The national capital christened Delhi NCR by consumer goods marketers, is arguably better aware of the importance of early childhood care and education than any other city countrywide
The national capital of Delhi which includes several newly risen cities spilling across state boundaries, christened Delhi NCR (national capital region) by FMCG (fast moving consumer goods) marketers, is arguably better aware of the importance and value of early childhood care and education (ECCE) than any other city countrywide. In no other metropolis is the annual scramble for application forms for admission into the city’s most well-known pre-primaries as frantic and intensive as in Delhi NCR. Every January, anxious parents brave the city’s smog-laden winter weather and queue all-night before the gates of Delhi’s most preferred pre-primaries/preschools to register their infants as applicants for admission. Although the longest queues are formed before the gates of the city’s premier composite K-12 schools because admission into their nurseries spares parents the bother of having to separately apply to primary schools after completion of pre-primary education, the pressure for admission of tiny tots into top-ranked standalone pre-primaries is only slightly less intensive.
For this year’s EW-C fore perceptual survey to determine the national capital’s most admired preschools, C fore field researchers constituted a 620 carefully selected sample respondents database comprising 544 parents with children in preschools and 76 teachers and principals and requested them to rate 68 pre-primaries on ten parameters of early childhood education excellence. The parameters included competence of teachers, infrastructure, individual attention to students, quality of leadership, safety and hygiene and provision for differently-abled children, among others. The scores awarded by respondents to preschools on each parameter were totalled and proprietary and franchised pre-primaries were separately ranked inter se. 
OWNED/PROPRIETARY PRESCHOOLS
The highlight of the 2016 Delhi preschools league table is that the seven-year reign of The Magic Years (TMY), Vasant Vihar as the city’s consistently top-ranked proprietary preschool is over. This year’s sample respondents have decisively voted Step by Step, Panchsheel (SbS, estb.1992), the national capital’s #1 proprietary pre-primary relegating TMY to the second position. Top-ranked on the parameters of competence of teachers, infrastructure, parental involvement, innovative teaching and special needs education, SbS chalked up an aggregate score of 928 (of a maximum 1,100) against TMY’s 924.
Ramani Chopra, an alumna of the top-ranked Welham Girls, Dehradun and Panjab University with teaching experience in the Marshal School, Chandigarh and Vasant Valley, Delhi who was appointed principal of SbS Nursery School in 1997, is delighted with the #1 ranking awarded to this preschool. “I am very pleased SbS has been given its rightful rank after a long wait. The hard work and dedication of our teachers whose defining characteristic is that they love children, has finally impacted the Delhi public. Over the past 24 years, we have built an excellent team of teachers and this is reflected in SbS’ top ranking under the parameters of teacher competence and innovative teaching. I am also very pleased with our #1 rank under the parameters of parental involvement and special needs education for which SbS has been top-ranked for several years,” says Chopra. Currently, SbS has 430 infants aged between 18 months and four years mentored by 56 teachers on its muster rolls. 
After the top two — SbS and TMY — the Top 5 ranks in the EW Delhi Preschool Rankings 2016 are completed by the Amiown Amity Caring School, Pushp Vihar, jointly ranked #3 with Ardee Montessori, Sujan Singh Park, the Wonderland Play School, Chanakyapuri at #4 (ranked #6 in 2015) and Petals, Nirman Nagar at #5 (8).
The Top 10 table is completed by Aadyant, Vasant Kunj at #6 (5 last year), The Learning Tree, Sujan Singh Park at #7 (9), Mother’s Pride, Punjabi Bagh #8 (10), Little Pearls, Vasant Vihar #9 (3) and Little Millennium, Pitampura ranked #10 (6) jointly with the previously unranked The Knowledge Bus Global Preschool, Ashok Vihar-Phase I. Little Pearls (9), Tender Feet, Vasant Kunj (11) and Shemrock Heritage, Rohini (12) are ranked lower this year among the 38 preschools sufficiently well-known to be included in EW’s 2016 Delhi proprietary preschools league table.
Entry into the exclusive club of Delhi’s Top 5 proprietary pre-primaries has enthused Shefali Khuller Ahuja, director of the Wonderland Playschool, Chanakyapuri (estb. 2012), rated highly on the parameter of safety and hygiene. “Our improved ranking is very encouraging. It’s the outcome of the hard work put in by our team every day to achieve our most important objective — creating happiness for our children. It is also the outcome of our parents placing their faith in us and encouraging us to constantly innovate our enjoyable teaching practices and pedagogies. I am specially delighted with our high score on the parameter of safety and hygiene because at Wonderland we put the safety and health of our children at the forefront of all our decisions, ahead of everything else,” says Ahuja.
