India's premier co-ed boarding schools

The media shy Rishi Valley School, Madanapalle which had been ranked the country’s #1 co-ed boarding school for four of the past five years has regained its #1 rank

Within India’s legacy boarding schools sector, co-ed primary-secondaries substantially outnumber single sex institutions, undoubtedly a sign of progress towards gender egalitarianism. In this highly competitive segment, the country’s organic swamiji schools, which offer a combination of progressive, new-age western liberal arts education combined with the best strains of traditional Indian philosophy and wisdom, have begun to dominate the annual EducationWorld India School Rankings (EWISR) during the past quinquennium.

In particular, the media shy Rishi Valley School, Madanapalle (RVS), founded in the Silverton Hills of Andhra Pradesh by philosopher, educationist and seer Jiddu Krishnamurti (1895-1986) in 1926, has captured the imagination of India’s upper middle class SECA (socio-economic category A), who constitute the majority of the 11,660-strong database of sample respondents who rated and ranked India’s 1,000 most reputed schools for EWISR 2015. RVS — a pioneer in environment friendly (aka sustainable development) education — has been ranked the country’s #1 co-ed boarding school for four of the past five years. Surprisingly, last year’s sample respondents voted the Sahyadri School, Pune (estb. 1995), also promoted by the Chennai-based Krishnamurti Foundation, highest in this segment. However this year RVS has regained its #1 ranking, while the Sahyadri School is ranked a modest #6.

Moreover, a twist in this year’s narrative is that another swamiji primary-secondary — the class V-XII Chinmaya International Residential School, Coimbatore (CIRS, estb. 1996), which was ranked #4 in 2014 — has stormed to second position in this year’s co-ed boarding schools all-India league table. It’s worth noting that both these schools are the highest ranked academically with an actual 92 percent average in the class XII ISC examination of the Delhi-based Council for the Indian School Certificate Examination (CISCE) as per data compiled by the Hyderabad-based education website www.thelearningpoint.net. Because of the irrational refusal of the pan-India CISCE and CBSE boards to provide school exams performance data, thelearningpoint.net collated and compiled this information from various sources and provided it to EducationWorld (see national league table last column).

Although highly respected nationwide and ranked India’s premier co-ed boarding school for four of the past five years, the management of Rishi Valley School tends to be lukewarm about the high ranking the SECA respondents of successive EWISR surveys confer upon this 79-year-old institution. “I am happy the parameters on which we have been rated high are considered important by the (survey) respondents, and it’s nice to know the school is generally well thought of. But the rankings don’t matter and we have always downplayed them,” says Siddhartha Menon an alumnus of Delhi University and IGNOU, who signed up with RVS in 1991 as a maths and English teacher and is currently the low-profile principal of the school.

Unimpressed by the top ratings given to RVS on nine of the 14 parameters and expressing “perturbation” about “the increasingly widespread tendency to rank educational institutions, and mystified by the methodology”, Menon comments: “Maybe EducationWorld can set a pioneering example by eschewing ratings and rankings of this kind. They can be replaced, for instance, by profiles of lesser known but truly valuable educational initiatives, or by detailed studies of specific programmes and activities in schools across the country. This way the focus could shift from mutual comparison/competition among schools to mutual learning.”

However Shanti Krishnamurthy, principal of CIRS sited on a picturesque 80-acre green campus within easy driving distance of the industrial hub of Coimbatore (pop. 1.05 million), is more enthused about this liberal values school’s steady upward progress in the annual EWISR league tables. “It is indeed a great joy to receive this news, and I am overwhelmed that our mission to develop leaders with good values who will transform society and the nation is getting recognition. Our continuous rise in the annual EWISR is an assurance that we are on the right track. I am especially pleased with our high rating under the parameter of internationalism. Over the past three years, we have developed partnerships with several schools in the UK, Africa and USA and students are working on projects with children in these countries. Indeed, internationalism has made our curriculum dynamic, and has given a new dimension to the teaching learning process,” says Krishnamurthy, an alumna of SIET Women’s College and Madras Christian College (both in Chennai) and former founder principal of Mahindra World School, Chennai, who was appointed principal of CIRS in 2009.

