Punjab’s government schools are set to witness equal distribution of teachers in the academic session as the state education department intends to implement the much-awaited online transfer system for teachers from April 2018.

Addressing a Press conference along with the education minister ArunaChaudhary, the secretary (school education), Kishan Kumar, said with this, the system of teachers getting transfers only to preferred urban area schools will be over as the online system would ensure each school gets the required number of teachers without any bias.

“At present, schools in urban areas are having the required teachers, others in rural areas specially in the border districts are short of teachers as nobody wants to serve. But once we implement the online transfer system is implemented, this problem will get addressed and arbitrary transfers to select schools will come to an end, ” Kumar said. He said the draft of the online transfer policy is ready and will be presented before the Council of ministers for clearance soon.

In another significant step to improve enrolments in the government schools as compared to the private ones, the secretary said pre-primary classes have been started in all the government schools in Punjab.

“Till now, parents used to have no choice but to send their kids to private schools as there were no pre-primary classes in government schools. But now we hope increased enrolment in government schools as three-year-olds can be admitted. We have already opened 8000 Aganwaris in schools for this and space is being arranged in another 25,00 schools for the same,” Kumar said.

He said English-medium teaching will also be started in 1953 selected schools from 1 April. “We have selected the required teachers for the English medium teaching in government schools. But these schools will continue to have a section for students who would prefer teaching in Hindi or Punjab language,” Kumar said.

He said for Smart Classes, at least 10 Tablets and a projector will be provided in each government schools that the students can be given Information Technology enabled teaching. Free Wifi will also be made available in all government schools by June 2018 through the private service providers.

To prevent copying, video cameras will be installed in examination centers with the dubious record. For ensuring attendance of teachers, biometric attendance system will be installed in each school, Kumar said adding that a learning enhancement programme, Padho Punjab Badho Punjab, is being implemented in all schools to improve the learning levels of students.