Khyber schools told to return part of received books amid shortages

KHYBER: The education department has directed government schools in Khyber tribal district to return 30 per cent of the free textbooks they received as a full share of books.

The move will help address the shortage of course books in the province, according to a notification of the department.

It said principals and headmasters of all government schools in the district were required to return 30 per cent of the developed books to the office of the district education officer with an immediate effect.

The development comes at a time when a drive is under way in the district to enrol more and more children in government schools.

The teachers, especially those posted to Bara tehsil, expressed reservation about the notification and insisted that the move would adversely affect the ongoing enrolment drive as a large number of the inflation hit parents were desirable to admit their children in the government schools.

They told Dawn that the shortage of course books coupled with a lack of facilities in most schools damaged by militants a decade ago would cause learning loss for students. The teachers added that the schoolchildren had already suffered a lot while living as internally displaced persons away from their homes during the decade long insurgency.

Teachers in Landi Kotal tehsil said that they collected free textbooks from the designated places before transporting them to their schools after spending their own money as the office of the district education officer refused to deliver them.

They said that the DEO’s office had directed schools to return 30 per cent of the received books back to it in the Jamrud area but the latter were too short of funds to comply.

The teachers said that government schools in Landi Kotal were hit hard by the shortage of textbooks as a majority of students enrolled for kindergarten-grade 10 courses awaited books of different subjects even more than a month after the start of the new academic year.

District education officer Uzair Ali didn’t respond to the repeated phone calls and messages of this correspondent.

Staff members of his Jamrud office confirmed the issuance of the textbook recall notification.

They said that textbook shortages in schools, which were told to return 30 per cent of the received books, would be addressed by collecting books from students, who were promoted to the next grades recently.

Courtesy: Published at Dawn on April 15, 2023