lockdown 700 students.

I rarely write serious stuff.
I work as Administrator of three schools. Two (a Konkanni-medium primary school and a high school) get grant-in-aid from the government and one is unaided.
A few of our ‘aided’ children, from standards I-VIII come to school attracted by the midday-meal provided by the government. We can’t help them with food through their vacations anytime, even in years past, that’s true. But, the lockout that flowed from 22 Mar into the summer holidays meant many of them would be drinking/eating Pepsi/vada-paav (or basic fare like chapati-onions equivalent) for more than two months.
These midday-meals comprising two pulses and two vegetables, and bread, are monotonous, but nutritious. When I joined, and found that on some days the food was bad, I threw a minor tantrum and threatened to complain to the authorities. After that, the local women’s Self-Help Group started making pretty good stuff. (Aside: four women cater to a total of 1200 students in different schools, daily, in Porvorim. They start cooking at 0445 in the morning and dispatch the dabbas by 0945. Covid19 has locked down on their income, approx. Rs 7000/m/person.)
The UNaided school’s fees are low, approximately Rs 600/month; I don’t know whether the parents will henceforth be able to afford even those.
The lockdown means a large number of students would lose out on routine. I don’t mean a rigid time-table, but expected events like getting a meal at all or an uninterrupted night’s rest. A single room shared by family members and ‘guests’ from the village, even a tenant or two, don’t allow for the humdrum existence and privacy most middle-class persons take for granted. Unpleasant silences and high-decibel quarrels are the norm. Physical fights, substance abuse, sexual harassment provide highly avoidable excitement.
Considering they’re already lagging in studies compared to their better-off contemporaries from well-off homes and expensive schools, this gap—already big-- is going to be hard to fill over the years post-lockdown. Unlocking cannot be switched on, it will take time for the parents’ incomes to stabilize and for their homes to return to normalcy.
I read posts on Facebook. This is what comes to mind. The Covid-19 Lockdown, to those connected with schools like mine, is not about getting used to doing jhaadoo-pocha. Our PTA comprises plumbers, electricians, masons, tea-stall workers, maids and such like who have never had groceries home-delivered, who believe their children will get a better life than theirs because they wear a uniform and attend school with a bag and books.
Many of the semi-/illiterate parents aren’t unintelligent. They recognize how the Lockdown losses will affect them. So do those of my ilk. But we can plan. We won’t starve. They might.
Goa locked down a few days before the rest of the country. Schools and colleges were among the first to shut their doors to students, though the teachers/staff attended. Exams were initially cancelled, then postponed. For the first three days, only the stray dogs that prowl in the compound missed the children. The rest thought it was time to catch up with Whatsapp messages, finishing corrections and making long-pending register entries. By the time the national lockdown was announced on 22 Mar, there was a sense of unease: what to do about the IV, IX and X standards?
Standard IV is when the child leaves primary to enter middle school. It involves re-admission, even if it is into the same institution’s senior section. Standard X appears for the Board examination. It’s the first rung of the future, the first external exam. The backgrounds of the students notwithstanding, our Board results have been good. Speaks well for the teachers/staff.
IX is important for a completely different reason. That is the only time a school need not promote a student who has not fared well over since the time s/he joined school, when students can decide whether they want to subsequently do vocational/academic courses, or take up jobs.
Until VIII, schools are supposed to continuously evaluate students through the year on classwork, homework, projects, oral responses, behaviour, attendance, etc. Practically, in a class of forty students, most of whom are first-generation school-goers, the only way to evaluate a child’s progress is through tests and exams. It is almost impossible to make a child repeat a year, which is why this policy has earned the name ‘no-fail’ policy.
Many of the 700+ students of my schools aren’t going to be learning music/craft with their parents. The online tutorials on the free channels are in English or Hindi; our Konkanni Primary kids won’t follow any of it. Even our high school students will find difficulty without guidance from a teacher. They must be whiling away their awake hours playing games on their parents’ phones. Or hanging around OUTside their homes as there’s not much space inside. The swampy, garage-littered surroundings won’t do much for their physiological/psychological well-being.
Much though people grumble about ‘government schools/teachers’, my small audit sample, restricted to these schools, has shown me that the teachers really do their best. They have to tackle more than finishing portions and imparting knowledge through modern teaching methods. They are faced with poverty, malfunctioning families and their consequences. They hand-hold the children from ages five to fourteen. Releasing them into the world at the best of times is heart-breaking.
The lockdown can’t be suddenly lifted. Whilst the haves will pick up the threads quite easily—their parents have spent quality time with them, their teachers have gently taught them the reading/writing/’rithmatic, craft/music/PE through virtual media, the have-nots would have developed deficiencies in nutrition, emotion and discipline.
Can I bring myself, anxious as I am about the future of ‘my’ students, to think about new recipes, embroidery, poetry, painting, when in isolation/solitude? Yes. I have running water, electricity, cooking-fuel, food, a roof and the ability to read. It helps.
But, the Covid-19 Lockdown has, after a very long time, forced something humourless to get typed out of my keyboard.