The Municipal Corporation of Delhi (MCD) is going hi-tech this admission season. For the first time, the civic body will have the option of online admissions, thus cutting down on queues at its 1,729 schools. People will now be able to log on to the MCD website, fill up forms and submit it. Later the admission can be verified by showing the birth certificate.
The admission season began on July 1 and the online admissions will begin in a week's time. This year, as part of the Right to Education policy, admissions will continue throughout the year and according to MCD officials, no child will be turned away.
There is no admission fees and so registering online is sufficient to get a child to school.
Most of the people who admit their children to the MCD schools belong to the economically weaker sections (EWS) of society but according to Chairman of Education Committee, Mahendra Nagpal, that will not hamper online admissions. "When we were discussing the plan, some people said that it will not benefit people who are not computer literate and who do not have the means to buy computers. However, since our online property tax submission also started picking up among the EWS, we thought we should give online admissions a chance," he said.
The MCD has already started distributing one computer each to all its schools to record data of admissions, teacher/student attendance and upload it on its website.
The MCD has been holding training camps with the help of its Information Technology (IT) department to train its teachers, staff and education directors of different zones. The civic body will soon begin computer education as part of the school curriculum for which internet connection is being provided to all the its schools.
A senior official of the MCD said since it is the first year that computerisation has been implemented, there will be some hiccups. "Some teachers are still apprehensive about using computers but we hope to improve things soon," he said.