Kavya, the Second Floor, and Parents Who Refuse the Certificate
A government primary school in Andhra Pradesh has 41 children in Class V with one teacher. Kavya, aged 10, has low vision with nystagmus and reads only 18-point print at about 30 cm. She sits in the last row because she is tall. The class has one blackboard and the teacher writes small. There is no large-print or braille material in the school. Her parents have twice refused to attend the district medical board camp for a disability certificate, saying the certificate would label her and that a neighbouring child with a certificate was sent away to a hostel. One resource teacher serves eleven schools and visits on the second Saturday of the month. The SMC has built a ramp with MGNREGA labour, but the classroom is on the first floor of an old block and the ramp stops at the ground floor. In Class IV, a boy repeating for the second time is called 'dull' by the same teacher.
1. What can be done in the next two weeks without waiting for a disability certificate? Separate what the school can do on its own from what needs departmental action.
Read the worked answer
First, correct a widespread misunderstanding. Enrolment and classroom access do not depend on certification. The RTE Act covers every child, and its definition of a child with disability refers to the disabilities listed in the RPwD Act, 2016, which include low vision; the certificate is an entry point to specific benefits, not to schooling. The refusal of the parents therefore cannot be used by anyone as a reason to delay accommodations.
The school can act this week, at no cost. Seat Kavya in the front, with her back to the window so light falls on the page and not into her eyes. Write larger on the blackboard and read aloud what has been written. Photocopy the relevant textbook pages enlarged to A3 and give them to her; use matte paper and a dark felt pen. Allow oral answers where copying from the board is the barrier. Pair her with a reading buddy, but do not make the buddy the teacher. Check with her privately which of these actually help, since she is the expert on her own vision.
Departmental action. Ask the MEO for an unscheduled resource teacher visit rather than waiting for the second Saturday; request the class be shifted to a ground-floor room, since a ramp that stops at the ground floor is not access; ask the DIET or block resource centre for large-print material and a magnifier; and place the boy in Class IV on the referral list for a learning-disability screening.
Reject. Transfer to a special school or hostel is not the answer and is not required by anything in the law.
2. How will you counsel parents whose fear is genuine and partly justified, and what is the department's position if they continue to refuse?
Read the worked answer
Take the fear seriously. They are not being irrational. A neighbour's child was sent to a hostel after certification, and for a family with no experience of the system, certificate and separation are the same event. Lecturing them about rights will entrench the refusal.
Separate the certificate from the consequence. Explain concretely what the certificate does: it enables a UDID card, a low-vision aid and magnifier, scholarship and transport allowances, extra time and a reader in public examinations, and exemption from certain subjects where permitted. Explain what it does not do: it does not remove her from the neighbourhood school, and under the RPwD Act the default is inclusive education in a neighbourhood school. Offer to put this in writing so they can show it to relatives who will advise them.
Use the right messenger. The headmaster alone will not persuade them. Involve the SMC parent member, preferably a mother, and if possible a parent from another school who obtained a certificate and whose child stayed in school. Have the resource teacher meet them on a school day.
Remove practical barriers. Offer a specific camp date, arrange for a teacher to accompany them, and reassure them about the school day she will miss.
If refusal continues. The department cannot compel certification. The school's duty to educate her continues unchanged, and she is to be recorded as a child with disability for classroom purposes while her parents decide. Note the refusal factually, keep the accommodations in place, and revisit the conversation each term. Her own view at age ten, as her capacity develops, is part of the decision.
3. How should Kavya be assessed so that the standard is not lowered, and what would you do about the boy in Class IV?
Read the worked answer
Assess the outcome, adapt the medium. The competencies remain those of Class V; what changes is presentation and response. Give a large-print question paper on A3, seat her in good light, and grant extra time as provided for children with disabilities in examination norms. Her barrier is reading, not writing, so a reader is more appropriate than a scribe; a scribe would only be justified if writing too were affected. Accept oral answers where the assessment is of reasoning rather than spelling.
Formative assessment. Check comprehension orally, listen to her read with the magnifier, and record against the same learning indicators used for the class. The register should carry a short note of the accommodations used, so that next year's teacher does not restart the search.
The Class IV boy. Repeating twice and being called 'dull' are two warning signs, not one. The pattern points to a specific learning difficulty or to gaps never remediated, not to low intelligence; calling him dull in front of peers is mental harassment under Section 17 of the RTE Act and must stop immediately, whatever the assessment outcome. Meanwhile, give him structured, sequential work in reading and number with daily short practice, and track a simple measure such as words read correctly per minute each fortnight. Refer him for screening through the block resource centre, and tell the parents what the screening is and is not. The teacher needs a brief orientation, not a reprimand, because in a 41-child single-teacher class the real constraint is time and support.