People

Indefatigable scientist

From a small recreation club offering table-tennis, chess and other activities, the Children’s Club Society (CCS) in Mylapore, Chennai, founded by Savitri Srinivasan and Pattu Balagopal in 1947, has metamorphosed into an intellectual centre alive with discussions and talks by senior scientists, professors and aeronautics experts. The credit for this transformation goes to 90-year-old M. Narayanaswamy, the honorary secretary of the Children’s Club Society whose mission is to kindle interest in science among school students.

"In today’s exam-oriented education system children are encouraged to confine their interest to the science syllabus prescribed by schools. We want children to enjoy learning science without fear of examinations, therefore our programme goes beyond the prescribed syllabus," says Narayanaswamy, an economics and political science graduate of Madras University who began his career at the National Council of Applied Economic Research, switched to the Economic and Scientific Research Foundation, Delhi and returned to Chennai in 1976.

In 1987, Narayanaswamy was invited by patrons of the Children’s Club Society to take charge as honorary secretary and two decades on, the professionally run society is widely acclaimed for its outstanding programmes. Every Sunday, from June to December, the club hosts science lectures by eminent professors, senior scientists and Ph D students from reputed institutions such as the Indian Institute of Technology, Madras, Mathematical Institute, Matscience, Anna University and Vivekananda College. The lectures are especially popular with higher secondary students during the summer vacation.

Discussions, debates and lectures apart, CCS also offers several extra-curricular activities. These include coaching in table tennis (seven-15 years), chess (five-15 years), drawing and painting (five-15 years) and cricket coaching for boys (eight-13 years). Qualified coaches instruct children within the 16,000 sq. ft premises of CCS, which has a lecture hall on the first floor. Moreover every January, the club hosts a state level open chess tournament for children under 16 years of age, co-sponsored by Madras Cements, and an annual inter-school competition in bhajans, carnatic music, violin and drama which attracts participants from across Tamil Nadu.

Nor is Narayanaswamy done. "We plan to introduce two new activities — oil painting for adults and children and dramatics. Meanwhile we recently received an endowment of Rs.50,000 for the science programme from our founders and are confident of attracting more student participation in this major activity," he says.

Hemalatha Raghupathi (Chennai)

Niche tutor

India-based online e-tutoring companies, providing one-on-one cost-effective private tuition over the internet to American students, are making a big splash in the US. The market for this newly emergent outsourcing business is estimated at $17 billion globally, and India with its large pool of English-speaking, talented but underpaid teachers is poised to dominate this new transnational tutoring business.

The latest entrant into this growing market for online private tuition services currently dominated by names such as TutorVista, Educomp and Learning Unbound, is the Bangalore-based Beastartutoring Pvt Ltd (www.beastar tutoring.com). Launching this month, the company’s first-of-its-kind website will offer one-on-one online science and maths tuition to American students preparing for the MCAT (Medical College Admission Test), success in which is a prerequisite for admission into medical schools in the US.

"Beastartutoring.com is the first website to focus on providing online tuition to American students preparing for MCAT. In the US, a medical degree is a postgraduate programme and usually students in their second and/or final year of undergrad studies start preparing for this testing entrance exam. Annually more than 500,000 students write MCAT. By utilising the huge pool of highly-experienced maths and science teachers in India, Beastartutoring will offer US medical college aspirants the most cost-effective private tutoring over the internet," says Rajiv Varma, an electronics engineering graduate of the highly-reputed Visvesvaraya College of Engineering, Bangalore and the co-promoter and chief executive of www.beastartutoring.com. Beastartutoring’s other promoters include Dr. A. Citrin (of Georgia Tech, Atlanta) and Dr. Neil Shulman (a well-known US-based author and medical education evangelist).

