The Central Board of Secondary Education (CBSE) has given a direction to its schools all over the country to not engage teachers in non-academics related activities, such as for help with transport or canteens. It added that the schools should deploy separate trained staff for the same.
The following directions have been given in a circular dated October 28, 2016. The issue of engaging teachers in activities other than academics was also raised by the representatives of various states in the meeting of the Central Advisory Board on Education (CABE) on October 25.
The circular reads, “The primary function of the teaching profession lies in facilitating the educational process of the children, which is becoming challenging in modern times, and no teacher will be deployed for any non-educational purposes other than the decennial population census, disaster relief duties relating to elections to the local authority or the state legislatures or Parliament, and the same has been acknowledged by statutes and regulations in terms of section 27 of the Right To Education Act, 2009.”
The CBSE in the circular also spoke about modifying its existing guidelines, where provision is to be made by school authorities for at least one schoolteacher in each school bus for the safety of the students.
According to the modification, the school authorities will now have to ensure at least one lady attendant or lady guard in each school bus for the security and safety of the school students in the bus.
Further, the circular has made the principal of the school responsible to ensure strict compliance of the guidelines issued.
