The Schools and the Education

Schools are dime a dozen in Bangalore but yet they all are all overbooked. Very little has changed in the way the older staff reacts to parents or students in school. They feel they are always right and people are expected to listen to them. The younger staff is more open for discussion.

One of the myths of Indian education is "Indian educational standards are higher than that of US". The fact is "Indian standards are actually lower and especially in the areas of MATH!!". If you are surprised so was I and 3 other parents who relocated to India this year. I am not sure how the curriculum compares to US in the higher grades but at the grade levels (2-5) it is definitely true. So, if you are planning to relocate for educational reasons think again. I am making this assertion because I am comparing CBSE 4th grade syllabus to what Anirudh studied in the 2nd and 3rd grade in US.

The other myth was "There is better discipline in Indian schools than in US". Once again this was a surprise to me to find out from Anirudh as to how students behave when class is in progress. According to Anirudh several of the students would have been sent home in Millikin or Delphi if they had behaved the way they were behaving here.

However, to the credit of the other students, Anirudh finds kids here to be more friendly than in US especially towards new students although he did complain about how they made fun of his accent.

These days schools in Bangalore are very commercially oriented and just to give an idea, we spent about Rs 5500 (> $100) on Anirudh's uniforms (have to buy it from school) because all his outfits are Levi's!!! I am not kidding the school uniform is

Levi's Jeans
Levi's Polo Shirts
Levi's Belts
Levi's Socks
Levi's Shorts and workout T shirts

Anisha's was more reasonable but the quality of the uniform dresses was poor (I cannot say the same thing about quality for Anirudh's uniform)

Just a FYI, Anirudh and Anisha are enrolled in 2 different schools and we will switch one of them depending on which one we feel is the better school.

The hard part has been the second language, which was expected. So far they are handling it OK with some extra tutoring near home. Although the schools promised to provide extra language tutoring they have been very inconsistent. So far I have heard only once the use of the phrase "Yes Yaa" from Anirudh.