Following subdivision of last year’s composite day schools league table, all-girls day schools have acquired a higher profile and improved rankings — useful information for conservative and newly middle class households
Disaggregation and division of last year’s 443 day schools composite league table into four separate categories has improved the visibility and rankings of India’s shrinking minority of all-girls schools. With liberalisation of social norms and attitudes within aspiring middle class India, the great majority of newly-promoted primary-secondaries are co-educational. Hence all-girls schools tended to get lost in the lengthy composite day schools league table. Now following subdivision, all-girls schools, which are usually academically excellent (see CISCE-affiliated schools ranked according to ISC 2013 exam performance p.190), have acquired a higher profile and better rankings — useful information for conservative and newly middle class households which are becoming increasingly aware of the value of high-quality K-12 education for girl children.
Ranked #1 in West Bengal, Kolkata and #14 nationally last year, Modern High School, Kolkata (estb. 1952) which has an aggregate enrolment of 2,500 students, is ranked India’s premier all-girls day school in 2013 with top billing on the parameters of teacher welfare and development, faculty competence, academic reputation and co-curricular education within the newly created category. But despite being “delighted” about Modern High’s elevation from #14 in the 2012 composite league table to the status of India’s #1 girls day school, Devi Kar director of Modern High, is unimpressed by EW’s annual schools rating and rankings initiative.
“We have never believed in ranking schools — or students for that matter — because we don’t see any qualitative difference in the top two-three schools in your league tables. In my opinion a seal of excellence is required rather than rank. But if a grading system is follo-wed, the annual excitement generated by the EducationWorld India School Rankings would be missing. Never-theless we are delighted with our #1 all- girls schools ranking and the fact that Kolkata hosts three of the Top 5 girls schools in India,” says Kar, former principal of La Martiniere for Girls, Kolkata, who was appointed principal of Modern High in 1996 and was recently elevated to the position of director.
The subdivision has given a boost to the rankings of several other girls’ schools including La Martiniere for Girls, Kolkata which is ranked #2 followed by J.B. Petit, Mumbai (3), Carmel Convent, Chandigarh (4), Loreto House, Middleton, Kolkata (5), St. Mary’s, Pune (6), Bishop Cotton Girls, Bangalore (7), Loreto Convent, Luck-now (8), Maharani Gayatri Devi, Jaipur (9) and La Martiniere Girls College, Lucknow (10).
Unlike Kar, Shobha Jaishankar, an alumna of Sri Venkateswara, Annamalai and Delhi universities and former teacher at Tagore International and New Green Field schools (Delhi) and incumbent headmistress (junior section) of NASR School, Khairatabad, Hyderabad (estb. 1965) — an all-girls K-12 CISCE-affiliated school with an aggregate enrolment of “almost 3,000” students (and alma mater of tennis star Sania Mirza) — whose national ranking has risen spectacularly from #61 in 2012 to #11 and #1 in Andhra Pradesh and Hyderabad as a consequence of subdivision, is “thrilled”. However she disputes the ratings given by respondents of the survey to NASR School under the parameters of academic reputation and value for money. “They don’t reflect the correct picture. For the past several years we’ve felt our school hasn’t been given its due because of wrongful comparisons and your respondents are not aware of the good work our faculty has been doing. However subdivision of the days school table list partially corrects the picture,” says Jaishankar, who has served with NASR School for the past 24 years.
To see Girls day schools league table visit http://www.educationworld.in/rank-school/all-cities/day-school/girls/2013.html