PUNE: Schools are expected to restart online for the next academic year from June 14, but there is no clarity on how the institutions affiliated to Pune Municipal Corporation (PMC) will fare since at least 43% of their students have no access to online education.
Minakshi Raut, primary education director of the PMC, said they had at the end of last academic year around 93,000 students registered from Standard I to Standard VIII.
“Of these around 40,000 students do not have access to any kind of device to access online education.
Another 10,000 students could not be contacted when teachers tried, probably due to migration,” she said.
Siddharth Dhende, social activist and former deputy mayor of the Pune Municipal Corporation (PMC), said more than 80% of the students enrolled in PMC schools come from poor families.
“These students can hardly afford three meals a day due to the persistent lockdown.
They are in no position to buy a device and pay for internet.
Hence, even if they have phones or even smartphones, not many of them are actually able to attend classes,” he added.
A PMC school principal from Hadapsar said the attendance is extremely poor in the junior classes from Std I to IV as compared to the higher classes.
“Parents are mostly daily-wage labourers or autorickshaw drivers who take away the sole cellphone in the house leaving the children with no access to online classes.
Most parents have two or more children and they have to decide whom to give the phone to if it is available at home.
Moreover, the pandemic has rendered many people jobless which means, recharging their phones is the least of their priorities.
This, in turn, means, an even smaller number of students attend online classes,” the principal said.