City

Nursery interviews throw parents in preschool daze

Saturday, 08 February 2014 | Aditi Gupta | New Delhi

After struggling to pick up and submit application forms for nursery admissions, parents are now brainstorming over the alleged interviews being conducted by some unaided schools going against the guidelines. Parents have alleged that schools have called them along with their child for an ‘interaction’ before declaring the first list of selected candidates scheduled to be out on February 28.

From honing their communication skills to making themselves more presentable, parents are trying it all, to ensure that their child is admitted to a prestigious city school. “We have been called for interview on February 13. The school authorities have asked us to come with documents and bring our child along. As far as I know the Government guidelines prohibit schools from interviewing parents and kids then how are schools doing this?” asked a parent wishing to not be named as it may disrupt their child’s admission in New Era School, Rajouri Garden.

After the form submission phase, several schools have come up with interview dates for parents and children, violating the Right to Education and admission norms. “If such a thing is being practiced by schools, it is a violation of the RTE and the admission guidelines. Schools are strictly prohibited from conducting any kind of exam or interview and it can even land them in jail. They can be prosecuted,” said Khagesh Jha, advocate and member of Social Jurist, a civil rights’ group which has been actively fighting for the fair nursery admissions in the capital.

Sumit Vohra of admissionsnursery.com said it is like a pattern as each year schools continue to hideously flout the guidelines and come up with their own procedures. “Despite strict instructions from the government and courts, schools do their own thing. They should be pulled up for non-abidance and severely punished. It is a complete harassment to parents,” he said.

Some parents have lodged complaints with the nursery admission helpline number- 01127352525 of the Directorate of Education to get the issue addressed. However, no action has been taken so far. Some other schools flouting the norms include, Aster Public School, Mayur Vihar Phase-1, Vivekanand International Senior Secondary School, IP Extension, Modern School, Shalimar Bagh, Bhatnagar International school and St Lawrence School, Geeta Colony, to name a few.