Pune: Teachers are unhappy over the Directorate of Secondary Education’s advisory to schools on Thursday to guide students in filling up the forms after technical glitches adversely impacted the online centralised admission process for the first year of junior college (FYJC). Teachers feel the state administration is trying to cover up its inadequacy in running the website smoothly by shifting the work onto teachers. They said the website should have been relaunched only after ensuring there were no technical problems, and if issues persist, the company that was awarded the contract must be penalised.Mahesh Palkar, director of secondary and higher secondary education, confirmed to TOI on Thursday that they had asked schools to help students fill out the online forms. When asked about the oppositionPalkar said, “There are clerical staff in the school who can do this, and the headmaster and teachers just need to monitor them. Also, the glitches are happening because some students are finding it hard to fill it up. With guidance, it can run smoothly.”Teachers and principals are not happy. Mahendra Ganpule, spokesperson for the Maharashtra School Principals’ Federation, pointed out that schools were closed for vacations at the time. “But most importantly, just because their system is not working, how can they make teachers work and compensate for that? This has nothing to do with schools till Std X or its teachers. It is the work of junior colleges, if at all.” “Why are they asking schoolteachers to do it? The system was working well till last year. But this year, they gave the work to a new company, which seems unable to handle the load. They should work on bettering the online system rather than asking teachers to do this work also,” Ganpule added. Some teachers said the administration should have anticipated the technical problems and accordingly asked the third party to provide solutions. “In rural areas, everybody is fed up with the online process. When they started the online process, did they ask us if it was feasible, or how to go about it? They did not, and now they are asking us to help with solutions. Since it was their idea to introduce the online system, they should find solutions, instead of making teachers work to cover up their lacunae,” said Ajay Bhoyar, head of the Nagpur division of Prahar Shikshak Sanghatana.
