Spyder wishes every parent all the best for 1st Feb

The nursery admission process in Delhi is one of the most difficult and emotionally traumatic for everyone. It is simply heart breaking to watch amazing parents as they navigate this almost impossible process. We have seen almost every type of emotional reaction since November 2007 the date when DOE first came out with first order for nursery admissions guidelines.

I just want to wish every parent all the very best! I wish that every kid gets to at least one list tomorrow.

We plan to work closely with other parents and media starting next month and take it to next level where parents community will provide suggestions, solution to problems so that at least next year we see happy faces at school gates from start of the admissions till the last kid gets admission and even beyond. I will certainly need your help, so please keep sending your suggestions to me (at spyderindia@gmail.com) and I will try my level best and give my 1000% to this mission - no looking back from here. Thanks again to everyone and best wishes.

...and stay connected for more real stuff on Nursery Admissions in Delhi.

PLEASE NOTE: SELECTION LISTS/LINKS/URLs WILL BE UPDATED ON NAD SITE!

Cheers
Spyder

Letter to Apeejay schools and their reposnse on selection criteria

Note: Entire conversation has been added now, last updated on January 28th, 2008

There was some confusion and doubt in parents mind related to selection list of Apeejay schools. As we could not get much details on issues reported by parents so we send a mail to school principals (Saket, Sheikh Sarai and Pitam Pura) and in response to our e-mail (Dated: January 25, 2008) that we had sent on behalf of all parents, we have received response from Mr. Aditya Berlia (head of ASERF - Apeejay Education Research Foundation) clarifying the doubts that were raised by parents through this blog.

Here is the abstract of this e-conversation:

We asked them to give clarification regarding nursery shortlisting which took place on 24th Jan 2008 across Apeejay schools in Delhi. The issues we highlighted included:
1) Since from the lists it was not clear as to what was the basis of shortlisting. So we asked them to help us understand the exact criteria that schools have followed.
2) As we all had observed that there are kids who scored higher points (for example 50, 54, 58 etc.) and they have not made it to the list but kids with less points (for example 40, 45, 50) have been selected. We asked them to give explanation of the same.

In his response (Dated: January 26, 2008) Mr Aditya mentioned that Apeejay Education Research Foundation has designed “representative affirmative action” system for the nursery admission and details can be found at research foundation website http://admissions.apeejay.edu/
Mr Aditya also mentioned that “system is new and some of the factors are hard to explain; we certainly could do a better job in this regard. I am sure however you will appreciate the manner in which we have conducted the admissions this year; we are certainly quite proud of it.”

Giving due respect to Mr. Aditya’s explanation we spent good time understanding the system process from website, and it was clear that the school had prepared 11 lists (by segments) and selected top scoring kids from each of these lists. So it is also clear that every list will have its own cutoff and hence a kid with 50 points (from “engineering segment”) might have failed but a kid with 35 points (from “media segment”) has made it to the selection list.

We don’t see any rule violation here, except that the school has not made the complete list available to public, so we have sent another mail (Dated: January 26th 2008) to Mr. Aditya asking school to publish the complete list so that we can check if this “system” has really been followed.

Updates received on January 28, 2008:
We have received response from Mr. Aditya today and in his response he mentioned that “With regards to publishing the names and numbers we had decided not to do it online to protect the privacy of the parents. Since the marks given be broken up to reveal confidential information about the parents' qualification and work background, as well as allow anyone to find out the status of someone else's admission, we wish to err on the side of caution in this regard. In this day and age when the privacy of individuals both online and offline are been regularly compromised we felt ethically obliged not to reveal this information online.”

He also added that “Next year we plan to implement a more stringent security system with a username / password aspect; along with a more secure server (better programming as pointed out by you is also needed). The lists were put on the notice board of the school for local consumption. Certainly we have learned a lot from the process this year (we received around 6700 applications for 300 seats), and try for more disclosure next year, perhaps putting in a place a system where marks are given immediately at the point of application.”

We thank Mr. Aditya for timely clarification he has provided to all of us. This has certainly helped everyone

Apeejay School, Sheikh Sarai, Panchsheel Park - baby's day out!

Apeejay School, (Sheikh Sarai, Saket and Pitam Pura) has come out with their first list, I am sure by now most of us have got used to "not seeing" their lil' ones on the lists.

