspirational Districts for WEB