But even as new-age culturally-rooted schools are winning increasing public approbation and approval, in north India the vintage CBSE-affiliated The Lawrence School, Sanawar (LSS, estb.1847), which has an aggregate enrolment of 761 class VI-XII students, including 264 girls, continues to hold its ground and is ranked #3 for the second year in succession. The consistent Top 5 table position which LSS has maintained since 2010 is specially remarkable because this school — and the Lawrence School, Lovedale (estb. 1958) down south ranked #8 — fall within the administrative purview of the Union ministry of human resource development, Delhi, notorious for its reckless interference with education institutions. Quite obviously, the governing boards of these two vintage boarding schools dominated by their alumni have been able to insulate them from excessive government interference. Top-ranked on the parameters of teacher development and robust sports education, despite its long-serving principal Praveen Vasisht stepping down after a ten-year term, LSS continues to be held in high esteem for its legacy boarding school traditions.

“Given the school’s rich heritage and strong traditions which instil right values in our students, I expected your respondents to have moved Lawrence, Sanawar to the top of the league table by now! However, on a positive note, even maintaining the #3 position is quite a feat considering the ever growing number of schools being included in the EW annual league tables. The factors behind the consistent high ranking of LSS are team work, commitment and dedication of the faculty. Much has been done in the school during the past few years including community service projects, upgradation of our campus infrastructure, teacher development and learning enhancement initiatives. As a result, one third of the students who wrote the CBSE class XII exams this year averaged over 90 percent,” says Shonu Mukherjee, an alumna of Panjab University who signed up with LSS in 1986 and is currently the officiating headmaster of this pioneer co-ed boarding school.

On the other hand Sonya Gandhy Mehta, an alumna of St. Xavier’s College, Mumbai, SNDT and San Diego universities with expansive work experience in The Shri Ram School, Delhi, and Indus International, Bangalore (2004-13) and currently head of the state-of-the-art Assam Valley School, Balipara (AVS, estb. 2003), is “overjoyed” that AVS has moved up to the #4 slot all-India and #1 in eastern India in EWISR 2015.

“It’s a matter of great pride for us to be ranked among the country’s Top 5 co-ed boarding schools despite being a relatively young school in comparison with much older institutions in the same category. I attribute this rise in public perception to the relentless efforts of our teachers and administrative staff, who set themselves high goals. Moreover, the openness with which our students and parents have embraced new ideas and pedagogies, and adjusted to changes in the recent past, has helped us keep the AVS flag flying high,” says Mehta. Currently, this CISCE affiliated class V-XII school spread over 270 acres in the heart of a tea garden in Assam, has 784 students, including 322 girls and 97 teachers on its muster rolls.

Capt. (Retd) A.J. Singh, the promoter-principal of the young CBSE-affiliated class I-XII Pinegrove School, Dharmpur (estb. 1991), is also uplifted by the school’s improved #8 (up from #10 last year) ranking. “Our steadily improving ranking in the EducationWorld league tables is a matter of honour and pride for us. More importantly, it motivates us to improve the quality of education we provide and do our best for society. However, it simultaneously places additional responsibility on our teachers and support staff to perform to raised expectations,” says Singh, an alumnus of The Lawrence School, Sanawar; National Defence Academy, Khadakvasla, and the Indian Military Academy, Dehradun. Pinegrove’s improved ranking this year is not unconnected with the spate of football tournaments that Pinegrove girls have won recently, the school’s admission as a member of the London-based Round Square club of exclusive international private schools plus its hosting of the platinum jubilee (75 years) celebrations of the exclusive Indian Public Schools Conference last year.

Further down this year’s national league table of the country’s co-ed boarding schools which largely mirrors the 2014 pecking order, two notable debutants are the Punjab Public School, Nabha (#16) and Anubhuti School, Jalgaon, Maharashtra (#24).

To view EW India Co-ed Boarding Schools Rankings visit www.educationworld.in/rank-school/all-cities/boarding-school/co-ed/2015.html