Congratulations to all those who have made to this list!! :)

The cut-off (score of the kid who is last on the selection list) is 65 marks. Myself being computer nurd, I keep doing experiments with the stuff I come across on net, and to my surprise, the school site of prone to "hacking" which is really a bad bad thing. This is hard-core programming stuff, has nothing to do with Nursery Admissions as such ;)

I am planning to inform the school tomorrow about this vulnerability so that they can secure the site information. Spyder is not that bad either - I am after schools for voilating norms and after DOE and Mr. Lovely so letting them do . Can't help it!

Just FYI, my kid also "failed" to make it to Apeejay (7 down out of 19, 12 more to go...) currently he is not aware of what we are going thru for his admission to a bigger school. He is busy playing "Need for Speed" on my laptop and can easily drive the car thru rough pathces on road....I am still learning on the roads of life though...

Problems/issues reported by parents and data verified from the school site:
It is confirmed that Apeejay (Saket, Sheikh Sarai and Pitam Pura - all three) has done soemething fishy with the list. There are kids with 40, 45, 50 marks who are on the selection list and there are those with 50, 58, 54 who have not made it to the list.

We are sending e-mail to school, lets see what resposne we get, if you have reported the problem to the school and have any info/response from school (any tele conv, mails etc), please share it with us. If we don't hear back from school within next 24 hours, let's see what can be done here!

Media? Interested? We have real data! You know my e-mail id - right?

Ryan International - parent interaction has started before list is out!

One of the parents has just reported -

In Ryan International, Vasant Kunj, they are inviting parents for interaction (basis unknown).

When I called up to enquire about the interaction, I got the reply that the list will be put up on 1st Feb and there is no interaction prior to that.

Then on what basis they are calling the parents for interaction. Something fishy??? What kind of value education these schools will provide to our children???

Does anyone has more inputs to this?

Nursery Mathematics

I never thought that my good score in mathematics (shameless self-promotion: I scored 100% marks in 10th grade exams) would come handy after almost 19 years when I will start searching for a nursery school for my kid. What else you can expect from a harried engineer parent?

This “brain twisting” analysis idea came into my mind when I started analyzing chances/probability of my kid making to ‘any’ possible second, third of final list of any school in Delhi.

Hope you understand that the numbers used for this analysis are only indicative and doesn’t reflect any real data. I hope this would lit some ‘hope’ in everyone’s heart – yes there is still some hope. Keep smiling!

Let’s do some basic maths now:

Inputs:
100 - Schools taking admissions for 2008-2009 year in Delhi………...…..… (a)
3000 - Seats for 2008-2009 year (across all schools in Delhi)…………....… (b)
4000 – Applicants for 2008-2009 year (across Delhi)…………………………. (c)

Avg. no. of applications per applicant: 10 (data taken from poll results)
Total applications: 4000 x 10= 40000

Output:
Seats short (c - b): 1000
% of applicants appearing on more than one list: 10% = 4000 (c) x 10%= 400 …….....…….. (d)
Avg. no of lists one kid is appearing: 4
Total seats blocked by these applicants (d x 4): 400 x 4 = 1600 seats……………….…...……... (e)
These kids would free seats (e - d): 1600 – 400 = 1200 seats………………………………………. (f)
Avg. no of available seats per school (f/a): 1200/100 = 12……………………………………………. (g)

Average highest points (based on observations so far): 75 …………………………………...……… (h)
Average cut-off points (based on observations so far): 50 ………………………………….………… (i)
Average points per seat ((h - i)/(b/a)): (75-50)/30 = 25/30= approx. 0.75………..………….. (j)
Expected drop in points (g x j): 12 x 0.75 = approx. 10
Next expected cut-off: 50 – 10 = 40

If you think, you could not understand my point here, then here is the conclusion of this math :)
If you look at the final result of this calculation, the expected drop in cut-off is touching 40, and I am sure it would even drop to 30 which means that many of us would make to the list at one or other school after 1st Feb, 2008. I wish I could put actual numbers in this calculation, the output would have been really really interesting. What you say?

I wish I were right here with this calculation ‘cum’ prediction and see ‘many-many’ happy parents at schools gates in the month of February.

Cheers!

Interation 'Nautanki' at Amity International Saket!

