On a mission to South Asia to re-establish the University of Cambridge International Examinations (CIE) board and affiliate as many schools as possible to this school leaving examination board which was a well-known and well-regarded name in India, Mark Bartholomew, CIE’s regional manager for South Asia, has got off to a good start. Already, within three months of his arrival in Delhi, CIE has signed up 50 new schools for affiliation. “We intend to affiliate about 350 to 500 schools in India by 2009,” says Bartholomew.

CIE offers the well-known IGCSE (International General Certificate of Secondary Examination) ‘O’ level and ‘A’ level (Plus Two) examinations and related syllabuses to affiliated schools in 158 countries around the world including India. Syllabuses apart, CIE also provides cost effective teacher training and development to affiliated schools to raise their teaching-learning standards to globally acceptable levels.

A psychology and education postgraduate of Keele, Oxford and Sheffield universities, Bartholomew began his career in 1987 as a translator for GlaxoSmithKline in Turkey, translating Turkish and German into English. In 1990 he signed up with the British Council, to teach English in Greece and Sri Lanka and later managed ELT (English language teaching) centres in Saudi Arabia and Morocco. In 1999, he was posted to Bangladesh as director of the council’s branch in Chittagong before taking on the role of deputy director of the British Council, Bangladesh, in charge of exams and education until 2004. In September last year Bartholomew signed up with CIE as regional manager, South Asia. “I am delighted to be back in South Asia, a part of the world in which I feel very at home,” says Bartholomew, whose jurisdiction covers India, Bangladesh, Sri Lanka, Nepal and Bhutan.

“At the moment I am trying to meet as many educationists as I can to inform schools, principals, teachers, students and parents of the advantages of affiliating with the CIE board — the largest international examinations board worldwide. Every year over 2 million students around the world write these examinations. CIE affiliation and training services are available at a highly competitive price of less than Rs.1 lakh per year, although schools must meet the exacting academic and infrastructural demands the University of Cambridge insists upon,” says Bartholomew.

According to him, the advantage for students writing the ‘A’ level school leaving exam is that they “really hit the ground running” when they enter university or the job market, as the rigorous syllabus forces them to become independent learners. Moreover, the greater specialisation of ‘A’ levels, focusing students on what they will study at university, gains them a year in several American universities. Even Ivy League schools such as Princeton give additional credits to ‘A’ level toppers. “Of course, CIE exams are also recognised by Indian universities,” says Bartholomew.

With CIE having chalked out an ambitious agenda following its comeback to South Asia after a long hiatus, it intends to contribute to the debate on the future of India’s education system. As part of this programme, CIE will invite leading British educationists and teachers to share their insights with their Indian counterparts. First on the agenda is Dr. David Hargreaves, a leading educationist from the UK, who’s scheduled to speak in Bangalore on February 4.

Swagatam!

Mona Barbhaya (Mumbai)

Raviras Basti upliftment initiative

Unlike most government servants, Virendra Kumar Dubey (41), an officer of Uttar Pradesh’s Provincial Educational Services and principal of the Rajkiya Inter College, Nishatganj, Lucknow genuinely believes in the social utility of making quality education available to all. This belief has prompted him to target 150 children aged between six- 12 from Raviras Basti — a Lucknow slum habitation — for provision of free primary education (classes I-V) in the Rajkiya College premises. Into its second year, Dubey’s experiment hit some initial roadblocks when parents of these children were hesitant to send them for fear he would charge fees despite promises of free education. But when he distributed free books and school uniforms, they changed their minds.

Another parental concern was that once schooled, the children would disdain manual labour. But Dubey has included activities such as gardening and cleaning of school premises in the primary school curriculum. “Schooling should not mean that we render children unsuitable for their own environments,” he says. “Moreover as school hours for these children are 12 noon to 5 p.m, they are free in the mornings and evenings to contribute to household work.”

