Anniversary celebrations @ Leonia!!!

Abhyaas Educorp completes 7 years in 2016 and has grown to around 50 employees. The entire team celebrated the anniversary at the Leonia resorts on 6^th October 2016. It was an event filled with fun, frolic, awards, games et al.

The event started with employees travelling by the GVA bus from HO/GVA to the resort. After a welcome drink and distribution of the map and itinerary, everyone dispersed to explore the resort. There were numerous activities ranging from cycling, shuttle, indoor games like table tennis and carroms, swimming, water games/rain dance.

After a hectic tour exploring the various areas, the team assembled for a sumptuous lunch. Post lunch, people settled in their allotted rooms for a brief spell before returning for the presentations. The formal anniversary event started with presentations from the different teams explaining their current achievements, challenges and future goals.

Next came the awards presentations. It was exciting with nail-biting anticipation for the announcement of the winners in different categories. Some of the awardees felt as if they were nominated or won an Oscar award. Such was the enthusiasm and the fervor of the moment.

Dinner was enjoyable and suited the palates of one and all. The cultural programmes included a skit and songs by various individuals/groups. Before we realized, it was 11 pm, but the night was young as everyone was just getting into the mood for fun and frolic. The games conducted by the games committee brought out the best in everyone and the competition was neck to neck. Though it was soon past midnight, no one was ready to retire for the night. The tambola game brought cheer to the lucky and to even one unlucky candidate who got a prize for being the last one to get atleast one number.

The next day saw an early start with most of the team heading to the cricket ground and a few lounging in their rooms or going to the swimming pool. A delicious breakfast spread awaited the team after engaging in one of the above activities. This followed by another set of games and the star attraction was the dance by baby Srivalli who accompanied her mother to the event.

Alas, all good things have to come to an end. Once the mementos/gifts were distributed, the team had to disperse after 24 hours of fun and celebrations as people started for their dussehra break.

A dream come true!!

It was around the summer of 2012, exactly four years ago, that I was desperately looking for a school/college for my niece who completed her tenth standard. She wanted to join the MPC stream with the goal of becoming an engineer. Being in the education sector, I wanted to make sure she has the right guidance, good ambience, like-minded friends and a healthy environment for “learning”, mind you, I mean learning and not studying or getting seat in an engineering college. The first choice was between CBSE and State Board/Intermediate. Students, especially girls, want to get free from the shackles of the school uniform and wear colourful clothes or jeans/slacks. However, I did not want to completely eliminate CBSE schools for that reason.

Now, there are advantages to joining a CBSE school, as the curriculum is good, the emphasis is more on learning the subject rather than rote learning. The drawback is that most schools cater to the board syllabus well, but the preparation for the entrance exams is not that great. Moreover, following the CBSE syllabus, the students are at a disadvantage when it comes to the State entrance exam, EAMCET. So I would need to enroll her to another institution for the entrance exam coaching post school. This would be pretty taxing for her as she would have to go to school and later, for the coaching.

The other option was to join her in an Intermediate college. There are two types of colleges. The old-time colleges that focus on the Intermediate education and the new-age corporate colleges that focus on Intermediate as well as entrance exam preparation. The first option would not solve the problem of separate coaching. Most of the new age colleges have very demanding schedules. The duration would be from 8:00 am to 8:00 pm with no extra-curricular activities. I could not imagine studying only maths, physics and chemistry whole day long for 6 days in a week and then writing exams on Sunday. During this quest, I came across a college in Secunderabad, iClass Junior college, which had classes only from 8:00 am to 3:30 pm and also included entrance exam preparation. I liked the fact that the directors were personally involved in the teaching. So my quest for a college ended and she studied in that college.

During this journey, I had a revelation. There are limited options for students who want to pursue all-round development during their 11^th and 12^th with extra-curricular activities as well as adequate preparation for entrance exams. Further, the options for the students who wanted to study in the commerce stream were further restricted. Worst of all was the fate of students who were averse to Maths. Only the students who barely passed tenth grade got into such streams, so those who joined by choice had only such students for company. Do the students in Hyderabad who want to pursue good quality education be denied of a good environment? Further, is it a crime to take up Arts or Commerce? And that was when the seed of starting an Intermediate College was sown.

Around the same time, our Abhyaas CLAT preparation was in full swing and parents of our current students were enquiring why we only train students for CLAT and not for intermediate. Parents liked our teaching methodology and wanted a one-stop solution for their other children. Most of the CLAT aspirants actually opt for Commerce so as we saw earlier, they have limited options. Now the business need also evolved to initiate Intermediate education. Though we could not satisfy the needs of the parents in that year, within two years, we successfully launched Gyanville Academy in 2014.

How is Gyanville Academy different from the run-of-the mill colleges? For one, we focus on intermediate education along with careers and personality development. Students go through a counselling session where their aptitude is evaluated through a questionnaire to ascertain their interests. Based on their responses, our counsellors identify their aptitude towards different career options like Engineering, law, design or management. Next, they write a test which assesses their capability. Only when their interests are in alignment with their capabilities, a student will be able to exploit his/her potential. After a brief interaction with the student as well as parents, a decision is made to enroll the student into Gyanville Academy. The major factor to consider while admitting a student is the learnability of the students and the proper support and conducive learning environment from the family.

The pedagogy includes intermediate education along with emphasis on improving the reading skills, writing skills and the general knowledge of the students. Personality development with discussions and debates forms a major component. Assignments and tests challenge the students to explore the subject. Continuous feedback on the performance using charts for emphasis and understanding of the data help pin-point areas for improvement.

Two years have passed and the first batch of students were given a farewell by the students last week. We had a mix of science and commerce students with an average percentage of 91% for Science stream and 93% for Commerce stream. Out of the four engineering aspirants, three of them qualified IIT-Mains and the fourth one gained admission in VIT. The lone design career aspirant gained admission into the School of Design at Pearl Academy, Mumbai and is awaiting results from NIFT. Law aspirants have written the CLAT exam as well as the entrance exams for Symbiosis. The lone management career aspirant has written the exam to gain admission to IIM-Indore for their 5-year integrated program. What started as a dream four years ago has now turned a reality and the first set of students is going out to pursue careers of their choice. It is a truly satisfying journey and one that justifies leaving a lucrative but stressful IT career to pursue a career in education.