There goes another school-parent interaction at one of the best (on paper they might be but after our recent visit I really doubt if they are close to what they say) South Delhi schools. This school that claims to follow the belief “Vidya Dadate Vinayam- we did not see any signs of "Humanity". Here is the up close and personal experience that we (as parents of 4 year old kid) will never forget in our lives.

1) Our first interaction was with two 'fools' (read 'Amity' Document Verification Officers) who did not even know the difference between a graduation degree and post-graduation one. Myself and my wife had to explain them the difference so that they could mark it properly on the verification form. As we were trying to explain it to them, they were busy arguing between themselves all the time at every stage.
Once the verification part was over they asked us to wait for interaction call.
2) They handed over us a good 6 page paper to fill that had descriptive, objective, multiple choice and questions that hardly make any sense in this admission scenario (e.g. Complete details of Paternal Grandparents, Maternal Grandparents, by complete I mean contact no, education, designation, address and what not...). It took us 45 minutes to complete that form and we thought it is worth spending time on it as probably they would refer to this form during interaction.
3) It was over 2 hours since we landed inAmity land but we were nowhere on that interaction list, after repeated reminders they noticed that verification officer had misplaced the form and so they asked us to wait for 'some more' time, so we did as we had no other option at hand.
4) Finally the wait was over and we got the call and then the 'Nautanki' started, as we entered the room two well dressed ladies were waiting inside and it was a rapid fire questions round (very much standard ones as you can guess), and with in 3 (yes! three!) minutes we were shown the door. Thank You! - she said.

I am not calling this interaction as Nautanki, because of the time duration, or type of questions they asked but the 'quality' of the interaction. One of those ladies was busy with her own stuff (flipping thru some files, papers etc) and the one who was firing questions was really not listening to us.

That's the real problem, why were we parents are being humiliated? Why are we made to stand in the queues, wait at schools for these silly interactions? Sucs!

We also asked couple of other parents and the response was the same - 'Nautanki'!

The truth behind nursery admissions in Delhi!

The story is known to everyone, parents have cried themselves hoarse over the issue, we have had everything from media to public participation over the Nursery Admission fiasco. The problem began when the DOE flouted vague guidelines regarding nursery admissions on 24th November 2007 (Order No. F/DE/15/1031/ACT/2007/7002 later revised in Dec 2007) which led to the rampant rule flouting by schools across Delhi. Since the guidelines were not very clear the schools got a chance to play with the guidelines and started there own modifications (read fiddling around with the rules). A number of them have been exposed here on nurseryadmissionsdelhi.blogspot.com; but it hasn’t been enough to move anybody to take a step in the interest of the tiny tots (who we all know are the future of the nation). The government’s reaction has been limited to the one off comment (Lovely proudly declaring that every student would get admission) where as the media has pitched in with a few articles here and another news story there (no blaming the media since the future of India is not a TRP or readership booster). The actual problem is that no body cares about the real problem; on a poll conducted here (http://nurseryadmissionsdelhi.blogspot.com/) we asked the people “How many schools have you applied for?” we got shocking results:


You might ask what’s the relevance of my talking about this poll here; well for one it goes on to show the level of desperation among parents ( to the Delhi government – you are losing serious votes here). Now the question “who is listening to our plea?” the DOE is silent, the media doesn’t see a TRP cow in nursery admissions, the schools have become like Reliance Power IPO (oversubscribed) and the sad truth is nobody cares.

It’s our sincere plea to the government of Delhi and the media to please take note (a little bit of action would also come in handy).

Now the latest in the series of exposes about the schools and there football with DOE guidelines:

“SHRI RAM SCHOOL FARCE – As seen and reported by a harried parent”

Imagine as if this is your profile:
1) You are an Engineer, IIM Graduate with an excellent academic record
2) Your spouse has a profile similar to yours
3) You have represented India abroad on multiple occasions
3) You have won several National Level debates/contests/awards like “Technical Paper Contest, National Quiz, International Scholarship” etc.
4) You have certain 40 points (as per admissions criterion detailed out on admission form and school website)

Now, I think you would agree with me that you both can easily score at least 15 points in the interaction (some fellow parents like to call it GD, 'Cattle' Fair and so on) that was held at Sri Ram Vatika a few days back.

