[prabhu789]

Folks, My nephew is doing his 10th grade and he is very much interested in Football.

Could you please suggest me a few best sports schools in Bangalore/Chennai where he can do his academics [XI] as well as concentrate on his football career where latter being the most important. Thanks in advance.

[NetfreakBombay]

Originally Posted by msdivy

How is IB/IGCSE for 11th & 12th instead of CBSE/ICSE?

I would not recommend it. IGCSE requires significant focus in 11th and 12th. On the other hand, students can sleepwalk through CBSE PCM.

Best combination is IB/IGCSE till 10th and then CBSE or state board for 11th / 12th.

1. Students can opt out of Local language + History + Civics etc in 9th and 10th
2. Science in 9th and 10th requires critical thinking. This will be helpful with engineering entrance.
3. CBSE English in 12th is comparable to 9th grade English in IB/IGCSE, students can sleepwalk through it
4. Some boards like MH have "fake" subjects like Electrical maintenance that students can opt for. This makes JEE prep easier (PCM + EM + English for 5 subjects)

With this, students need to focus hard on 12th boards for 2 months, can ignore it otherwise. This is mostly for "how to write answers". For example, long answers or flowery language means negatively marks in IGCSE / IB. OTOH, state boards prefer it.

[balenoed_]

What are your thoughts on how much % of increase of fees should the Schools go with year on year? The school in which my kid is studying, in Bangalore, is going ahead with a 15% increase every year and a 25% increase for Class 5th to Class 6th and then continue with 15% thereafter until 8th or so. How is it with your schools? Is there any regulation for this fees increase? Isn't it supposed to be something like 5-10%, which is what natural inflation is I suppose? Any thoughts?

[Miyata]

Originally Posted by balenoed_

Isn't it supposed to be something like 5-10%, which is what natural inflation is I suppose? Any thoughts?

15-25% increase seems predatory. The schools know that most parents will not want to move the kids around (more so in higher grades). At my kids' school, the increment's been <10% typically.

Another trend that seems to be catching up with few schools in Bangalore - They are not teaching Hindi till the 4th grade. When the introduce Hindi in 5th grade, it obviously has to be at a very elementary level. By the time they reach 10th, they are likely to not be proficient enough.

The above mentioned problem will hit those kids (and parents) hard that are likely to be relocating around the country.

[One]

Originally Posted by prabhu789

Folks, My nephew is doing his 10th grade and he is very much interested in Football.

Could you please suggest me a few best sports schools in Bangalore/Chennai where he can do his academics [XI] as well as concentrate on his football career where latter being the most important. Thanks in advance.

FC Madras in Chennai has a huge residential setup for kids. Also check the team academy for the youth team from Bangalore which plays ISL. If you nephew can get selected into either of these, then atleast for India, he will be exposed to all opportunities.

Am not sure about your nephew, but there are also options around football not restricted to just playing which the parents can keep in mind for future guidance (starting academies, coaching, physical trainers, biomechanics etc.)

All the best to the family and the kiddo

[prabhu789]

Originally Posted by One

FC Madras in Chennai has a huge residential setup for kids. Also check the team academy for the youth team from Bangalore which plays ISL. All the best to the family and the kiddo

Thanks a ton buddy for your response. Will definitely call and inquire both the clubs.

[balenoed_]

Slightly OT.

Have seen a practice that schools rent out their ground to external parties, like football tournament, matches or coaching etc. Particularly in Bangalore, guess it must be there in other places too.

Are schools supposed to cash in like this. Aren’t the parents paying all sorts of fees that must cover the ground to exclusively be used by only the students of the school? Any thoughts?

[HTC]

Originally Posted by balenoed_

Slightly OT.

Have seen a practice that schools rent out their ground to external parties, like football tournament, matches or coaching etc. Particularly in Bangalore, guess it must be there in other places too.

Are schools supposed to cash in like this. Aren’t the parents paying all sorts of fees that must cover the ground to exclusively be used by only the students of the school? Any thoughts?