According to Varma, in its first year of operations, Beastartutoring expects to enroll 3,500 pupils tutored by 250 India-based teachers, working out of fully-wired homes. Tutors will use whiteboard, chat, voice over IP and application sharing mechanisms to teach. Each student is charged $22 per hour for one-on-one tuition delivered over the internet. The newly promoted company is targeted to achieve a sales revenue of $1 million (Rs.4 crore) in the first year of operations.

"We are confident of achieving these numbers because of our unique marketing strategy wherein we approach American college and university managements directly to recommend their best students. In this connection Dr. Shulman has already spoken to several colleges to apprise them of the unique features of this innovative venture. Two large universities have already signed up students for online MCAT tutoring," says Varma.

This new enterprise has a good chance at success given Varma’s varied work experience, which includes stints with Tata Burroughs (1987-91), Computer Point, Bangalore (1991-92), and as country manager of Motorola (1992-2000) and CEO of Infocom Telesolutions Pvt Ltd.

"The market for online tuition is unlimited. With MCAT online tutoring we have only touched the tip of the iceberg. We gradually hope to extend our portfolio to include learning content for engineering and class VII-XII school systems," says Varma.

Fair winds!

Summiya Yasmeen (Bangalore)

Challenged children’s champion

Although Neeta Bahadur lacks formal training in rehabilitation, she has something more important — a burning desire to make life bearable and pleasant for mentally and physically challenged children. So 17 years ago, this Lucknow-based journalist started recording educational audio cassettes for visually challenged children. That small beginning has morphed into the Mission School, an institution that mainstreams 300 mentally and physically challenged children with ‘normal’ children, an integration crucial to fostering greater acceptance of people with disabilities in society. Hence though classes for the two sets of children are run separately, they stage cultural events and participate in school competitions together. Challenged children are not charged any tuition fee and the school provides them with books, uniforms and meals during school hours.

Run under the aegis of the Drishti Samajik Sansthan Trust (estb. 1990), the school is the latest addition to a long success story that has seen many challenged children from Lucknow’s rural and backward fringes getting training in vocational skills. "I started working with these children at a time when they were not a ‘popular’ cause," says Bahadur. The first task was to convince parents that something worthwhile could be made of the lives of children they had virtually discarded. "Challenged children are held back not by lack of talent, but by lack of opportunities" she observes.

Vocational courses in typing, shorthand, weaving, tailoring, candle making and other crafts are offered at the school. Regular medical and awareness camps have been integrated into the programmes. Children exhibiting aptitude for academics are supported for higher studies. One such success story is Pawan Gaur, a physically challenged orphan who is now employed with a nationalised bank. More than 1,000 children have found purpose to their lives with help from Drishti during the past 17 years.

The society also managed a pilot project for the National Trust and Rehabilitation Council of India to construct a residential centre/hostel for children suffering from autism, mental and/or multiple retardation. Moreover it regularly conducts training programmes for care givers, anganwadi workers and parents of disabled children, besides aiding the micro financing schemes of the Union government promoted National Handicapped Finance and Development Corporation.

Although Bahadur is always ready, willing and able to work with govern-ment departments and organisations, she draws the line at accepting government finance. DSS is financed by Bahadur’s own family and donations from philanthropists. While the Central government provides assistance for 11 teachers at the Mission School, some income is generated by sales of art and crafts produced by children.

In recognition of Bahadur’s dedica-tion to the cause of challenged children, FICCI honoured her with ‘Outstanding social worker of the country’ award in 2003 and Dr. Reddy’s Laboratories similarly honoured her in 2001.

Looking back on her socially purposive venture started almost two decades ago, Bahadur believes it has taught her much. "I have learned to count my blessings. The trials, tribulations and courage of our children is an inspiration to all," she says.

Vidya Pandit (Lucknow)

Master journalism tutor

"The advent of electronic media has created a plethora of job opportunities for the next generation. As a result numerous mass communication schools have sprung up across the country. But unfortunately, most of them lack high quality teachers," laments Prof. Kollemvarieth Thomas Oommen (70), director of the Manorama School of Communication (MASCOM), Kottayam. With more than two decades of experience in training and mentoring aspiring journalists, Oommen’s protégés are playing key roles in almost all leading newspapers of India.