So in total you have good 55 points in Sri Ram School and the cut-off is 55 points (54 for the waiting list), but you are no where on that list?

What do you think they should do now? Does that selection criterion really make any sense to anyone out there?

We are opening a new poll today to help understand this problem, please give him the score that you think he would have scored looking at his profile (consider that he has good academic, extra-curricular record).

Kathuria Public School, Mahipalpur - Pre-School Admissions Open!

Kathuria Public School, Mahipalpur Road, Vasant Kunj New Delhi , Delhi-70

This school has opened seats for pre-school (nursery) classes for 2008-2009 session. As per current information they have approx. 35-40 seats.

Although school has opened admissions very late but no harm for parents as such. HEre is the school report (received at 10:00am on 14/01/2008):

1. Very ordinary school, gives an impression of govt. school, so parents who are not willing to send their kids to Govt. school might reject it.
2. Admission on first come-first serve basis
3. Very nominal fee (Approx. 3-4K admission fee, Rs. 700-900 p/m tution fee) - please check with school for exact fee structure.
4. Overall very avg. type of school in terms of education, facilities etc.

Here is the contact information:
Ph:26871111, 55336061

All the best!

Survey results are shocking...we really need to think about it!

We conducted a survey and we had received almost 32 replies from parents within last 3 days. The results are very shocking and in fact reflect the kind of frustration and confusion every parent is going through. Here are the details:

As you can see, only 4% say that they will try Govt. school, so Mr. Lovely has a reason to smile as he can always come back and say that there are plenty of seats available in Govt. schools but parents are not willing to send their kids/wards to these schools.

Almost 40% parents ready to give bribe (well read ‘donation’) to the school/management in order to get that ‘one’ seat for their kid. Some parents (12%) think that they can plan shifting out of Delhi (to nearby regions) as they can get a seat there.

The most worrying part is that larger section of our community (62%) still doesn’t know what to do…if they don’t get a seat in Delhi.

Take That! The site claiming to be non-commercial blocks and bans this blog!

As most of us all have seen them on TV, it looked like they were advertising their website rather addressing the issues. I thought I should share my view and help them with whatever I can and I posted this comments today evening on their site:

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Thanks Puja for really coming out and showing courage. You guys have really set an example for rest of the people, but I would somewhat agree to the comments by 'r' that says "it was more like site promotion than bringing up real issues", saying openly that you spent 'x' amount and helping other parents and then talking about future plans (next year and so on) of this 'website' was bit discouraging and out of the topic of issue that parents are facing...

Anyways, thanks for great efforts. We are also trying our level best at Nursery Admissions Delhi blog (http://nurseryadmissionsdelhi.blogspot.com/) to address real issues directly from parents and media and more.

Thanks again, but it could have been better.
Spyder
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....and to my big surprise, the original post was removed from site because many parents had displayed same views on their site regarding today's coverage on NDTV. And to add to that they banned my account and blocked me from entering the site. Any explainations ????

If anyone wants to see this, I can share my login and password and you can check yourself.

One could easily guess that from the today's coverage on NDTV, as they mentioned they had spent so much money on the site, they have plans for next year and so on.....but hardly a word about the Nursery Admissions, Issues Parents are facing........

Shame on such business minded people that are playing with Parents feelings!

A Parent's Agony - Dilli Se...

हम इस कहानी को यहीं खतम नहीं करना चाहते! खास कर जब हमें दुसरे अभिभावकों की सद्भावना और सहायता मिल रही है। ये कहानी एक परिवार, एक बच्चे की नहीं, बल्कि हज़ारों, लाखों परिवारों की है, उनके बच्चों की है। हमें मालूम है कि हमारी तरह बहुत से माता पिता इस परेशानी से गुज़र रहे हैं।

आज (११-जनवरी-2008) एक पिता ने, जो श्री राम वाटिका में 'ग्रुप मीटिंग' कर के आ रह था, बताया कि सच तो ये है के मेने सब स्कूलों में फॉर्म भरें हैं, अब प्रिंसिपल के इस सवाल का ज़वाब क्या हो के मैंने "श्री राम वाटिका क्यों चुना ?"

