'Siti bajao, Upsthithi badao' initiative to increase attendance in Jharkhand schools

Jamshedpur: In an attempt to bring back students who have skipped classes for over a month, the Department of School Education and Literacy of Jharkhand has launched a unique programme 'Prayas -Siti bajao, school bulao' (blow whistle, call students to school).

A government school in Tangrain, about 45 km from here, in Potka block of East Singhbhum district implemented 'Siti bajao, Upsthithi badao' (blow whistle, increase attendance) in line with the government programme a couple of days ago and the response was good.

'Blow whistle' campaign launched recently in villages surrounding the school evoked a good response as students, who were absent for almost a month have started attending school as soon as they hear the whistle sound, said Headmaster-in-Charge Arvind Tiwary of Tangrain Upgraded Middle School.

Considering the constructive response to the programme, the education and literacy department decided to launch it in all government schools across the state and directed the concerned authorities to upload the pictures of students blowing the whistle on social media with hashtag #seetibajao# on January 11 as soon as students arrive in the school in the morning, he said.

"We are targeting those students, who skipped classes continuously for about a month", Tiwary, who had implemented innovative ideas in the past to motivate students to attend classes, told PTI.

"We have divided students into groups and picked up group leaders based on their answers to questions such as name of rivers/famous personality etc", he said, adding that a member of the school management committee and a teacher along with the group leader mark a zero against student who failed to attend classes for one/two days, two zeros against students absent for about a month and three zeros against those, who failed to turn up for over a month.

"Our main target is to bring back the students of the last two categories and to achieve the target we have launched the drive 'siti bajao, upsthithi badao' (blow whistle, increase attendance) in line with the government's proposed programme blow whistle, call students", he said.

The group leaders along with other students visit villages and blow whistles in the morning to alert students to get ready for school.

The impact of the drive was such that even those students, who were considered dropouts were also getting motivated and started attending classes, he claimed.

The students are excited to post whistle-blowing photographs on social media including Facebook, Instagram, etc on January 11.

The Tangrains Upgraded Middle School has 257 students (almost 50:50 boys and girls) from KG to Class 8.

Earlier, Tiwary had administered innovative ideas to motivate students in the rural pocket to pursue studies.

He painted the school building in the shape of a train, introduced 'anda challenge' (egg challenge), one-page handwriting every day, took students to theatres to show the movie for memorizing 1 to 20 tables and even made them feel the experience of travelling on a train.

Asked about the 'Anda challenge', Tiwary said if a student runs 6 km continuously for a week, he will be presented with seven eggs as a prize.

The objective behind a challenge was to make students physically and mentally strong, Tiwary added.