FORMER INDIA tennis player and coach of many Davis Cup stars, and co-founder of Bangalore’s top-ranked The Magical Years (TMY) preschool, Krishna Bhupathi is all set to launch The Village School (TVS), a primary-secondary which in the fullness of time will roll out into a fully-fledged Cambridge Assessment International Examinations (CAIE), UK-affiliated class I-XII co-ed day school.

Newspeg. TVS, which shares a two-acre campus in Kodigehalli, Bangalore with the Bhupathi Tennis Village and its feeder preschool TMY, is ready to admit its first batch of class I and II students in June. Admission interviews are on in full swing with 50 students expected to enroll for the academic year 2014-15.

History. In 1995, Bhupathi forayed into sports education by launching the Nike Bhupathi Tennis Village, which transformed into Bhupathi Tennis Village after its collaboration with the US-based sports equipment, shoes and apparel major Nike ended in 2009. After revolutionising tennis coaching in India, Bhupathi ventured into academics in 2011 with the promotion of The Magical Years, a preschool for children in the age group two-six years in partnership with The Magic Years, Delhi’s consistently top-ranked preschool founded by Shirley Madhavan Kutty. In the EW India Preschool Rankings 2013, TMY was ranked #5 in Bangalore and #1 on the parameter of infrastructure provision.

TVS is equipped with six tennis courts which double as multipurpose areas to teach basketball, football, hockey and cricket. Moreover, students are served by a fully-equipped gym and swimming pool.

Direct talk. “In The Village School, we will continue the TMY tradition of offering excellent academics with high-quality sports education. Students will receive structured physical training and those exhibiting aptitude and promise in a particular sport will be trained by professionals under a special programme integrated with the academic time-table. Our aim is to offer holistic education with special focus on early and sustained sports training,” says Krishna Bhupathi.

USP. To assuage fears of prospective parents about the academic curriculum of TVS, Bhupathi has roped in the expertise of Kiran Sethi, the celebrated promoter-chairperson of The Riverside School, Ahmedabad — ranked #3 all-India and #1 co-ed day school in Gujarat in the EW India School Rankings 2013. Under a collaboration agreement, Riverside will share its K-12 curriculum, pedagogies, processes and practices with TVS.

Future plans. With the garden city’s informed public well aware of Bhupathi’s successful transformation of the Bhupathi Tennis Village into a nursery of champions, and Magical Years into a top-ranked preschool, the response to TVS’ admission drive has been enthusiastic. “We are receiving overwhelming response from parents for admission into our inaugural classes I-II. Subsequently we will be adding one class every year until class XII. With our affiliation application pending with the CAIE, I’m confident that TVS will evolve into a unique institution committed to imparting high-quality academic education combined with globally comparable sports training,” says Krishna Bhupathi.

Summiya Yasmeen (Bangalore)