The  Indian Express              17.12.2013

With diaries, civic body to forge student-teacher interaction

Beginning this academic year, children studying in schools run by the South civic body will be provided with special school diaries along with their new books. The one-of-a-kind move makes South Municipal Corporation the only civic body to have undertaken such an initiative at the school level.

The diaries, titled Samvad, will be distributed to students of Classes I to V free of cost.

"You will find that children studying in private schools have school dairies. In corporation schools, it is unheard of. So, we thought of providing these diaries to students. Currently, there is no system of interaction between students, parents and teachers in municipal schools. Through these diaries, we hope to create a system," Satish Upadhyay, Chairman of Education Committee, South corporation, said.

The school diary will have information about school management committees, different welfare schemes for students and grading and assessment system.

"We even have a page on the 'no corporal punishment rule', so students who are subjected to physical punishments know where to complain," Upadhyay said.

Then there is space allocated to weekly division of class-wise syllabus. "Municipal schools don't follow any syllabus or rules. But, we have created syllabi for individual classes and printed it in the diaries, so that we can monitor the syllabus as well as pace of teaching," PRO of South corporation Mukesh Yadav said.

More than 3 lakh diaries have been printed and sent for distribution. At Rs 18.36 each, it has cost the civic body nearly Rs 65 lakh. The diaries also include a daily time table, a yearly calendar, an annual school calendar and a list of important phone numbers.

"Samvad means communication. Without Samvad, there can be no improvement. We hope, through this diary, to bridge gaps of communication between schools and parents," Yadav said.