Schoolgoers seek break from studies

BHUBANESWAR: Heavy school syllabus, parental pressure and cut-throat competition are putting immense pressure on school students. With not much time to play and relax, children often become machines, students from different parts of the state, who participated in an interactive workshop in the capital on Thursday, said.
"Overloaded with school curriculum and private tuitions, children don't get enough time to play these days.The parents and family members often push their wards very hard, adding to their burden," lamented Satyajit Mohanty, a Class VIII student from Palanda village under Rajnagar block.
The young participants in the workshop also demanded better facilities and more trained teachers in their schools. The focus should be on quality education and not just on mid-day meals, they said.
Some children blamed the politicians and the media for not taking up issues related to quality school education. They demanded that people selling liquor and tobacco near school premises must be severely punished.
How many politicians raise a question in the Parliament or Assembly on those issues, they said. They also resented that problems related to school education hardly get a place in the editorial or op-ed pages of the print media or in the primetime panel discussions of TV channels.
Mamata Bag, a class-X student from Bhawanipatna said, "Despite all the tall claims, the Right to Education Act, 2009 is still a distant dream in many areas of our state. Thousands of children continue as child labour and every year after Nuakhai festival, children from at least 10 villages from Nuapada district migrate with their parents to other states, to work as migrant labours."