The Sindh education department has decided to launch a project management system (PMS) for marking the attendance of primary and secondary school teachers who have to install an application in android phones to record attendance twice a day. The unions of primary and secondary teachers have announced to boycott the training sessions in this regard, and have refused to use this application.
In May 2015, the biometric system was introduced for teachers’ attendance and to identify ‘ghost teachers’. Chief monitoring officers and monitoring assistants at taluka and union council (UC) levels were recruited to record biometric attendance of teachers during random visits to schools. This gave better results, but could not track ghost teachers completely. In several districts, this system also became a victim of corruption.
Even today, when teachers get trans- ferred from one place to another, they can easily get a letter of transfer, but a change in biometrics is not easy. It is almost impossible to get biometric data changed to the place of posting ‘free of cost’.
Before 2015, a teacher from each UC was selected as a supervisor who would monitor the school and record the attendance of teachers. This system worked well for a few years, but later some supervisors started taking bribes from the teachers.
Now, once again, another project related to the introduction of a new application is being launched to ensure teachers’ attendance. Undoubtedly this application is perfect for recording attendance, but there are several issues and reservations that need to be addressed.
This application is good to use for the teachers working in cities and urban areas. However, its use is almost impossible for teachers working in rural and remote areas where mobile network is hardly available. In fact, it is not even available at all in some areas. Besides, senior teachers even have no idea of how to use a smartphone. This application needs a strong cellular network which is hardly available in remote areas.
Also, the system has several issues, such as the location of schools is often different from the actual location. Teachers have to record their attendance while being within 10 metres of the relevant school building. If the location is different, the feature of recording attendance becomes inactive.
This application is not backed by strong servers, and stops working randomly. For a while it shows that the attendance has been recorded, but later marks one absent. Besides, every teacher has to purchase an android mobile, create an account, make the internet available, and keep the mobile battery charged all the time.
The relevant department does not care about these issues. The most appropriate and suitable way to monitor the attendance is to fix a biometric device in each school instead of wasting resources on faulty systems.
When biometric teams visit schools with moveable devices to keep track of attendance record, one wonders why it is necessary to go for newer applications. Why other important factors, such as provision of basic facilities, infrastructure, overall educational environment, quality education, competent school administrations, and others are neglected?
ALI GUL LEGHARI
JOHI
