Page 62 - EW August 2021

Cover Story

Bhupinder Gogia duced to make up for the learning loss
suffered by children and support their
Principal, Sat Paul Mittal School, mental well-being?
Ludhiana We have designed an effective
teacher-student connect programme
hupinder Gogia is principal
of the CISCE-affiliated Sat which has enhanced communication
BPaul Mittal School, Ludhiana between teachers and students. This
(SPMS), ranked Punjab’s #1 co-ed is complemented by robust online
counselling and Quality Circle Time
day school in the EW India School
Rankings 2020-21. sessions. Our online SEL (socio-emo-
tional learning) programme has also
How satisfied are you with SPMS’ move proved successful and our webinars,
to online learning over the past year? life skills development sessions
Totally satisfied. SPMS was the first have improved our children’s self-
school in Ludhiana to transition awareness, self-management, social
to virtual classes after the national awareness, relationship building and creating a database named Covepe-
lockdown was announced on March problem-solving skills. dia of Covid-19 resources.
25, 2020. More than a year later, it’s Community service and student welfare
very satisfying that the collabora- programmes... What are your plans to deal with future
tive efforts of teachers, parents and A large number of students have vol- pandemic disruptions?
students have paid off. We have We have prepared a detailed Covid
formulated a multi-pronged strategy unteered for a range of social service Contingency Plan with excellent safe-
programmes including webinars to
by adopting existing and new digital ty protocols for sustainable reopen-
technologies to ensure not only train students and teachers to use ing of our school campus. We have
ICT tools and organised fund-raising
academic learning delivery, but also also prepared a detailed plan to en-
continuity of co-curricular and sports campaigns to distribute free mo- able our teachers to bridge children’s
bile phones to underprivileged girl
education. The credit for all this goes learning gaps and provide them
to the collective efforts of our dedi- children. Moreover, the school has social emotional support. Moreover,
partnered with local NGO CityNeeds
cated team of teachers, admin and we have developed an excellent
support staff. to donate books and educational technology-enabled hybrid learning
material to less-privileged children model which will prove useful when
What major initiatives has SPMS intro- and our teachers have contributed to schools reopen.
Bageshree Kerkar ranged digital training for all our 42
teachers to teach online and manage
Principal, Worli Seaface Mumbai children’s stress. We also tune in to
Public English School MCGB’s television channel which
airs subject lessons for students.
ageshree Kerkar is principal
of the local government Worli What is your estimate of children’s learn-
BSeaface Mumbai Public Eng- ing loss? What remedial programmes
lish School (WSMPES, estb.2000) have you introduced?
promoted by the Municipal Corpora- There’s definitely been a huge learn-
tion of Greater Mumbai. The class ing loss over the past year. That’s
I-X WSMPES is the sole municipal why we decided to introduce a
school countrywide ranked in the baseline testing programme, under
Top 10 league table of government which teachers continuously revise
day schools in the EducationWorld the previous academic year’s syl-
India School Rankings 2020-21. labus. We have also started a bridge
course of 45 days beginning July 1 in
How have you ensured the learning pandemic and safety precautions which teachers will assess students’
continuity of WSMPES children? through our school management learning levels and address learning
We started conducting online classes committee (SMC) meetings. gaps. Once schools reopen, we will
from May, 2020 itself by introducing intensify our remedial programmes.
new teaching methods to engage stu- Most government school children don’t
dents online, and appreciated per- have access to digital gadgets and Future plans...
formance by awarding them digital Internet. What are the measures you took We will continue to implement new
trophies and certificates. This helped to address this challenge? online teaching methodologies to
to improve student attendance in Fortunately, all our 1,354 students ensure learning continuity of our
online classes. Moreover, our teach- have access to at least one Android children. But we are hopeful schools
ers maintained contact with pupils smartphone at home, so we all will reopen soon and WSMPES is
by visiting their homes to ensure were digitally connected during fully prepared with all Covid-19
they didn’t drop out of school. We the pandemic. MCGB (Municipal safety protocols in place. We are
also spread awareness about the Corporation of Greater Mumbai) ar- ready to begin in-person classes.

62 EDUCATIONWORLD AUGUST 2021