Karnataka: 262 new govt pre-schools to start within a month

Considering the demand for admissions to pre-primary grades at the government schools, the Samagra Shikshana Karnataka (SSK) is opening pre-primary classes at 262 government schools across the state.

Though the classes for the current academic year resumed in the month of June, the SSK has directed the officials concerned at the local level to start the pre-primary classes at least from September.

The state government first introduced the pre-primary (LKG-UKG) grades in government schools in the year 2019-20 as part of Karnataka Public Schools (KPS), where the government decided to offer kindergarten to pre-university education on the same campus. Currently, the state has 276 pre-schools at KPS and 664 at government primary schools.

“Though there was demand, new permission was not granted to start government pre-schools for the last three years because of the Covid-19 pandemic and its impact. This year, considering the demand, we have sanctioned 262 schools at various locations,” said a senior official of SSK.

However, these newly sanctioned pre-primary grades will admit kids only to lower kindergarten this year and the same students will be promoted to upper kindergarten next year. Children aged between 4 and 5 years can be enrolled.

SSK has fixed the minimum strength at 20 and maximum at 30. A classroom should be exclusively dedicated for pre-primary grades. 

“The head masters of the schools have been clearly instructed to make these classrooms attractive and colorful. The School Development and Monitoring Committees (SDMC) are responsible to hire a teacher and matron (aaya) for a period of 10 months by paying Rs 7,000 and Rs 5,000 per month, respectively,” the official stated.

The newly sanctioned pre-schools are spread across all the 34 educational districts, including Bengaluru South and North. Bengaluru North got four and South managed to get 10.

However, the anganawadi workers have expressed the fear of losing jobs with the commencement of pre-schools. They have decided to meet the chief minister.

H S Sunanda, general secretary, Karnataka State Anganwadi Workers’ Union (CITU), said, “We opposed this concept in 2019 itself, when the government decided to open pre- schools at government schools. The Congress government again sanctioned new pre-schools, which is a question of survival of anganwadis.”