Bhubaneswar, June 3: The scheme of engaging retired government teachers to deal with vacancy in high schools has been shelved as many teachers did not show any interest in taking up job as guest teachers.

In January 2011, the school and mass education department had announced a scheme in which retired high school teachers were planned to be allowed to teach in high schools on a voluntary basis. The government had also agreed to pay Rs 150 per class to the guest teachers. While the scheme did not kick off at most places, it stopped halfway at some places because of a plethora of reasons. The teachers were not ready to teach in guest capacity for the amount fixed by the government.

“The amount was meagre and it did not attract many. Some teachers joined with the hope that the amount would be increased later. But, they stopped coming to schools when they found that there were little chances of increase in the honorarium,” said Khurda circle inspector S.K. Patra.

The scheme planned to engage teachers in schools closer to their residence. “However, there were cases in which many teachers were interested in teaching in one particular school. There was a group of teachers who was interested to teach at Capital High School here, where there were no vacancies. They did not agree to teach in other schools. So, it did not work out,” said Patra.

The shortage of full-time teachers in schools, however, continues with most students not finding teachers for subjects in the sciences, mathematics and English. There are about 40,000 retired teachers, of which 10,000 teachers retired in the last two months.