A large number of these students had dropped out of school completely and had to be extensively counselled by Dubey to rejoin. And the fact that the 1,400 students of Rajkiya College made the children welcome helped. “These students learn in our classrooms, are part of the assembly, quizzes and all other activities. Our strategy is to make them feel included so that they don’t feel inferior to anyone,” says Dubey.

Next on Dubey’s agenda is an initiative to get girls from the slum to join class. “Since this is an all boys school there are bound to be parental reservations. But I am sure this is a solvable problem. Where there’s will there must be a way,” he says.

Vidya Pandit (Lucknow)

ISTE-India initiator

Annamalai Muthaiah, chairman, Future Schools Foundation has set himself the ambitious objective of revolutionising teaching-learning processes in India’s schools through effective use of technology. An agreement signed between Future Schools Foundation and the International Society for Technology in Education (ISTE), USA in the presence of the latter’s chief executive Don Knezek, for the launch of ISTE India in Chennai in November last year, could well initiate the process of transforming secondary education in the subcontinent.

“ISTE India’s mission is to modernise Indian education into a 21st century student-centred endeavour and give educators in the country access to the professional association and development that their American counterparts enjoy. It is a programme for educators by educators,” says Muthaiah, a computer science engineering graduate of BMS Engineering College, Bangalore, and engineering postgrad of the University of Colorado, USA. The great grandson of Raja Sir Annamalai Chettiar, founder of the Annamalai University, Muthaiah worked briefly for several software majors in the US but found himself increasingly drawn towards the family vocation of education. This prompted him to promote the Future Schools Foundation (FSF) in 1998 with a corpus of Rs.2 crore. FSF has since grown into a 200-member strong missionary force for technology in education.

Muthaiah’s overriding objective is to “bridge the digital divide in education in India”. In pursuit of this objective he has engineered an alliance of leaders in technology, education, social entrepreneurship, community development and emerging fields of research. One of the outcomes of this alliance is the promotion of ISTE-India.

The first initiative of the Future Schools Foundation and ISTE-USA was a colloquium attended by 110 school heads in Chennai last December to educate principals about ISTE-India, which already has a membership of 275 in Tamil Nadu and Karnataka, and to reassess the current school system. Colloquiums were also held in Bangalore and New Delhi last month to establish state-level chapters and will culminate in 2005 in a national organisational structure. ISTE members will be provided guidance and networking opportunities when they install computers and new technologies in their schools. Professional development programmes, workshops and seminars to train teachers will also be a regular feature.

“ISTE-India will raise funds from society and utilise them effectively. American multinationals like IBM, Intel, Microsoft and others are willing to fund our initiatives and Indian corporates will soon follow suit,” says Muthaiah confidently. “Education is a challenging and high-potential sector which can be dramatically changed for the better through intelligent application of ICT (information communication technologies). ISTE-India intends to make this happen.”

Right on, brother !

Hemalatha Raghupathi (Chennai)

Second wing

The first woman to fly the sophisticated Airbus 300 passenger airplane, the first woman pilot in Asia to notch up 7,500 flying hours and one of Indian Airlines’ senior-most woman commanders, Captain Indraani Singh ascribes her exalted position in the fast-track civil aviation business to her sound education background. A political science graduate of Delhi’s all-women Kamala Nehru College, Singh acquired the confidence to pursue her chosen vocation after topping Delhi University’s academic charts.

Despite openings and opportunities for women keen to take to the skies being few and far between — neither training schemes nor scholarships were available — Singh set her sights unwaveringly on qualifying as an airline pilot. An award-winning NCC cadet in college, she took private flying lessons and a few months into her training, won ‘the best amateur glider pilot’ award of Indian Airlines in 1992. A chance application for the post of trainee pilot saw her sail through Indian Airlines’ entrance exam and bag a job with the nation’s largest domestic (public sector) air carrier. Since then there’s been no looking back. After flying Boeing 737 and 747, Singh took command of IA’s wide-bodied Airbus 300 and 320 in the 1990s.