हमने एक शुरुआत की थी इस एक सच्ची कहानी से, और इस कहानी में आज एक और पन्ना जुडा है। आज हम ये प्रण करते हैं की हर इस कहानी को सब के सामने लाया जाएगा। हर कोशिश नाकाम न जाये ये हम सब कि दुआ है। हर बच्चे को एक अच्छा स्कूल मिले....हर वो सपना सच हो जो उसके लिए माता पिता ने संजोया है।

आमीन!

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True Story#1 from parents: "Untitled..."
I thought that I will take this blog to a new level and probably will help change the politics behind admissions but seems like it is not as easy as it seems. I even thought of filing PIL (also suggested by few visitors on this blog) but as we all know even PIL is not an easy way out, high courts are not accepting PILs and has given their own limitations.

Don’t know if my kid would get admission in pre-primary in any of the schools in Delhi, I have forgotten of all my dreams of getting him a good school from day one…
I wonder sometimes, why I have to compromise in life, why my innocent child is forced to compromise for no reason. Why a stupid fault in the system will go down our life which will keep coming as nightmare for rest of the life.

Why can’t we have intelligent politicians that put some brain before they take any decisions? I go to schools and see poor parents standing in the lines to get forms, and other are standing to submit forms. No one is really looking confident, and I am sure none of us can understand why schools are allowed to have different form formats? Why different schools are asking for different supporting documents and that too in their own way (self attested, attested by gazetted officer, just plain photo-copies and so on…).

I am a poor parent like 1000 out there who is earning good my family belongs to general class, has raised a healthy first child, I have spent over 5000 rupees in buying admission forms and still not sure if my kid will get admission in any school this year.

Here I am, the typical Indian parent, now for the future of my 4 year kid I am ready to pay anyone a good amount who can promise me admission in school for my kid…
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True Story#2 from parents: "My Poor Child"
As I type this, I hear you playing downstairs, so happily, so cheerfully, so unaware of the hundreds of vicious people in those schools out there who will give negative marks to you and me. Me for not being a Govt servant, not being on transfer, not being a post-graduate. You for not being first-born, not being physically-handicapped, not being a girl.

Play on, my child, play on.

These arrogant people - these Principals and Head-mistresses and Head-masters who will determine your next 14 years of life this month with a flick of their pens or at the flick of a cheque - don't matter. You still are my most wonderful child.

GOTHILLA, THE SADDEST OF THE VISIGOTHS
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The Banyan Tree School (Lodhi Complex) - Parents Interaction

Here are updates from The Banyan Tree School (Nr. Sai Mandir, Lodhi Complex, New Delhi) - Parents Interaction held today:

Overview: Very well organized, the parents who attended interaction at Birla Vidya Mandir would easily get it as it was more or less the same, except that parents had to face two 'interviewers' (sorry read teachers). It was very well organized in terms of time slots, waiting areas, attendents etc. Per reports, it was taking approx. 20-30 mins (school gate entry-exit time) which is pretty much okie. Per reports from parents we came to know that teachers greeted them as they entered and were very friendly. They made it clear that this interaction will not attract any additional points.

Bad things about interaction:

1. Interviewers (sorry again, please read 'teachers') were asking questions, so in all it can be called interview.
2. Majority of the parents have reported that they did not check documents in front of them, instead they fired questions to parents.

Schools, Admissions and Voilation of DOE rules!

नमस्ते लवली चाचा! चरण स्पर्श दीक्षित अंटी! कर लो जो कर सकते हो इन स्कूलों का! - दिल्ली के नन्हें बच्चे !

NAMES OF SUCH BUSINESS MINDED SCHOOLS WILL BE LISTED ON THIS BLOG! IF YOU COME ACROSS SUCH INCIDENT, PLEASE REPORT TO US IMMEDIATELY AND WE WILL DO THE REST!

How many times the working parent can keep taking off from their offices? And how much money could a middle class person put at stake for this non-refundable token amount? - one of the parents reports

GIVEN BELOW THE LIST OF SCHOOLS THAT ARE OPENLY VOILATING THE RULES - information may be outdated, just in case you notice that it has been fixed/changed please inform us - Thanks!

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Red Roses Public School, Saket, New Delhi (reported by one of the parents on 14-jan-2008)
Rule voilation:
School is taking written test of kids, they are asking kids to write alphabets, numbers. Parents are asked to stand away from kids and they also ask kids to chant/sing 1-2 rhymes.

