Promoting inclusive learning

Tell us something about your school.
Far Agnel’s School is managed by the Society of Agnel Charities (Agnel Seva Sangh),Agnel Ashram,Gautam Nagar. The school is focussed on imparting education through a liberal approach in all matters. The Agnel tradition ensures an educational environment that supports students and helps develop the whole person.

When was the school established? Tell us something about the history and mission of the school.
The school was established in 1979 in South Extension and later shifted to its own campus at Gautam Nagar. As it is a part of the Agnel Ashram Fathers which is also known as the Society of Pilar,it is a minority institution. It was accorded recognition by the Delhi government on May 1,1981,and inaugurated on April 3,1985.

What is the focus usually on?
Our entire education is driven by the teachings of Our Lord Jesus Christ,whose message of love and brotherhood are more than relevant today. Education is perceived and practised by the Ashram Fathers,is the understanding that human development is the total growth of an individual in a manner that he or she responds to God’s call in his or her heart and lives according to his or her convictions and reaches the limits of personal excellence.

Fr Agnel’s School places great importance on prayer and each day begins and ends with a non denominational prayer.

What are the goals of the school?
We try and inculcate critical thinking in our students. Agnelites strive towards promoting academic excellence through critical thinking and active learning in classrooms aided by a well-trained faculty and state-of-art technology in the campus. They strive towards advancing a thriving intellectual environment in the schools and promoting wellness to develop leadership and fellowship.

We try and foster a student’s self-confidence and encourage both responsibility and innovation through classroom experiences,collaborative leadership and citizenship by participation in activities,sports,clubs and students — faculty projects.

Our school perceives each of its students as free men and women of our pluralistic society,who through their thought processes and human engagement contribute towards a more integrated,rational,egalitarian and caring society.

Fr Agnel students will be confident and life-long learners,responsible for their learning,risk takers and through their positive efforts contribute towards the growth of the community they belong to. They will be required to acquire the ability for complex thinking and problem solving and the ability to qualitatively improve products and processes that affect them and their community.

What are the issues that bother you?
There are a couple of issues that bother me a great deal,and I would like to share them with parents,teachers and students,so that together we can evolve a consensus as a school and a community of people who share a common goal of shaping children’s lives. Why is schooling,ie,learning the cause of so much stress on our children,often breaking them completely? Who is at fault — the schools,the board,the curriculum,the society at large,teachers,parents,peers,or a combination of all of them?

I have always been passionate about children. Children provide us with the opportunity,the sounding board and the experience to refine our own views about the world and how we are required to shape it to make their future a better place.

The children teach us,day in and day out,by their generosity towards us for all the wrongs we do by omission and commission,and they do it in such a fashion that we do not even notice it. How many times do we fail to notice our children,how many ways and how easily we judge them,how many times we fail them in not preparing our lessons,coming late to class,ignoring to notice the pain that is often writ large on their faces,and at the end of it all they still forgive,love and appreciate us. Among other things,like a safe environment,good education,financial security,etc that our children have a right to,the most important is to be able to grow in an atmosphere of complete love,emotional and moral security and full understanding.

What are the areas where our children experience the severest stress?
Physical handicap or any other elements that they are born with and consider negative,could be a major stress factor. Children need to be educated on these issues and parents will be able to do so only if they believe what they want their children to believe and accept. Schools,particularly teachers must be extremely alert to any peer aggression based on these issues. Schools should promote plurality as the greatest and most beautiful reality of our world.

What socially relevant projects has your school has undertaken?
To be able to successfully combine the right approach to education and provide students with the best of facilities and technology,with remarkable academic performance,and yet have policies that at all times and in every way are inclusive,tells volumes about an institute of learning.

Fr Agnel Schools have made it a policy matter that their education enterprise will be accessible to all,and when the deprived and the marginalised are unable to access it,Fr Agnel School has reached out to them in a manner that is indicative of its beliefs. Right from its inception,Fr Agnel School launched its facility to reach out to others through a programme called PRERNA — Program to Reach through Education the Non-Accessed.

Through this programme,community outreach projects in education,health and vocational training were started in the slum neighbourhoods and an accredited centre National Institute of Open Schooling was started that allows the school dropouts to complete their secondary and higher secondary education without attending regular school.