10-year jail for Schools Interviewing kids or parents for Admissions for Nursery admissions (Delhi)

AAP Govt. is planning to introduce the Delhi School Education (Amendment) Bill 2015.

School authorities interviewing a child or his or her parents for admission to nursery classes could face imprisonment of up to 10 years if the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) government in Delhi has its way. With an aim to make existing rules strict to prevent arbitrariness of private schools in nursery admissions, the Arvind Kejriwal government is planning to introduce the Delhi School Education (Amendment) Bill 2015.

The draft of the proposed Bill suggests that at an entry level in pre-primary and pre-school, where children are below the age of six, schools should neither interview a child nor his or her parents. "Any person or school violating the admission rules should be punished with imprisonment for a term which shall not be less than five years but which may extend up to 10 years. The punishment may vary provided that the court may, for any adequate and special reason to be recorded in writing, impose a sentence of imprisonment for a term, which may be less than five years," it said.

There are 1100 government-run schools and 1500 private schools in Delhi. Another draft Bill being debated is on the regulation of collection of fee by unaided private schools in the national capital. "The government shall constitute a committee for the purpose of determination of fee for any standard or course of study in unaided private schools," reads the proposed draft.

Source: http://indiatoday.intoday.in/story/nursery-admission-aap-govt-proposes-10-year-jail-for-schools-screening-kids-parents/1/451049.html

About Parent's Handbook - Nursery Admissions in Delhi

Parent’s Handbook - Nursery Admissions in Delhi
(First book ever written on Nursery Admissions in 2008) - new 2014 edition for 2014-2015 session is out now!! Check it out here!!

What works in admissions?
What are the DoE rules/guidelines/recommendations?
How can we apply all these to help ourselves during admissions?How can I score maximum points?

...and what questions they usually ask during INTERACTIONS?, and what could be the good answers?

Questions like these have been arising since last few years, and busy parents often don’t have time and right place to find the authentic answers. Authors (Ashok Gupta and Sujata Gupta) have examined DoE rules, consulted several parents to distill the results into this handbook for parents that we hope will help bring positive results for parents.

Got doubts, questions but no authentic answers? This handbook will help you understand the core DoE recommendations for Nursery Admissions in Delhi. It also includes the simplified parameter system. We have also covered few real cases that will help you understand the problems that several parents gone through last year.

…and last but not the least you will also get several practical tips and suggestions that we hope will help you succeed.

…and you will never doubt your command over Nursery Admission process again

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About Authors:

Ashok is an IT geek with over 15 years of industry experience while Sujata is from academic background with over 5 years of teaching experience. Duo had started Nursery Admissions Delhi blog in 2007 that received 50,000+ visitors from 100+ countries and 150+ Indian cities...thats the IMPACT both have made to parents community!

Duo also provided 100% free-of-charge phone helpline to Delhi parents to boost their morale, help them understand the issues and possible solutions to their problems related to Nursery Admissions in Delhi – a first of its kind initiative.

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The eBook is available to parents community and past editions were covered by leading media - NDTV Metronation, FM Channel Radio City Delhi as well. eBook is available free-of-cost to all

(20th Dec 2013: Update: http://blog.nurseryadmission.net/2013/12/download-nursery-admissions-delhi.html)

Schools have enough seats!

Yes, Delhi has enough seats to accommodate all nursery kids! I guess this is what our education minister said last year and I am sure they vouch the same even for this year as well, because they always count gverment schools also in their total available seats for te session.
According to the DOE, the problem is with the choice of parents, as eveyone wants their kid to go to one of that top schools only. Unless Govt is going to improving the infrastructure and quality of education in govt schools the problem with admissions will remain as is.

No seats? There is still some hope….

Your ward did not get seat anywhere? I know how frustrating this could be as I myself have lived thru it in 2007-2008 session. Many parents who thought that they would get a seat becaue fo their links, status, designation and had applied to top 3-5 schools only, are worst hit as they are now having minimum chances of getting to any school.
I have been suggesting this on many platforms (my blog, my articles in media, my handbook on Nursery Admission in Delhi, and also in interviews with Radio City…as well) that apply to as many school as you can as that would at least increase your chances. Anyways, the battle is not lost……!!
We observed last year that many schools has some HIDDEN-UNDISCLOSED seats and they filled them after the dust got settled, they started calling parents (probably picked randomly from the waitlidted candidates) and offered them seats (for no extra money! and not sure some schools amy have accpet money as well- who knows….. you know how all these things work benind the doors)
So this could be one hope for few parents and more-over, expect that some wards may have got admission in multiple schools and they are going to keep one seat only and will withdraw from other school and that would give way to some other lucky ward there….and by the way……trust me this worked for me and for few parents to whom i sugested this, if you know such lucky parents, offer them to accompany you when they are going to submit the withdrawal application, you can meet the admission officer and request them to enroll your kid for that NOW vacant seat.
Aprart from this, you can try getting in touch with admission officer yourself and seerequest them to call you if there is any vacant seat….

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?

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).

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.

Amiown Interview Questions (yes they conducting so called interactions)

No matter what you do, we will do what we want, the way we want... Probably this is the message that schools are trying to convey to DOE.

This is what we came to know from few parents - Amiown called them for so called "interaction with parents" but then they asked child to be taken into a room and one of the parents was allowed to go in. The "interaction" took place in Hinglish (mix of Hindi and English) and they bombarded kid with question on topics like:

• Color identification
• Shape identification
• Animals, Birds identification
• Painting
• Drawing

The parent were asked these questions (sort of, language and type of question may differ):

• How you want to raise your kid
• What is your take on future of your kid
• Where you both work
• What you do

The total duration of this interaction varied from 30 minutes to 60 minutes. As we can guess, what school is trying to do here........