Ha ha. Good question.

Mostly, the infrastructure is owned by THE TRUST. Schools usually pay huge rent to these trusts for the infrastructure. The trust might have it in the agreement to use the play grounds for its business purposes. And every year the trust increases the rent and poor school has to increase the fees to accommodate the hike. But here is the fun part: most of the TRUST members are school owner's family members.

Some youtuber has explained it very well. Here is the

https://youtu.be/az_zvD06DFU?si=yT6BXpe618mXzkXE

P.S. Not connected to this youtuber in any way.

[dsnaveen21]

Guys,

My son studying in Class 12 now, in Belgaum, Karnataka.

1. Name is different in Class 10(studied in Thane, Maharashtra) and class 12.
Should i make a Affidavit for KCET verification, saying both are same individual.

2. Do candidates needs to go to Bangalore for KCET documents verification.

Any suggestions will be appreciated.

Thanks,

[androdev]

Originally Posted by HTC

Ha ha. Good question.

Mostly, the infrastructure is owned by THE TRUST. Schools usually pay huge rent to these trusts for the infrastructure. The trust might have it in the agreement to use the play grounds for its business purposes. And every year the trust increases the rent and poor school has to increase the fees to accommodate the hike. But here is the fun part: most of the TRUST members are school owner's family members.

Some Youtuber has explained it very well. Here is the
https://Youtu.be/az_zvD06DFU?si=yT6BXpe618mXzkXE

P.S. Not connected to this Youtuber in any way.

It costs a LOT to setup a school. Schools can’t be operated like regular businesses generating profits etc. These are the only ways to take money out of the system.

Nobody in their right mind would setup a school with tax paid money or bank loans (except for honest charity projects or to give a position of power and respect to their college drop out children). If real estate/educational institutions were not a great place to stash black money, our country would hardly have any private educational institutions

[hothatchaway]

Originally Posted by androdev

It costs a LOT to setup a school. Schools can’t be operated like regular businesses generating profits etc. These are the only ways to take money out of the system.

Nobody in their right mind would setup a school with tax paid money or bank loans (except for honest charity projects or to give a position of power and respect to their college drop out children). If real estate/educational institutions were not a great place to stash black money, our country would hardly have any private educational institutions

It will be interesting to study the financial data on a cross section of contemporary private schools in India to understand the capital investment of setting up some. My understanding is that land will be the primary input; construction cost of the building, auditorium, mixed use places & playground will be a small percentage of that.

Most schools are abysmal paymasters and some of the teachers will be put to shame by how much security guards in India draw. The wife is a trained teacher and spent her first few years in a leading "convent" school. She moved to the corporate sector two decades back. I think it takes a special kind of motivation for talented teachers to persist in the overall environment in our schools. Simple market forces at work here, better pay elsewhere will motivate promising workers to switch careers. Some if not most schools also have a command and control kind of environment where the management or at best the principal calls the shots. Imparting education is anyways an accidental occurrence in most of these new fangled private schools. So teachers are usually a harried lot. The situation is not very different for the other members of the staff.

As you rightly said, schools in India cannot be for profit, so trusts are set up which can be run as businesses. The accounting is such that the schools channel a bulk of the revenue (ie tuition fees) as fees to this trust. Here in Hyderabad, where land is abundant and the builder lobby calls the shots in pretty much every facet of life, many such businessmen with access to land banks have set up 'schools" Many also sport international names (with a bias for North American nomenclature) There is a culture here of people aspiring to emigrate. So it all fits in very nicely with the narrative. In fact, my brother, who is a corporate lawyer and has experience in deal making, tells me that private equity players have been very active in the education business in India. The result of this is not hard to guess.

I think people with school going kids in India need to see this dispassionately as a service. With fees exceeding upwards of a lakh/annum easily, what is the possible return for this kind of outflow. Learning is often not not guaranteed and there will inevitably be a large sum of money waiting to be paid for a college degree. I consider myself fortunate that I earned both my graduate + postgraduate degree for a fee which people will laugh at today!

