City to get 5 in lieu of 25 international schools

MUMBAI: The Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC) education department’s ambitious project of converting 25 existing civic schools into international schools has hit a roadblock.

According to officials, instead of 25, a maximum five schools will now be approved for an international curriculum under the Maharashtra Internat-ional Education Board (MIEB). The MIEB will start the selection process from December 15, where they will choose 100 scho-ols from all over the state.

Mahesh Palkar, BMC education officer, told The Asian Age that they had given a list of 25 to 26 schools to MIEB for the project.

“International schools are much more important in non-city localities as our city already has quite a large number of international and international level schools. A maximum of around four to five schools will be approved by the MIEB, which will be enlisted as international schools in due course of time,” Mr Palkar said.

Initially, when the civic body came up with the idea of international schools, the MIEB was not in the picture. “Twenty-five international schools were supposed to be established by the BMC independently where the curriculum of Cambridge would be applied. However, after MIEB, the project was integrated with them and hence, the number of schools too has been limited,” said a source at the department.

The MIEB falls under the state education department and is the second board after the Maharashtra State Board of Secondary and Higher Secondary Education in the state.

The programme of international schools was initiated in the state last year to provide an international curriculum to students which would be on par with the ICSE and CBSE boards.

Currently, there are 25 schools which are called “Ojas” schools which are being operated in the zilla parishad (ZP) areas. Following this, around 100 “Tejas” schools will function under the guidance of “Ojas” schools.

The criteria for these 100 schools will be that the existing schools, which are interested in getting international status under the MIEB, should fall under the ZP, municipal corporation, gram panchayat, government-aided and self-financed categories. Schools that are willing can apply for international status till December 15 and after that, the selection process will begin and selected schools will be notified.

The state education department plans to kick-start the international school project under the MIEB by January end across the state.