Megha Verma, an alumna of Indraprastha University, Delhi who switched tracks after a decade in banking (Standard Chartered, Axis) and industry (A.V. Birla Group) to preschool education (Gennext, Noida) and is currently the national coordinator of the fast-growing The Knowledge Bus chain of pre-primaries in India and also headmistress of The Knowledge Bus Global Preschool, Ashok Vihar (TKB), is very encouraged that TKB has broken through into the Top 10 within a year of its promotion.
“The entire TKB team is elated by the Top 10 ranking awarded to us within one year of operations. I believe the hard work and real love that our teachers have for children, has been recognised by the public. These factors apart, the excellent international curriculum given to us by Knowledge Universe, Singapore, the safe, well-ventilated and secure environment built by the management for our children and the full support we receive from our parents community is behind our exciting entry into the EW Delhi Top 10 preschools league table in our very first year,” says Verma. TKB currently has 100 children facilitated by 16 teachers on its rolls.
Further down the 2016 league table, the recently-promoted and previously unranked Ryan Shalom Montessori, Rohini, G.D. Goenka la Petite, Greater Kailash I and Dwarka, Shri Ram Global, Dwarka — big names in primary-secondary education — have debuted within the Top 20 and are likely to swiftly improve their rankings in the years ahead. Moreover, the entire 21-32 ranks in the Delhi proprietary pre-primaries league table 2016 comprises previously unranked and presumably recently promoted preschools. 
Quite obviously with greater awareness of the vital importance of professionally-administered early childhood care and education, the demand for ECCE is rising exponentially, and brave edupreneurs are responding to it.
FRANCHISED PRESCHOOLS
Informed public opinion about the relative merits of Delhi’s franchised pre-primaries, i.e, independent preschools provided curriculums, teacher training and brand name rights for a negotiated annual fee by multi-school chains such as the Mumbai-based Kangaroo Kids, EuroKids and Kidzee, hasn’t changed much during the past 12 months. The stellar Top 5 rankings is headed by Kangaroo Kids, New Friends Colony and EuroKids, E Block, GK II while the Top 10 league table league table of 2016 continues to be occupied by the same schools as last year. However, this year the previously unranked EuroKids, Paschim Vihar has made an impressive debut in the Top 10 league table at#6. Similarly, Mother’s Pride, Dwarka, ranked #27 in 2015, is ranked #8 this year.
An alumna of Kakatiya (Warangal) and Chaudhary Charan Singh (Meerut) universities, with 12 years of teaching experience who promoted Kangaroo Kids, New Friends Colony (KKNFC) in 2010, Menka Sharma is “happy and thankful” that the informed public of Delhi has awarded KKNFC the #1 rank among Delhi’s franchised preschools. She attributes the good reputation of the school to the excellent curriculum, pedagogy and bundle of services this pre-primary receives from the “country’s most popular preschools chain promoted by an idealistic woman, a visionary mentor and lady who stands firm in her direction to pave the path for the next generation of children”, i.e, Lina Ashar, promoter-director of franchisor, the Mumbai-based Kangaroo Kids Education Ltd. “We are blessed that our efforts have been appreciated by Delhi’s informed public and we promise not to let our children and stakeholders down,” says Sharma.
Priyanka Wadhwa, promoter-franchisee of the Kidzee Little Tinkles Preschool, Saket (estb. 2011) is also enthused by the steady ascent of her pre-primary in Delhi’s Top 10 league table. “I am honoured and delighted that Kidzee Little Tinkles which was unranked in 2014, has been ranked among the Top 10 for two years. We have invested heavily in infrastructure, security and teacher training and over the past five years we have acquired a good reputation for developing the social and emotional intelligences and cognitive skills of our children,” says Wadhwa, an arts graduate of Meerut University who acquired teaching and admin experience at the Asha Modern Primary, Saharanpur before promoting Kidzee, Saket five years ago. Currently this pre-primary has 90 pupils and nine teachers on its muster roll (tuition fee: Rs.30,000-36,000 per annum).
Further down the 38 preschools-strong league table of Delhi’s most preferred franchised preschools as well, there is minimal change in the rankings of last year. Among the preschools that have improved their ranking this year are Bachpan, Mayur Vihar, Kidzee, Janakpuri, Little Millennium, Kalkaji and Tilak Nagar and two Maple Bear Canadian preschools in Rajouri Garden and Safdarjung Enclave, among others.
Evidently, with the National Early Childhood Care and Education Policy draft approved by the Union cabinet in the last days in office of the Congress-led UPA-II government put in cold storage by the BJP-led NDA government and the prospect of government interference, control and regulation of pre-primary education having receded, a rising number of edupreneurs are promoting much needed ECCE centres at all price points in the national capital. One hopes this phenomenon doesn’t attract the unwelcome attention of government school inspectors with their notoriously itching palms.
To read the EW Delhi Preschool Rankings 2016 please visit: http://www.educationworld.in/rank-preschool/delhi/2016.html