Hyderabad: After receiving complaints from students regarding the imposition of undue academic pressure on them, teachers from corporate colleges say that they are being forced to conduct six hour-long classes every day. According to the rules, classes must only be 45-minutes long.
Junior lecturers say that they are forced to teach 36 classes every week, while their counterparts at government colleges teach only 18 classes. The disgruntled lecturers have been conducting protests for the past three days at the Archana Campus of Chaitanya Kalashala in Dilsukhnagar, demanding a reduction in their workloads.
Senior lecturer Dr Hari Haranath says, “If we raise our voice against the management, we are targeted, blacklisted and our services are terminated.” Pakala Srikanth, a junior lecturer, says, “ We have to teach for six hours every day, and then we have another two to three study hours.” Students are allowed to clear their doubts during these study hour.
N. Narayana, an educationist, says, “The ideal duration of a class is 45 minutes. Students’ interests begin to decline within 40 minutes. A class which stretches beyond 50 minutes can kill the creativity of the students and teachers.”
A psychologist says that the attention spans of students increase as they grow up, but only if lessons are made engaging. According to another psychologist, teachers also require regular breaks. “Brains are designed to concentrate, take a break, and then concentrate again. If you make your brain do only one thing for a long time, it will cause problems,” she said.
Kumar Veeramallu, the Dean of Chaitanya Junior College, says that teachers are made to teach six classes a day, instead of seven. “Government colleges have different teaching methods, which cant be compared with corporate colleges,” he says. This is the reason why parents prefer corporate colleges over government colleges.”
