KALABURAGI: Primary and Secondary Education Minister BC Nagesh said students have to appear for SSLC exams and answer questions this year as there will be no "Corona Pass" -- a reference to students being passed without exams because of the raging COVID pandemic last year.
He told The New Indian Express that the issue was different last year as students and schools faced severe COVID-related problems throughout the 2020-21 academic year. "If we keep extending this facility, students will forget how to study and it will set a bad trend," he added.
Nagesh said that as per his information, almost all schools in the State have completed 70 per cent of the syllabus, while 30 per cent has been reduced to help students. "Experts are of the opinion that COVID will drastically come down in the last week of February or in the first week of March, while SSLC exams will take place in the last week March to April 11. Let us see the situation at that time," he added.
On the delay in issuing appointment orders to guest teachers for high schools, he said that the orders were issued on November 1 last year. But the orders were there since the beginning of the academic year. For 2022-23, they will be issued at the beginning of the academic year, he added.
On transfer of teachers at the end of the academic year, he said that some teachers had gone to court about two to three years ago, and the court disposed of the case only a few months back. Once the order was out, teachers started asking for transfers. "We have to respect the court order and genuine demands of teachers. Though we started the transfer process, we did not move teachers from areas where there was an acute shortage," he clarified.