The best part is the kid gets candy at the end of this test.
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Santa Maria: Junior section of St. Mary. (reported by one of the parents on 11-jan-2008)
Address (as reported by on of the parents): 4, Green Avenue Lane, (near D-3 church), Vasant Kunj, New Delhi

Rule voilation:
1.They are openly asking for 20K. The principal says "First come first serve, give 20K & you can admit your child right now."
2. Parent asked "Is it a donation or what?", The answer was "You can think whatever you want. It's non-refundable."
3. The cost of the form was 500 & no receipt was being given to anybody.
4. The principal's opinion on the "Mission Admission" : "As a good citizen of country, I should not say this. But the fact is the court has made a mess of the admission process." What a great message !!!

Shame! Shame! Shame!

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DPS Dwarka (NEW ENTRY! - 10-jan-2008)

Rule voilation:This school lays down the age criterion for pre-school admissions as:Age Eligibility: 3+ as on 31 March 2008 (children born between 01 April 2004 and 31 March 2005) This is clearly against the rules set by DOE. Can someone do anything about this. Where do I admit my Jan, 2004 born child?
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Venkateshwar International School (Dwarka in Sector-10 on 11-jan-2008)

Rule voilation:
1. This School distributed first of all the forms at the cost of Rs. 400.
2. They did not specify any admission criterion (100 point system)
3. They are openly asking Rs. 25000/- on the name of development fund.
4. Parent residing in the range of 12-15 km. with no siblings were invited for the interaction
5. After few minutes of discussion with the administration guy, the chairman of the school comes out and clearly states - The school is not answerable to any parent, we don't have to give any reason to your why or what......... go and do whatever you want to do!!

Shame! Shame! Shame!
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AMIOWN, Pushp Vihar (details available at: http://www.amiown.com/admissions.aspx)

Pre-School: Available
Pre-Primary: No Vacancy

Rule voilation:
1. They are conducting interviews openly for over 1 month now! Yes! Ask any parent that has attended that so called interaction। They take child to a room along with one of the wards and so called interaction takes place.
Our blog was first to publish this in any media (print, online) AMIOWN, see this post dated 31st Dec 2007.

2.School distributed forms from 7th Dec till 15th Dec, and registration has been closed on 15th Dec which is against the rules set by DOE!
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Birla Vidya Niketan (Details available at:http://birla.ac.in/Notice%20board.htm)

Pre-School: Available
Pre-Primary: No Vacancy
Forms: Not available online

Rule voilation: School says "Kid must be born between - 1st April’ 04 to 31st March ’05" which is against the rules set by DOE! Fixed!
BPS has changed their rule to match the guidelines set by DOE. So the above voilation has been corrected.
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Ryan International, Vasant Kunj (No details available at: http://www.risvk.org/admission.html)

Pre-School: Available
Pre-Primary: No Vacancy
Forms: Not available online (as on 16/12/07 at 4:23pm IST). Admissions page has not been updated for a long time now.

Rule voilation: School distributed forms from 1st Dec till 15th Dec, i.e. closed on 15th Dec which is against the rules set by DOE!
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The Heritage School (Rohini)

Pre-School: Available

Rule voilation: School has the following regulations on its website: "Children born only between 1st April 2004 and 31st March 2005।" which is against the rules set by DOE! Fixed! School has changed their rule to match the guidelines set by DOE. So the above voilation has been corrected.
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Delhi Public School (Rohini)

Pre-Primary: No Vacancy

Rule voilation: This school is planning to scrap Nursery
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Ramjas School

Pre-Primary: No Vacancy

Rule voilation: School is denying forms for the 4+ yrs for pre-school and they don't have any vacancy in pre-primary class. Their age criteria is children born between 1st April 2004 to 31st March 2005.
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Laxman Public School (near Malviya Nagar F.O.)

Pre-Primary: No Vacancy

Rule voilation: Their age criteria is children born between 1st April 2004 to 31st March 2005.
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St. Mary's School

Rule voilation:(Reported by one of the parents) School is asking for Rs. 20000/- deposit for registration which is non-refundable and their last date for registration ends on 18th December.
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More to be listed here soon! Stay connected!

Need help from my peer Parents

TAARE ZAMEEN PAR! SCHOOLS ON CLOUD NINE....