[alpha1]

Originally Posted by NetfreakBombay

IGCSE requires significant focus in 11th and 12th. On the other hand, students can sleepwalk through CBSE PCM.

I am quite surprised reading this.
Not that CBSE or ICSE is difficult (school exams are much tougher than the national board exams) compared to say IIT entrance entrance exam, but IGCSE being something more involved than ICSE/CBSE is revealing to me.
What is it about the IB that makes it difficult?

[NetfreakBombay]

Originally Posted by alpha1

but IGCSE being something more involved than ICSE/CBSE is revealing to me.
What is it about the IB that makes it difficult?

Don't know about IB since my kids did not take that., they chose IGCSE.

IGCSE is more difficult than CBSE primarily due to application of knowledge. As an example, look at 2022 question paper https://pmt.physicsandmathstutor.com...0(v3)%20QP.pdf . It does not have questions that require rote learning.

[androdev]

Originally Posted by alpha1

I am quite surprised reading this.
Not that CBSE or ICSE is difficult (school exams are much tougher than the national board exams) compared to say IIT entrance entrance exam, but IGCSE being something more involved than ICSE/CBSE is revealing to me.
What is it about the IB that makes it difficult?

You will understand this better if you see the BSc mathematics syllabus.



This same syllabus is taught in a rural degree college in India as well as in top-tier IITs and also (I'm guessing) in many similar programs in the US, etc. I was talking to a friend who was engaged by the Dept of Education of a state to help with teacher training. He told me that 80%+ of the students doing BSc (Math) and the teachers responsible for teaching do not understand the subject even at a very basic level. I asked him how do students pass the exams? The explanation goes something like this: Both teachers and students mug up the Q&A without understanding head or tail of it. Same questions will come in the exam and they reproduce it. It's like how I did my Sanskrit exam. I had no idea about the language but I memorised enough "photographic data" to reproduce it without understanding any of it.

So the problem is not with the CBSE curriculum but the way it's taught and the way the assessment is carried out. I am not criticising it. We don't have the infrastructure and "will of the society" to deliver a high quality education across the country. I'm not sure it would do any good to conduct high quality exams and fail a majority of the kids that do not have access to quality schooling to start with. That's the harsh reality.

The entrance exams take care of "real learning" to some extent - here also a very graded approach exists. With little understanding of the core concepts, one can manage a rank to get a seat in lower tier colleges. You need to be really competent to make it to the top tier colleges.

I'm not suggesting IGCSE is better than CBSE - different ecosystems with different objectives. CBSE path relies a lot on cracking entrance exams and being extremely competitive with little reliance on family support. IGCSE is more about "learning" and hoping that family support will ensure a happy ending. Sorry if it offends anyone but that's the honest way to put it.

[ex-innova-guy]

Originally Posted by androdev

It's like how I did my Sanskrit exam.

The sanskrit reference got too personal for me :-) All I remember now is prathama dvitiya tritiya...

As a student who switched from ICSE to CBSE to HSC (State Board) here's my perspective. I studied in ICSE till 7th grade and used to score decently. The inner teen in me wanted to experience boarding school since a neighbour was there. The boarding school was a CBSE one and quite good as it had loads of extracurriculars. The change in my surroundings helped me a lot and we had dorms so all friends in a single dorm. CBSE involved lots of assignments which were graded by the teachers of your school so lots of marks depended on your internals. After passing 10th from there with a good score, I again went to a hostel for my junior college years. I learnt a lot there too but the amenities were almost negligible as compared to the earlier boarding school. Passed HSC with a decent score and off I went for College in Vellore. All in all, spent almost 7.5 years away from home but it is and was definitely worth it. (should have been 9 years but 1.5yrs at home due to COVID.)

I would say going from ICSE -> CBSE -> HSC was easier but viceversa would be tough but if the change is done in early years then it shouldn't be a problem.