No takers for PT teachers in government schools

Nalini Ravichandran: 15 Mar 2010 04:52:00 AM IST

 

 

CHENNAI: At a time when there has been increasing emphasis on 
grooming young sports talent, over 900 government schools in
Tamil Nadu have been running without a physical education teacher 
for the last five years.

There are more than 2,000 vacant posts for physical training 
teachers in both government and government- aided schools
.Suryanarayan, a PT teacher from a government school in 
Tambaram said, “While private schools have special sports 
coaches for specific games, our schools don’t even a have 
a physical education teacher for imparting basic sports skills.”

S Sankaraperumal, president, Tamil Nadu Physical Education 
Teachers-Directors Association, said although more than
1 lakh people had been trained to become sports instructors,
several were yet to be recruited
 
.As per government norms, one PT teacher must handle 
250 students, and a physical director should oversee 
450 students.Justice V Dhanapalan had ordered the 
education department on November 13, 2009 to ensure 
that within 18 weeks the scale of pay of graduate PT teachers
was at par with that of those handling academic subjects.
But, this too had not been implemented, the association sources said.