Heads of school slots still vacant in Jhang despite e-transfers

JHANG: Despite recent e-transfers, many district secondary schools, especially girls’ schools, remain without permanent heads due to long-standing vacancies.

Reliable sources have revealed that the additional responsibility of these vacant school head positions (BS-17-18) has been given to secondary school teachers (SST/BS-16) at the local level. It is a known fact that due to the absence of permanent heads, the administrative, financial, and academic affairs of the district’s secondary schools are suffering.

The public has been urging the School Education Department (SED) and PITB authorities for years to allow subject specialists (BS-17) to be appointed to the vacant secondary school head positions, which are currently being filled by SST/BS-16.

However, their requests have not been granted. Official sources have also noted that numerous positions for subject specialists (SS) in subjects like Urdu, Education, and other arts and sciences have been unfilled in various boys’ and girls’ higher secondary schools in the district for years.

These positions are not included as options in e-transfer applications for SS applicants because they have been upgraded to higher ranks of BS-18 & 19 at the local level. This arbitrary action has prevented highly educated SS teachers from teaching in higher secondary schools and being appointed as school heads near their homes.

It has been revealed that at the district level, the scales of SS positions were upgraded to justify the promotion of certain higher secondary school head positions to BS-20. Interestingly, the CEO of Education (head of the district) holds a BS-19 position, while some higher secondary school heads in the district have been upgraded to BS-20. For example, the Government Girls Higher Secondary School, Chund Bharwana, has been operating without an Urdu teacher for the past five years because the DEO secondary failed to update the vacant SS (Urdu) position to BS-17.

Similarly, SS English and Urdu teachers who have obtained an M.Phil in Education (equivalent to MA Education) are unable to transfer to vacant SS Education positions at Dabwala and other girls’ higher secondary schools in the district. Disgruntled teachers and parents have appealed to Punjab CM Maryam Nawaz Sharif, the School Education Department Minister, and Secretary to address the unjustified upgrading of SS positions, which hinders the transfer of highly qualified SS teachers near their homes. DEO secondary Zafar Iqbal was unavailable for comment regarding the pending request from the headteacher of Girls Higher Secondary School Chund Bharwana to correct the data for the SS Urdu position. CEO of Education Muhammad Sarwar stated that DEOs, including those in the secondary wing, have been instructed to collaborate with higher offices to ensure that staff data is corrected in the system as per recent directives.