Maha says no to school interviews Wants ICSE and CBSE schools to follow uniform admission process

Maha says no to school interviews

Wants ICSE and CBSE schools to follow uniform admission process

For the convenience of parents, schools affiliated to non-SSC boards may soon have to streamline their admission process to make it uniform with SSC board schools. This was the subject matter of a discussion in the state legislative assembly on Monday. The House was told that provisions of Right To Education (RTE) Act against conducting interviews of parents and the child seeking admission will now be closely monitored. What this means for you is that no school, irrespective of which board it is affiliated to, will be allowed to hold pre-admission interviews. Currently, this happens clandestinely under the guise of 'interactions' with parents and the child. Besides, all schools may now have to time their admissions uniformly. School education minister Rajendra Darda said his department would write to the central government to bring in uniformity in admission process of schools governed by central boards like ICSE and CBSE. Legislators from the treasury benches raised questions about different admission dates for different boards, which they said causes inconvenience to parents. Congress legislator Prashant Thakur pointed out that the state does not have any control over these schools. At this, Bala Nandgaonkar of the Maharashtra Navnirman Sena pointed out that many schools in the state still resort to interviews of parents and their wards during admission to pre-primary classes, although this is not allowed under the RTE Act. Darda assured the House of strict action against schools conducting such interviews. "The RTE Act has a provision to levy a penalty of at least Rs25,000 on managements of schools indulging in such a practice," said Darda. However, members said that a monetary penalty alone was not enough, and also sought criminal action against managements of such schools.. Speaker of the House Dilip Walse-Patil directed the government to amend the laws such that if a group of schools indulges in any malpractice, punitive action can be taken against the entire group, instead of that one school alone.