Doha: Parents of students studying in the Doha Modern Indian School (DMIS) have started a campaign on change.org against the introduction of electronic tracking system from next academic year.
They are planning to submit the petition to the school management and Ministry of Education after collecting signatures.
As reported by The Peninsula earlier a number of parents of students at DMIS met officials of the Ministry of Education and Higher Education earlier to express their distress over the issue.
Parents have raised concern over issues ranging from violation of human rights, to infringement of privacy to health risks associated with the new surveillance system. With acute shortage of seats in Indian schools, parents have found themselves forced to pay for the new identification tag, which cost QR1,200 per child a year.
DMIS has made it mandatory for all the students to have the rather pricey tags, Student Tracking and Ridership Solution (STRS) based on Bluetooth technology with real time visibility at its campus.
STRS makes use of Bluetooth Low Energy Technology which involves short range transmission to communicate between various electronic devices like identification tags used by students and Bluetooth beacons hosted at the school and in buses.
Also read: Electronic student tracking system at school irks parents
As of filing this report the petition had around 100 signatures.
“The school has not provided a valid assurance regarding the safety of these identity cards to the parents. The Certificate provided to the parents by the school in this regard is issued by the manufacturer of the ID card which is not assuring enough,” the petition said.
“We are concerned that use of radio frequency ID cards for prolonged duration on a daily basis would expose our children (aged 3.5 to 17 years) to health risks.
“As per the school, the ID cards are being introduced to enforce the safety and discipline of students by real time location monitoring of students. However we do not believe in enforcing discipline by inducing fear into the child of being tracked all the time. Rather discipline should be nourished within the child in a constructive way.”
“The school is charging a very high price of QAR.1200 per student each year for the ID card. This is a huge burden on parents, particularly for those parents who have more than one child studying in the school.
“We request the earliest intervention of Ministry of Education and advice Doha Modern Indian School to suspend the implementation of RFID till above mentioned concerns are resolved by the school,” it added.
“I believe this introduction is unnecessary. There are more grave issues in DMIS that needs more attention. Also it just doesnt justify this year there is no regular ID issued to kids at all by DMIS and the following year DMIS tries to justify the importance of RFID and student tracking. How ridiculous!!,” a parent wrote under the petition.
You can see the online petition here
