Netra Bahadur Budha, principal of Madhyamik Bidhyalaya Khahare, in Chaurjahari Municipality, has furnished clarification twice in just last month at the municipality’s Education, Youth and Sports Department for being late to work. So has Lal Bahadur Gharti, principal of Kalika Basic School, earlier in October. Both principals furnished oral clarifications through telephone at the department’s office based in Bijayshowri Danda.

The municipality, under the Educational Counselling and Technology Programme, has begun monitoring the attendance of teachers, including principals, of 23 out of 40 community schools, in an effort to keep a check on public school employees.

Coordinator of the department, Sher Prasad Dhakal, said that the programme was initiated to monitor teachers and students after the municipality found that school employees were negligent in taking classes and were often late to class, while students were also found cutting classes regularly.

As a part of the programme, nine secondary schools, eight basic schools and six primary schools were digitally connected to the municipality office enabling the office to use an attendance software to monitor the employee records. The municipality has also allocated budget—Rs220,000 to the secondary schools, Rs196,000 to basic schools and Rs190,000 to primary schools—for the programme.

"We get daily updates on teachers who attended or remained absent or left work in the middle of the day,” said Dhakal, “We are also monitoring the student's attendance from the office.”

Dhakal informed that any school employee upon reaching their respective schools should punch in their attendance at the digital attendance recorder which is then conveyed to the department’s office digitally.

"The programme has prevented teachers from being negligent and irregular," said Dhakal, "Now the teachers have become punctual.” He informed that programmes will be implemented in all schools inside the municipality within this fiscal year.

Budha, who was one of the employees put on check through the programme, said that the introduction of technology at the school has made everyone punctual and responsible for their work. “This has helped in maintaining discipline in the school,” said Budha.

Chaurjahari Municipality Mayor Vishal Sharma said that the municipality initiated the programme keeping in mind the interests of the students and to keep the teaching and learning process in tune with the changing times. “It does not make sense to refrain from using technology in the teaching and learning process in schools in this era of science and technology,” said Sharma, “We have made technology a priority at schools in our municipality.”