Masrat Nabi
SRINAGAR, March 24: From turmoil related shutdown to COVID caused lockdowns, the students in Jammu and Kashmir are suffering from a series of setbacks that have marred their career prospects.
First, they missed out classes and lessons due to months of spontaneous shutdown following the abrogation of article 370 in August 2019 and now, it’s the novel coronavirus, or Covid-19, which has compelled them for social distancing and home confinement to protect their lives.
120 countries have closed schools impacting almost a billion students across the globe particularly students of Jammu and Kashmir who have suffered huge losses of studies due to one or the other reasons.
Last year, restrictions were imposed in the Valley after the union government abrogated Jammu and Kashmir’s special status on August 5, 2019, and bifurcated it into two Union Territories (UTs) of Jammu and Kashmir, and Ladakh.
Educational institutions remained shut for around eight months and it was only recently the students had resumed classes.
As if it was jinxed, the novel coronavirus was standing tall already to shut schools again in Jammu and Kashmir.
In a conflict area like Kashmir, students suffer the most. The irregular system, the lack of well-qualified teachers as well as constant conflict, has pushed many students into depression or other mental health issues. While the rich and powerful in the state conveniently send their children to high-quality schools abroad, the middle and lower-middle classes have no option but to suffer at the hands of ill-equipped local schools
Same is the case with the students of Islamia Model High school situated at Fatehgarh Baramulla where the students are suffering the most because of the lack of well qualified teachers . Where an English teacher is providing notes to students due to lockdown because of the Covid_19 virus. The notes prepared by these teachers hardly make any sense and are grammatically incorrect said parents if various students of this school.
“Many teachers of this school lack skills in grammar,” a parent of a student of this school told Kashmir Despatch.
“Many teachers in the valley’s schools do not have the required qualifications to be hired for a teaching position. Their specialization, or the lack of it, is not considered while being employed in private schools,” said a PG student Khalid Hussain.
