From 25, only a handful BMC schools to get int'l curriculum

In rural areas of Maharashtra, students do not have access to private, international schools or even proper government schools. We want such students to study international curriculum through the medium of MIEB STATE EDUCATION DEPARTMENT OFFICIAL

The education department of Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC) had earlier said 25 civic schools will be included in the international board. Now, these schools have applied for the Maharashtra International Education Board (MIEB) to be started by the state education department. However, the catch is, not all of these 25 schools will be eligible, only a handful will be selected.

In June, the BMC education department had declared to start these 25 international schools independently and had even trained over 75 principals and teachers from these civic-run schools. After all this expenditure, the BMC has shelved its plan for starting its own international schools.

Mahesh Palkar, BMC Education Officer, told The Free Press Journal, “We could not start the international board in all these schools independently. Yes, we completed the due process, but now we have registered applications of our schools under the MIEB plan of the state.”

As the major aim of the state is to uplift Zilla Parishad (ZP) schools, civicrun schools of the city have a narrow scope for this international curriculum. Palkar revealed, “The state wants to start this new board in a total of 100 schools of different areas of Maharashtra. Even though, 25 schools from Mumbai applied for this board, not more than five will get selected as the remaining schools will be from rural areas of the state.”

The state aims to start 100 schools under MIEB across different districts and rural areas of Maharashtra with a special focus on Marathi medium ZP schools. The objective of MIEB is to provide an opportunity to students of rural areas to study international curriculum in a ZP or government school. A senior officer of the state education department said, “In rural areas of Maharashtra, students do not have access to private, international schools or even proper government schools. We want such students to study international curriculum through the medium of MIEB.”

The schools will be selected based on five categories namely Zilla Parishad (ZP), Municipal Corporation (Nagar Palika), Greater Municipal Corporation (Maha Nagar Palika), aided and self-financed schools. The names of the schools will be declared after December 15.