Dismal show by government PU colleges

BANGALORE: Government Pre-university (PU) colleges across the state have registered disappointing results in the II PUC examinations in the last three years According to the statistics from the PU Department, pass percentage in 49 government PU colleges in Bangalore is 58.73 per cent.Things are the same in 1,202 government PU colleges across the state. The Government PU College in Holesirigere (Harihar taluk) in Davangere registered a pass percentage of 72.34 per cent in 2010.However, in 2011, the percentage dropped to 34.78 per cent.With the II PUC results due on May 23, the PU Department has identified some areas and has vouched to work on them in the coming academic year. “The most important reason seems to be the absence of incentives for our teachers. There are lecturers who do not perform and there is no disincentive. Similarly, there is no encouragement for those who perform well. This is the immediate challenge,” said Commissioner for PU Education Rashmi V. She added that the department till now had failed to provide a bridge for students who enter PU from SSLC. With the introduction of National Core Curriculum (NCC) for Science, Arts and Commerce in regional languages, Rashmi said that the department was now trying to address another major issue. “Nearly 1-2 lakh students from Kannada backgrounds come to PUC, where all the texts book are in English, which is an alien language to them. With NCC textbooks translated into Kannada, the rural students will be helped,” said Rashmi. Quashing the notion that infrastructure was a critical marker of quality, she said that only standalone government colleges lacked it. “We have records of private PU colleges that do not have the right infrastructure,” she said. She added that the department was focused on gaining community credibility to get parents send their children to government colleges.“Colleges in Mangalore, Udupi, Belgaum and Kunigal perform better than private colleges.There is no dearth of qualified teachers in government colleges.Teachers focus more on academic activities,” she said.