Delay in nursery admissions leads to mixed response

The decision of Delhi government’s Directorate of Education (DoE) to start the nursery admission process for the academic session 2011-12 from January 1, has been received with mixed response by both parents and school principals.

The decision of Delhi government’s Directorate of Education (DoE) to start the nursery admission process for the academic session 2011-12 from January 1, has been received with mixed response by both parents and school principals.

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Last year the admission process started from December 15 and continued till March 31, the same deadline as this year’s.

The Union ministry of human resource and development, which had issued guidelines for admission regarding Right to Education (RTE) Act, said no school would be allowed to profile students based on their parents' education.

The ministry guidelines also allow schools to have categorization based on a "rationale and just basis" such as alumni and sibling.

However, within the categories, schools will not be allowed to conduct interviews of either students or parents; hence admission will be done entirely on a random basis, through draw of lots.

This had left both the parents and schools confused and they were eagerly waiting for some notification from the DoE to help clear the confusion.

Yet others like Sangeeta Das, who has to get her daughter admitted to nursery, sound worried.

"The delay in the process might mean that the government might delay releasing the guidelines further. It will only make the parents more anxious now," she said.

Principal of Laxman Public School Usha Ram, too, agreed, "The delay might just increased the anxiety levels of the parents who were waiting for the admission process to begin from December 15."

But others like Jyoti Bose, principal of Springdales School, Dhaula Kuan, said, "The admission process will continue till March 31, so what is the big hurry? The important thing is that the guidelines help bring clarity to the confusion that has been prevailing regarding RTE."

"Any sort of change takes time to get assimilated in the system, so even if the DoE is taking time in deciding the guidelines, one hopes that at
the end it helps smoothen the admission process," Bose added.