THIRUVANANTHAPURAM: Even as Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan announced that the school admission process for the 2020-21 academic year will begin on Monday, the process except for Class 1 will begin only after May 20 as the schools are directed to submit the promotion list of the students from Class 1 to Class 8 to the government later next week.
The online admission process will also begin after May 20. As per an order of the general education department, the fresh offline admissions for Class 1, however, will begin from Monday itself. Earlier, the state government had directed all government and aided school principals to prepare the promotion lists of students from Class 1 to Class 8. The school principals were asked to compile the lists before May 20.
As per the directive of the Directorate of General Education, all students of Class 1 to 8 should be promoted to the next class. However, the promotion of Class 9 students to Class 10 will be based on the marks obtained in the annual examinations and performance in mid-term examinations. The principals were also instructed to make preparations for the valuation of answer sheets of Class 9 annual examinations.
A Shahjahan, General Education Secretary, told TNIE that the admission process for Class 2 to Class 10 students will take place only after analysing the promotion lists from the schools. “The schools are told to prepare and send the lists before May 20 so that we can start the admission process after checking the lists. However, the fresh offline admissions to Class 1 will begin on Monday itself as we don’t need any academic-related documents.
The admission process will be in full throttle by later next week,” he said. Offline admissions will be carried out as per social distancing norms. Though the education department plans to facilitate an online admission process, it will begin only after May 20. The online facility is being rolled out in view of the difficulty parents and students would face in reaching the schools on time owing to the lockdown. The online admission will be done through Sampoorna portal which is available in all schools under the supervision of KITE (Kerala Infrastructure and Technology for Education).
According to K Anvar Sadath, CEO, KITE, the online admission module is under development and it will be functional once the admission to all classes begins. “The online module will be merged with the Sampoorna portal so that the school staff could use it. The portal is for those who cannot make it to the schools,” he said. Meanwhile, the CBSE schools in the state will start the admission process for all classes from Monday itself. The schools already have an automated admission system.