7 applications for 1 seat for civic body’s CBSE school

In an overwhelming response to Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation’s (BMC) pilot plan to introduce CBSE and ICSE curricula in one civic school each, for every seat

In an overwhelming response to Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation’s (BMC) pilot plan to introduce CBSE and ICSE curricula in one civic school each, for every seat for the newly launched CBSE course at Poonam Nagar Municipal School in Jogeshwari (East), there are nearly seven applications. For the 320 seats that are made open for admissions this year, a total of 2,154 students have applied.

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At the BMC’s first ICSE-affiliated school, Woolen  Mill Municipal School in Mahim, 343 have applied for 320 seats.

“We are happy to see a good response from parents and it is definitely more than what we had expected. It is good to see so many parents keen on enrolling their children into these schools and we are sure that they would benefit from this,” said Mahesh Palkar, education officer, BMC.

In the first year, admissions would be conducted for pre-primary to Class 6. Primary scrutiny of applications and preliminary counselling to parents would take place between March 13 and March 24. A lottery would be conducted to select from the applications between March 26 and 28. While the academic session of the CBSE school would begin from April 2020, that for the ICSE school sessions would start in June 2020.

For both the schools, the highest numbers of applications have come in for the pre-primary classes. Some have also registered for higher classes.

“Those who are coming from a state board school will not have any trouble adjusting to the new board as all the curriculums are similar till Class 6,” added Palkar. Admissions and tuition in both these schools would be free. Students who are admitted in these schools would have to study Marathi as a compulsory third language throughout.

Teachers who are already teaching in BMC schools have been selected through a rigorous process to become a part of the board. The move hopes to bring in more students to BMC schools, which over the years are struggling to get students with high drop-outs and low enrolments. Enrolment in BMC schools has gone down by over 50% in the last decade, revealed data shared by Praja Foundation.