CHENNAI: Kalai Thiruvizha, the art and culture festival organised by the school education department, is set to get bigger with more students participating in it. The department has announced the festival, which was so far conducted only in government schools, will be held separately for government-aided schools.
Top six students who win in most competitions will be taken on exposure visits to foreign countries.
The district-level competitions will be held from November 14 to 17 while state-level competitions will be from November 22 to 25. Students will be categorised into three for the competitions - classes 6 to 8, classes 9 and 10, and classes 11 and 12.
According to the department, around 28 lakh students from government schools had participated in school-level competitions - 6 lakh at the block level, and 1.9 lakh at the district level. “The competitions have been extended this year to include the students from government-aided schools following requests from several stakeholders, claiming they are missing out on an opportunity to exhibit their talents,” said an official from the department.
Committees will be formed at each level to organise the competitions similar to the guidelines issued for Kalai Thiruvizha in government schools.Several associations welcomed the move as it has been one of their demands to extend all the government schemes to the government-aided schools in the state.
“We have been urging the state government to treat both government and government-aided schools equally as they both are for students from poor background. This is a welcome move,” said a member of Directly Recruited Postgraduate Teachers Association.