Nursery admission process begins, Delhi schools upload criteria

Forms for admission to nursery, kindergarten and class 1 for the academic session 2020-21 will be available from Friday. The last date of submissions is December 27.

The admission process for unreserved seats in entry-level classes in over 1,700 private, unaided, and recognised schools in Delhi began on Thursday with schools uploading admission criteria on their websites.

While most schools will provide forms online on their websites, parents can personally visit and get them as per their convenience. Parents will have to pay an amount of Rs 25 as non-refundable admission registration fee. (HT File)

Forms for admission to nursery, kindergarten and class 1 for the academic session 2020-21 will be available from Friday. The last date of submissions is December 27.

While most schools will provide forms online on their websites, parents can personally visit and get them as per their convenience. Parents will have to pay an amount of Rs 25 as non-refundable admission registration fee.

Since admissions to entry-level classes are determined by a point-system followed by a draw of lots, most schools have allotted points to several factors, mostly distance, siblings in the school, alumni parents, or girl child.

For instance, Mother’s International School has fixed 40 points for the distance criteria and 10 additional points for girl child. Amity International School in Pushp Vihar has fixed 30 points for distance and allotted 30 points to alumni parents and another 20 to staff ward.

“We would like most children to stay close to school so that they don’t have to travel much in this polluted city. While having parents as alumni would help in understanding ethos of the school, if the child has a sibling in the same institute it becomes easier for parents. The points for girl child were allotted to maintain gender balance in classrooms,” said Sanghamitra Ghosh, principal of Mother’s International School.

While the DOE allows school to decide the admission norms, it has warned them not to include 50 listed criteria — such as state transfers, parents’ education, profession, income, food habits, regularity in payment of dues, and written or oral interviews of both students and parents —abolished by the Delhi government in 2016.

Several schools, however, continued to use some of these banned criteria. Sumit Vohra, founder of a nursery admissions portal, said, “Many schools are still using the transfer criteria or asking for professional and educational qualification of parents despite the court order.”

The DoE has fixed an upper age limit of 4, 5 and 6 years as on March 31, 2020, for admission in nursery, KG and Class 1, respectively.

The minimum age for admission in these classes is 3, 4 and 5 years as of March 31, 2020 respectively. However, age relaxation of up to 30 days can be given by heads of schools in maximum and minimum age limits, DOE clarified last week.

As per the Right to Education Act, 25% of seats are reserved for students from the economically weaker section (EWS) and disadvantaged (DG) categories. Admission to these seats is carried out centrally by Directorate of Education and the schedule for it will be announced in the coming weeks.

“We have a team of about five people who monitor if schools have used criteria that is not allowed. Action will be taken against those found violating the norms,” a senior DOE official said.