We have got tie-up with online media and we are planning to bring violation to attention of other parents and person responsible at DOE and Govt. This online media will publish the details anonymously so complete privacy will be maintained.

We need help from you all, please submit the information, news that you know, or are aware of anyvoilations taking place.

E.g: There are schools are asking for Rs. 20000/- or simillar deposit for registration which is non-refundable, or asking for documents that are vague and so on.

As some parents reported us that St Mary's school is charging Rs 20K at the time of form submission, but we dont know the exact address of school, so if someone can help us find the exact information we can really tap them, expose them for the sake of our community and our kids.

Please send your information to spyderindia@gmail.com and myself being parent of 3 yr old, I respect and assure the privacy in all communication to this mail id.

Or, you can post the comments here as well under any name you like.

Many thanks to all parents! Our efforts have been paid off!

Our collective efforts have been noticed and we were in Hindustan Times - Delhi Edition (Jan 10, 2008, See Page No. 6). I am getting so many e-mails from parents.

Thanks to everyone for helping us!

Delhi Nursery Admissions: Annoying issues! Who is responsible?

I've also noticed so many annoying issues for which i was really looking for a platform to share my views.

My first frustration is WE are made to buy the prospectus worth Rs. 250-800 each but still in that no school has given idea of its fee- structure. We are middle class people and have to do future planning for our investments in which child's monthly school expense will be counted. If I know in advance that a particular school will charge how much amount of fee it will be easy for us to take decision whether to apply in that school or not.

Second thing I think is that for all schools there should be a same date of declaring of lists so as to avoid confusion and submitting non refundable fees in 2-3 schools.

My third worry is the schools asking about the schooling of parents, what if the parents are well educated in post graduation and are in good jobs but hail from Govt. schools, as in our time education was the priority not the school name. I think schools should not ask parents this question in their interaction.

Please share your views on this.

The Shri Ram Vatika School, New Delhi - Interaction at it's best

Adding to the pain that parents are going through, this school (read The Shri Ram Vatika School, New Delhi) has asked parents not to bring their child/ward to school during interaction.

Wondering how single monther, or say in the era of nucleus families where parents should be dropping child? Why these schools don't think on these rules, instructions practically. I hope the guards would not stop parents who will take their child along on interaction day.

I remeber the case of Birla Vidya Niketan, where they asked parents not to bring child along, but they did allow child enter to the interaction room. I remember, some parents left their 3+yrs, 4+ yrs olds, on benches outside the interaction rooms just to avoid that "not so happy look" of interviwers.

What are we heading to? Is this the face of new India? A developing country? Do we have rights to file PL against such foolish invitations/rules? Probably delhi Govt. is least interested in answering such questions. I am happy parent, I have filled 18 odd admissions forms all around south delhi and I trust Mr. Lovely as he assured to public that no child will be left this year...

Ryan Internation - thinking out of the box!

When DOE is trying to streamline the admissions procedure across schools, Ryan International has taken it to the next level......

Ryan international is asking for thumb size photo graphs for nursery admissions. Passport size photograph is a norm across all schools except Ryan, so if at all you are planning to apply in Ryan, make sure you have thumb size photograph of your little one.

And bytheway...they are also asking for Family Pic! Oh my God! What the hell is going on all around............

Birla Vidya Niketan, Saket - Nursery Admissions Interaction

Taare Zameen Par - every school is special, so does the Birla Vidya Niketan. If you ignore the Trojan Viruses on their website, everything this school is doing is overall satisfactory.

Recently reported by one of my fellow parents that this school has started Nursery Interactions with parents and here is the abstract of what to expect during these interactions:

Good things about interactions at Birla Vidya Niketan:

• Very well managed by school, they give you date and time slot and adhere to that
  They give you pretty comfortable place to sit and a teacher will come calling your number when the interviewer is available.
• They allow child to accompany you in case of child is too young (although they mention that parents should come alone for interactions)
• They give you a form to fill-up during that wait period (family detail sort of form, 2 pages long) – sorry we can’t disclose the form questions because that would be against the rules and unfair to school norms as well.
• Interactions are 10-20 minutes long
• Complete process (start to end) takes no longer than 15-40 minutes.
• They don’t ask kid to color, paint, draw anything, neither they ask where they are (just in case you are not taking them along to school)

Bad things: Don't understand, why interaction is required?