There will be no summer break for schoolteachers this year, at least for many of them.
The board exams will cut into the summer holidays.
Teachers would have to report for invigilation and other examination duties on campus.
Both ICSE (Class X) and ISC (Class XII) semester 2 and CBSE Classes X and XII term II exams will start in the last week of April. ISC will end on June 13 and the last exam for CBSE Class XII is June 15.
Several schools are communicating to teachers not to make any travel plans and that they should not leave the station.
Usually in Kolkata the summer break starts in most of the schools from the middle of May and continues till the first or second week of June.
The term 1 exam for both the boards was held in the months of November and December.
An examination during Covid times would require more teachers on duty because candidates will have to be seated in a spread out manner to maintain distancing norms. “We told our teachers and staff that there would be no summer break for them this year. They should avoid travel even if there is a gap in invigilation duty because in case a teacher for some emergency is unable to report, some other teacher will have to fill in for her,” said Jessica Gomes Surana, the principal of Loreto Convent Entally.
“If travel is unavoidable because of an emergency and even if it falls on gap days the teacher should inform the school about it,” said Gomes Surana.
Heads of schools said that it was not just the examination duty but teachers would also be required for correction of answer scripts.
Once one set of teachers take up correction work, others would be required for invigilation duty.
“Many of our senior teachers are examiners and they would be required during this period of exam,” said Anjana Saha, the principal of Mahadevi Birla World Academy.
Teachers in primary and middle school might still get some time off because they would not be required for correction of exam papers, said Saha.
The requirement for teachers would be more because more rooms will be needed to conduct the examinations.
Schools are preparing a duty roster with back-up plans involving more teachers for contingencies.
“We will divide the exam in two halves. One set of teachers would be allotted duty in the first 15 days and another set in the rest of the days. This way at least teachers would get some days off, if not for the entire period,” said Meena Kak, the director of Lakshmipat Singhania Academy.
Calcutta Girls’ High School is planning to give a week off to teachers after the last day of the board exams.
“At least they would get some days off. But those on correction duty will have to report,” said principal Basanti Biswas.
