Thank you for apprising us of your decision to rank Step by Step #2 among the top preschools of Delhi. We respect your process of evaluation and humbly suggest if people from your organisation could personally visit our school to get a sense of all that is being done. 

We are constantly attempting to raise the bar by introducing new methodologies which are child-friendly and relevant. Step by Step also takes great pride in organising interactive programmes with our parents where we work together as a team and family.

But as I have already conveyed to you, it is not fair to assess preschools and their teachers’ competence in the absence of relevant information. We are neither competent to make such an evaluation nor would it be a fair and unbiased judgement.

Ramani Chopra
Principal, Step by Step Nursery School, New Delhi

 

The EW India Preschool Rankings methodology is exhaustively explained on pgs 37-38 of our cover story narrative. It’s financially and logistically impossible for us to visit every preschool countrywide — Editor

Inappropriate curriculums

Congratulations for publishing the extensive and detailed EW India Preschool Rankings across 16 cities (EW December). This is a valuable service provided to parents of young children as there is no reliable information on preschools. In fact, there are so many preschools mushrooming across the country that it’s very difficult to tell the good ones from the bad. Your rankings give parents credible information about the best nursery schools in major cities.

I also believe it’s a good idea for state governments to issue a list of approved preschools in major cities and provide curriculum guidelines to be followed by private preschools. As a young parent, while doing a recce for my daughter, I noticed that many preschools follow age-inappropriate and child-unfriendly curriculums. They are like full-fledged primary schools forcing children to learn the three R’s and even write term end exams. This is thoroughly unprofessional and can make children learning-averse in their early years.

Suman Mishra
Delhi

 

Words of praise

Thanks for the excellent 18th Anniversary issue of EducationWorld. I eagerly wait to get the latest copy of this magazine. Reading EW is always a wonderful experience.

Dr. Shayama Chona
New Delhi

 

Upgrade Indian Railways 

Thank you for your 18 years of service to Indian education. Re your editorial ‘Indian Railways need radical reforms’ (EW November), I agree with you that our trains need urgent upgradation. Though the introduction of high-speed bullet trains is welcome, existing trains need to be modernised first. Indian Railways trains are dirty as are the railway stations, notwithstanding the Swachh Bharat Abhiyan programme.

Mahesh Kapasi
Delhi

 

Wrong categorisation

Re the EW India School Rankings 2017-18 published in your September issue, parents have a lot of faith in your evaluation process and the credibility of the rankings. 

However, it has come to my notice that you have ranked Asian School (Dehradun), Taurian School (Ranchi), The Aryan School (Dehradun), Shree Vidya Niketan International School (Tirupati), Usha Martin School (Patna), and Cambrian Hall (Dehradun) in the category of co-ed boarding schools. These are predominantly day schools while they do offer the boarding option. This is misleading and affects the authenticity of your rankings. I request you to rectify this error and rank only schools which are fully residential in the category of co-educational residential schools.

J. Begum
On email

 

The schools were classified and ranked as co-educational residential schools based on declarations made by them. However, we will investigate your complaint and make necessary corrections in next year’s rankings — Editor

 

Corrigenda

In the Young Achievers section of the December issue, Delhi-based human rights campaigner Ayush Chopra was inadvertently referred to as Ayush Sharma in the headline.

Sharmila Chatterjee, principal of Kangaroo Kids, Sector 34 was inadvertently referred to as Sangeeta Chatterjee in the Noida Preschool Rankings story published in the December issue.

We regret these errors — Editor