No state board: BMC looks at new chapter for 2 schools
ICSE board for a civic school in Dadar, CBSE for one in Andheri
MUMBAI: In a bid to boost enrolments, the Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC) has decided to link one of its schools to the Central Board of Secondary Education (CBSE) and one to the Indian Certificate of Secondary Education (ICSE) board from the academic year 2020-21. The education committee of the civic body gave a final nod to the initiative in a meeting held on Tuesday.
Woollen Mill Municipal School in Dadar will be affiliated to the ICSE board and Poonam Nagar School in Andheri will get CBSE affiliation. According to the plan, the civic body will pay affiliation costs from its budget. Admissions to the schools will remain free. “The students will be selected on a lottery basis. The schools will get all facilities accessed by other civic-run schools. They will follow the curriculum of the respective board. The teachers will be trained by the board before the academic
year begins,” said a civic official.
In the first year, these schools will give admission to students for pre-primary to Class 6. Every year, a class will be added. “It is a model which will benefit a lot of students who come from poor background, bringing them on a par with students of private schools,” said Sainath Durge, BMC education committee member,
who floated the idea initially.
The BMC runs 1,200 schools across the city. According to data from NGO Praja Foundation, enrolment in civic-run schools has dipped by more than 50% in the past decade – the enrolment for Class 1 in 2017-18 was 30,075, compared to 63,392 in 2008. The total number of students in BMC schools was 3.11 lakh in 2017-18
from 4.04 lakh in 2008.
In 2019, 25 schools under the BMC were set to become a part of the Maharashtra International Education Board (MIEB), the state’s newly launched international board. However, after the state education department asked the civic body to pay affiliation costs and teacher training expenses, the plan was scrapped.