Delhi Education Minister Manish Sisodia Tuesday said that teachers and principals in schools are becoming slaves to curriculum and syllabus decided by bureaucrats and ministers, and should be given autonomy and freedom so that they can meet learning standards.“Teachers want to know if they are teachers or just instruments to transfer to the children what is prescribed in books by officers, ministers and experts. Principals ask if they are only agents to implement policies that are passed by higher-ups. They both need time and freedom to do quality work. Teachers are becoming slaves to curriculum and to teachers’ diaries and policies,” Sisodia, who was speaking at the Central Advisory Board for Education meeting, said. “There was a time when teachers had freedom to teach the way they wanted. Now, they are as bound as they were free earlier,” he said.

Calling private schools makeshift arrangements, Sisodia said that government schools were the answer to education needs. “We have to agree that as a nation, government schools are the ultimate solution for this country’s education needs. Private schools are makeshift arrangements that we have till proper infrastructure is ensured in government schools,” he said.

The minister, who has often asked for scrapping of the no-detention policy, said he was in support of the policy but not in the current environment. “I am an advocate of the no-detention policy but as of today, I am against it as we have implemented it without preparing the ground for it. Teachers have not been trained according to the policy, curriculum has remained the same and teaching methods are still the same. We should remove it right now but should note that it has to be brought back in the future,” he said.

Sisodia also requested Union HRD minister Prakash Javadekar to increase the central education budget and place a request to change the name of the Human Resource Development Ministry to the Education ministry.

[Source:-The Indian Express]