Teachers in East Jaiñtia Hills district have demanded discontinuation of the teacher’s attendance mobile app and decided not to use it further.
The decision was taken by the joint executive committee meeting of the Jaiñtia Hills Lower Primary School Teachers Association (JHLPSTA) Khliehriat Unit and Meghalaya SSA Schools Association (MSSASA) today.
“Ubiattendance Website/App is software designed, owned and managed by Ubitech Solution Pvt. Ltd which is a private firm and it is not the official website of the Education Department nor the official website of the office of the Deputy Commissioner neither it is maintained by the Education Department,” the teachers said.
Pointing out that no official instruction was obtained by the Deputy Commissioner’s office for implementation the app from the higher authority of the concerned department, the teacher’s union said the app implemented only to track the attendance of teachers and not the attendance of other staff in other department within the -jurisdiction of the district.
While the State government through the Department of Education has initiated TIMS (Teacher Information Management Systems) which is a centrally hosted web-based application with teacher attendance capturing as one of its salient features, the teachers questioned why the office of the DC was in a hurry to implement the app when the State is ready to implement the initiate the Vidya Samiksha Kendra (VKS).
The teachers said Education Minister Rakkam A Sangma recently announced that the State will implement VKS an initiative of the a Ministry of Education initiative which aims to integrated various State implemented existing applications such as TIMS, MLEAD etc.
“We are very clear with our stand, that we are not against the initiatives taken to improve the education system at district level in particular and the State in general but we are against the used and implementation of an app owned and managed by a private firm not by the government,” they said.
