The Sindh Textbook Board (STBB) would likely to miss the assignment to ensuring availability of textbooks in the local market for students of class IX and X for the academic year 2009.
The authorities have given additional charge of the STBB Chairman to Professor Abdul Salam who is also the Regional Director College Education, Hyderabad, making it hard for him to look after two key posts at the same time, Professor Athar Hussain, President Sindh Professors Lecturers' Association (SPLA) Karachi chapter, told Business Recorder on Thursday.
He said STBB had been assigned to publish textbooks and make their availability in the market before the commencement of the new academic session, ie April 2009, but due to absence of full-fledged chairman of the authority, the new books would not reach in the market. Recently, the STBB has approved the quality of printing paper to be used for the publication of books, he said.
He said the authority would now issue tenders for the paper and the lengthy official procedure including tenders, bidding etc would take time, thus causing delay in the printing process.
He said that already the introduction of new textbooks of Biology-II and Chemistry-II for the said classes after the passage of some five months of ongoing academic session have created immense difficulties for the students and teachers, as there is no much time left to complete the new course in remaining few months.
He said that school management are also baffled due to new paper pattern of examination being introduced from this year, besides the introduction of new books of biology and chemistry at the eleventh hour has created a panic like situation for the teachers, students and parents as well. He said that some schools had not prior information from the concerned authorities about the introduction of new textbooks, besides they were also worried about the change in examination pattern for all the subjects of 9th and 10th classes.
He said that the sample of new and revised paper pattern were yet to be provided to many private schools, which can create more troubles to students. The students of some private schools were forced to think about their future seriously, he said.
He said that the revised textbooks of biology and chemistry contain extra chapters, which also become a major problem for the students to go through whole book in this short academic year. The authorities have increased the chapters of biology and chemistry from 10 to 18 chapters, he said.
He said that already the academic session of 2008-09 has been started late and the annual examination to be started from March 15, 2009, the shortage of books and unavailability of paper pattern at some private schools would affect the performance of students.
He said that the mid-term in some schools of the city is going on and they have not much time due to Eid holidays and winter vacation and if the books are available at the local markets they can prepare themselves for final examination. He said that some private schools have suspended winter vacations due to short academic year and acute shortage of books at the market. He also urged upon a need to appoint a full fledged chairman for Sindh Textbook Board (STBB) as the current chairman who was also Regional Director College Education, Hyderabad, was failed to perform his duties well.