Promoted by the Kanpur-based Sparsh group of companies, JPIS (estb. 2004) is among the first K-12 schools to acknowledge the critical importance of dispensing skills education coterminously with traditional academics – AUTAR NEHRU

An extension of the fast-growing satellite city of Noida, Greater Noida (pop.107,676) has evolved into a major education hub of the Delhi National Capital Region (NCR). With the well-planned new city attracting a rising number of highly-educated and skilled professionals, quite a few education institutions from preschool to tertiary have mushroomed. The starting point of the six-lane Yamuna Expressway linking Delhi with Agra, Greater Noida hosts several private varsities including the Shiv Nadar, Sharda, and Galgotias universities and globally benchmarked primary-secondaries such as G.D. Goenka, Ryan International, DPS, Greater Noida and J.P. International.

Within this academic community, J.P. International School (JPIS, estb.2004), promoted by the Kanpur-based Sparsh Group of companies under the aegis of the Jai Prakash Educational Trust, has quickly earned an excellent reputation for academic achievement and holistic education. In 2015 and again last year, this CBSE-affiliated co-educational day school was ranked among the Top 5 ‘Leader Schools’ of Greater Noida by Times of India in its Best Schools Survey. Currently, the K-12 JPIS has an enrolment of 2,400 students mentored by 110 teachers. 

“We admitted our first batch of five students and six teachers 13 years ago, and since then the school has grown organically and through word-of-mouth publicity despite many of our students being first generation learners. I am pleased that JPIS has developed into an institution which values and develops every student’s creativity and potential. Our objective is to deliver 21st century education and skills to enable children to lead happy, disciplined and successful lives. That’s why we provide multiple platforms for children to excel in academics, sports and co-curricular activities,” says Heema Sharma, founder-principal of the school. An alumna of Panjab University, Chandigarh, Sharma worked with Gur Kaur Memorial Trust Public School, Ludhiana before being appointed principal of JPIS in 2004. 

Sharma takes special pride that during the past decade, JPIS has developed its own DECA (Discover, Explore, Connect and Apply) teaching-learning model — “a unique experiential learning and child-centric system”. “The DECA pedagogy trains teachers to become receptive to each child’s perspective, talent, uniqueness, ideation and learning style. This individualised approach in a stimulating setting which encourages hands-on learning, has enabled us to empower our children with knowledge and skills to prepare them for a bright future,” says Sharma, who adds that JPIS has benefited greatly from the advice and counsel of Dr. Shayama Chona, nationally-respected educationist and patron of the school. 

Conceptualisation and development of the school’s unique DECA experiential learning model has yielded rich academic dividends. In CBSE’s school-leaving class XII examination of 2016, the average score of the 242 JPIS children who wrote the exam was 72 percent with 194 students passing with distinction. 

One of the first schools to acknowledge the critical importance of dispensing skills education coterminously with traditional academics, last March, JPIS inaugurated its well-equipped Centre for Vocational Education (CVE) which offers marketing and sales, banking and insurance, retail, IT, bakery and confectionery, travel and tourism, and media management introductory education. More recently in February, trustees of the Jai Prakash Education Trust inaugurated JPIS’ Centre of Creation, Incubation & Entrepreneurship (CCIE). “The skills of critical thinking, communication and collaboration are imperative for children to succeed in 21st-century workplaces. Through the unprecedented CCIE we want to impact the importance of skills learning and entrepreneurship through innovation from early age,” says Roshan Agarwal, chairman of JPIS and director of the Sparsh Group of companies.

To deliver and enhance academic, vocational, co-curricular and sports education, the school management has constructed a child-friendly campus with excellent academic and sports facilities. JPIS’ five-acre campus offers 104 IT-enabled classrooms; science, mathematics, computer science, language, robotics, and 3D printing laboratories; music, dance (western and classical) and yoga rooms; a well-stocked library housing over 7,500 books and an amphitheatre. The facilities are currently being given a facelift by the well-known Delhi-based architecture firm Concept Planners.

For nurturing the health and well-being of students, JPIS also offers cricket, soccer, badminton, horse riding, basketball, carrom, chess, snooker, table tennis, hockey, skating and swimming facilities, and it’s mandatory for students to choose and actively participate in at least one sport. Moreover, a number of hobby clubs such as personality development, literary, environment and art and crafts enable students to develop extra-curricular interests and life skills. And under its outreach programme, JPIS has initiated a mobile library for parents living in catchment-area villages. 

With JPIS running smoothly and firmly established among Greater Noida’s top-ranked co-ed day schools, the promoters have finalised plans for a mint-new school on a separate eight-acre campus, as also an institution of higher education in this fast expanding city. “While we are committed to continuously improving and upgrading JPIS, we also want to replicate our excellent child-centric education model by promoting greenfield schools which encourage innovation, experiential learning, cultural integration and community service,” says Agarwal.