Born into a family of school teachers in Kottayam, Kerala, who migrated to Ethiopia, Oommen completed his schooling there and returned to India in 1952 to complete Plus Two at the Madras Christian College. Graduating from St. Stephen’s College, Delhi, he began his career as a sub editor in the Free Press Journal (FPJ). After two years in FPJ, Oommen accepted an assignment as an advisor to the ministry of information and broadcasting of the government of Ethiopia (1960-63). Subsequently he emplaned to the US and earned a Masters in journalism from the University of Iowa. After some small newspaper jobs, Oommen worked with the Associated Press in Los Angeles for a decade (1970-80). At the peak of his career with AP, Oommen and his American wife Sandra decided to come back to India as he "wanted his children to become familiar with Indian culture".

"I was bored with journalism and was looking for a change. In 1978 when the Indian Institute of Mass Communication started an eight-month course for news agency journalists from non-aligned countries to meet the requirements of third world media and H.Y. Sharada Prasad, the then principal information officer in the government of India, asked me to head its news agency journalism department, I readily accepted," recalls Oommen.

After eight years with IMC, Oommen put in a five-year (1986-91) stint as the head of the Times Centre for Media Studies, Delhi which he describes as the "golden era of his teaching years".

Following a two-year assignment with the then newly promoted Down to Earth — India’s first environment sciences monthly — the Oommens once again emplaned for Africa and joined the University of Swaziland in the department of journalism where he served for six years before returning to India. "Back home, I accepted an offer as dean of Asian College of Journalism, Chennai, run by the Hindu group of newspapers. Two years later in 2002 Malayalam Manorama invited me to head MASCOM in Kottayam. I have happily resettled in my home town," says Oommen.

For this tireless septuagenarian life has come full circle.

Sanjay Pandey (Kottayam)

Outdoor education missionary

Outdoor education aka adventure, experiential, and environmental education is fast gaining currency in schools across India. This new-found awareness of the multiple benefits of outdoor education is connected with changed perceptions within the teachers community about the value of life skills training, leadership, team building and environmental awareness as also with an emerging breed of can-do edupreneurs in post-liberalisation India. Delhi-based Ikram Singh Bawa and his wife Shobana, promoter directors of Roots Education, are representative of newgen edupreneurs who are teaching the public and teachers’ community the virtues of experiential education.

"We both worked in the hospitality industry before quitting our jobs to promote a consultancy firm in tourism and hospitality in 1994-95. Later in 1999 we diversified and started Roots Education for students as well as corporate executives. The objective of Roots is to widen perspectives by supplementing classroom curricula through outdoor activities," says Bawa, an MBA of Delhi University who worked for over a decade with the Oberoi group of hotels and KLM, the Dutch airline.

Over the past eight years Roots has conducted outdoor education camps for more than 11,000 students countrywide. However the critical factor which led to the Bawas’ diversification into outdoor education was the easy access they to had to two campsites owned by Ikram’s family at Ambala (Haryana) and Chail near Shimla. Each campsite has the capacity to host between 100-150 students. "Our outdoor education camps go beyond an excursion or adventure trip. They are well-devised learning programmes which incorporate knowledge and information about travel, nature, adventure, wildlife and rural India to develop life skills, leadership qualities, teamwork, creative thinking skills and sensitise students to nature and environment conservation," says Bawa.

Moreover Roots’ clientele is not restricted to students and education institutions; it extends to corporates and other organisations. "We have also developed a unique outdoor programme for corporate professionals and have thus far trained over 30,000 executives," says this outdoor enthusiast who is also the India representative of Thailand’s Webster University, for whom he regularly organises student exchange programmes.

With missionaries such as the Bawas actively redefining education, outdoor or experiential education’s popularity is all set to grow in leaps and bounds.