Mission accomplished and blessed with a satisfying career and a fulfilling personal life (her husband is a pilot with IA as well and they have a teenage son), Singh has resolved to provide the advantages of education to the national capital’s growing number of underprivileged children. “It’s the most important gift you can give to children,” she says with disarming simplicity.

In 1996 after mustering support from Indian Airlines and her colleagues, Singh registered Literacy India, a Gurgaon-based NGO to mainstream underprivileged children. The aim of the charitable trust which currently has 800 children under its wings, is to identify, support and nurture children from disadvantaged backgrounds — usually of daily wage earners — and offer them education, mid-day meals, healthcare and vocational training.

Though a hectic professional life precludes Singh from working full-time with Literacy India, she ensures that at least five to six hours of all off days are invested in its activities. Nor is her full-time attention necessary as the eight-year-old NGO has 34 employees (including 17 full-time teachers) spread over seven villages in Haryana. Nevertheless on her day off — often kitted out in pilot’s uniform — Singh is a familiar figure in Literacy India’s school, inspiring students to become young achievers or organising interactive sessions for them with sportspeople and performing artistes.

And latterly Literacy India has begun sponsoring the brighter children into private schools, “to mainstream them and give them exposure to the real world”.

Wind beneath your wings!

Neeta Lal (Delhi) 
Raj takes charge at XLRI

Fr. N. Casimir Raj SJ is the newly appointed director of Xavier’s Labour Research Institute (XLRI), Jamshedpur (estd. 1949), consistently ranked among the top ten B-schools in the country by the pink papers and business periodicals. XLRI has over 500 full and part-time students instructed by a 45-strong faculty on its muster rolls. “In my close association with education as an academic and administrator I have noticed a sea change in students’ attitude towards education. In the 1970s-80s few students were interested in real learning. A degree was acquired to land a secure government job. Since then this attitude has changed for the better, especially after the economic liberalisation initiative of 1991 which ushered in a new wave of aspirational consumerism across the country. Today’s youth are interested in real learning and prepared to study hard to make themselves ready for industry immediately after college,” says Raj a commerce, business administration and marketing alumnus of Madras, Santa Clara and St. Louis universities.

Raj brings a rich combination of teaching and administration expertise acquired over four decades of service in several top-rung B-schools and universities across the world to his new apex-level job at XLRI. Among the blue chip institutes where he has taught are St. Louis University, Missouri; Wheeling Jesuit College, Wheeling; XLRI Jamshedpur; Xavier’s Institute of Management (XIM), Bhubaneshwar. He was also the founder-director of Loyola Institute of Business Administration (LIBA); principal of Loyola College, Chennai and director, XIM Bhubaneshwar. “When we founded LIBA in 1979, little was known about management education in the country. But thanks to the encouragement and support of the management, it developed into one of the best B-schools in south India,” recalls Raj who took charge of LIBA again in 2001 when its rating had slipped to below 50. Following a total revamp of curriculum and pedagogies, the institute’s rating improved and currently it is ranked among top 20 B-schools in the country by India Today (September 9, 2004).

With XLRI already in the top-five b-schools slot (after the top four IIMs), Raj’s immediate priority is marketing the unique selling proposition of XLRI — its informal atmosphere of camaraderie combined with a testing curriculum. “Another focus area is to internationalise and contemporise our curriculum. This will be achieved by exchange of students, and faculty and research initiatives. We have already entered into exchange agreements with St. Joseph’s University, Philadelphia, Asian Institute of Management, Philippines, and Catholic University, Munich,” says Raj who specialises in teaching marketing and is a member of the prestigious American Marketing Association.

“Faculty and research exchange programmes are of immense benefit for Indian students for the opportunities it provides to learn about international business practices. I am waiting for the day when XLRI students come back from universities abroad with top grades and contribute to enhancing the standards here,” says Raj.

That’s not as impossible as it sounds.

Srinidhi Raghavendra (Bangalore)