Six Board toppers, all girls: How Mansa teachers went the extra mile

On May 24 came the results of the Class 12 exams, which Sujan Kaur of Dashmesh Convent Senior Secondary School at Sardulgarh in Mansa topped with a perfect score of 500/500.

The winning spree continued when on May 26, Harmandeep Kaur from the Government High School in Mandali village of Mansa scored 646 marks out of 650 in the Class 10 Board exams, securing Rank 3 in the state.

Of the total merit positions (the top 0.1% students) in the state’s four Board exams, 73 were secured by Mansa students, 63 of them girls. Punjab conducts Board exams for Classes 5, 8, 10 and 12.

Mansa, a district in Punjab’s Malwa region, is among the 14 ‘educationally backward districts’, according to the University Grants Commission, identified thus on the basis of various educational parameters including gross enrollment ratio, college population ratio and average enrolment per college.

Though the state government has initiated a string of measures to improve infrastructure and learning levels, what makes the success of the students special is that they had their teachers going the extra mile.

Harmandeep Kaur, who stood third in the state in Class 10, had her school headmaster rooting for her all the way. A farmer’s daughter, Harmandeep studied till Class 8 in the Government Middle School in Piplian village where she lives. When it was time for her to move to the bigger school in Mandhali, 4 km away, the family was hesitant since there was no bus service between the two villages. That’s when Piplian resident Harpreet Singh Akkanwali stepped in for Harmandeep. Headmaster of the Mandhali government high school, he offered to drive her to school and back in his car. “I had already been taking five students from our village to school in my car, and Harmandeep joined us,” says Akkanwali, adding that other teachers in his school too ferry students from nearby villages.

About 30 km away, Gurpreet Singh, head teacher of the Kothe Ralla primary school, whose students Jaspreet Kaur and Navdeep Kaur topped the Class 5 Board exams, says, “This year, 21 of our students appeared for the Class 5 exams and three scored 100% marks. This is a big achievement for us, more so because all our students are from very poor families.”

Gurpreet Singh, a primary teacher at the school, said, “We ensure students complete their homework at school and also take responsibility for their revision. We have been making this extra effort since the last few years. Results don’t come in a day.”

Jaspreet and Navdeep have taken admission in the Government Girls’ Senior Secondary School in Ralla village where Madan Lal Kataria is the proud principal. Six of his Class 8 students and one student in Class 10 feature in the merit list.

“We have a buddy system in place for our students. They are divided into groups of 5-6 students and one student, the buddy, is made the leader of the group. Students can clear doubts with their buddies or receive help in completing their notebooks,” says Kataria

Sujan Kaur, the Class 12 topper, says her school, Dashmesh Convent, did not encourage private tuitions, so Kaur would approach her teachers who organised extra classes. “Our school also announced a cash award of Rs 51,000 for the state topper. I was motivated by the desire to win that award,” she says.

Mansa’s District Education Officer Harinder Singh Bhullar said: “We focused on identifying intelligent, average and below average students and made them prepare accordingly. Our teachers even make phone calls to wake up children in the morning so that they can start studying. Teachers have spent money from their own pockets to help students.”