'Teachers Working In A Boarding School Have Special Qualification'

What must a parent look for while choosing a residenl school? What are the marketing mechanisms parents must see beyond?

First and foremost, parents must ensure boarding is the right choice for their child as not every student will be suited to a boarding environment, just as not every school fits every child. Parents need to understand the ethos and the philosophy of the school.

Parents need to know about pastoral care, facilities, curriculum, diversity, cost and extra curricular activities before choosing any school.

Sexual Abuse, loneliness, safety, health measures, psychological tortures, distancing from parents are some of the innumerable apprehensions of a parent when s/he thinks about admitting his/her child to a residential school. Do these myths still hold strong?

These are not the myths but we need to be careful about all these issues as this is directly related to the future of your child. Under POSCO Act, all the parents and students are well aware about their rights. Schools need to conduct more parents-faculty meetings on frequent basis.

Pedagogically, what have been the major challenges to run a residential school?

Family factors, technology, student attitudes and behaviours, no child left behind, parent involvement and student health are some of the major challenges, which are faced while operating any residential school.

Do you have difficulty in finding the right faculty for your school?

Getting the right faculty is a problem for all schools, but getting the right faculty for boarding schools is a herculean task for the head of any boarding institution. Teachers working in a boarding school have special qualification as compared to teachers working in day schools.  So, the degree of the problem is higher for boarding schools.

Discipline, safety, psychological balance is a problem that every residential school grapples with. What do you think of this?

Discipline, safety, psychological balance is a common problem in every school. In the boarding schools faculties have to be alert 24X7.

How do you engage and increase confidence of parents who are stationed far away from their children?

Parents have many questions in their mind while sending the child to boarding school like: Have I prepared him/her enough for the academic and social demands of boarding school?

Are we doing the right thing? Will she be okay? Will she fit in? How will the child deal with home sickness or illness? Will he make new friends and so on. We, as a school, have to address all these kind of issues on regular basis.

School has to meet all the expectation levels of the parents and the students. If the students are satisfied then the parents are always confident of their decision and the performance of the child. We, as a school, need to arrange effective two -way communication system with the parents on regular basis so that parents are well updated about the child’s well being. Last but not the least, parents should involve the child both before, and after the process of the boarding school. If both parents and student agree, only then admission should be done.