Parents make case for English as medium of instruction

Parents make case for English as medium of instruction

HERALD REPORTER
Parents make case for English as medium of instruction
HERALD REPORTER
MARGAO, MARCH 6
With the Right to Education Act envisaging mother tongue as the medium of instruction for imparting education at the elementary level, anxious parents – worried over the future of their wards — have demanded English as the medium of instruction from Std I-VIII with Konkani as a compulsory subject.
Parent Teachers Associations of two city-based prominent schools Fatima Convent and Loyola met here yesterday to deliberate on the implementation of the Right to Education Act. Anxious parents raised a host of questions over the medium of instruction policy from Std I-VIII and strongly demanded English as the medium of instruction with Konkani as a compulsory subject.
Binar Barros, who addressed the two PTA meetings, said the resolutions adopted at the PTA meetings would be forwarded to the government for action. He said parents will meet again in the city to deliberate on the issue and chalk out the future course of action.
Addressing the PTAs, Barros sought to know why mother tongue should be dragged in the corridors of instruction in a highly literate and multi-lingual State like Goa. “Figures available between 1991 till date would reveal that around two lakh children have suffered because of imposition of Konkani as the medium of instruction. This is not to express apprehension of any language. And, if the mother tongue is made the medium of instruction from Std I-VIII, it would be like hitting the last nail in the very future of our children,” he added.
“No doubt, the Constitution says that education should be provided preferably in the mother tongue. This was envisaged with an aim to take education to the door steps of the marginalised population like in the North Eastern States,” he said, but reminded the gathering that north eastern states such as Mizoram and Manipur have adopted English as the medium of instruction.
Dishing out statistics, Barros said “the enrolment of students at Std IV in Fatima Convent was 117 and the figure jumped to 163 in Std V. Similar was the case in Loyola school where the enrolment at Std IV was 100 and 189 in Std V, indicating that students from English schools were enrolled in these schools at Std V” and dared the government to decrease the number of seats and declare teachers surplus.
Panjim reporter adds: The PTA meeting of St Britto High School, Mapusa (held on Saturday – March 5) unanimously rejected Konkani as medium of instruction and demanded that English be retained as medium of instruction.
It was the unanimous and unequivocal assertion of the parents that introduction of Konkani as medium of instruction has lowered the standard of education in the State.
Students whose medium of instruction is English stand a better chance of getting jobs when they go out of Goa, while nobody wants Konkani medium candidates, they said.
The PTA meeting also passed a resolution rejecting Konkani as medium of instruction.