We are writing this appreciation note to the school to place on record our sincere appreciation of the way the GEAR school is impacting Sharan.

Sharan has been with the school since M2 (Montessori 2 ). And not once we have had reasons to think about changing his school. In fact, we have recommended the school to many of our friends. Starting from 2 students from our area, we now have about 8-9 children from our locality, even though the distance is not small. Our faith in the school comes from the following:

We see that the school really is child centric. The activities and attitude to the teachers attest to this. We are amazed that both Mr Srinivasan Sir and Mrs Savi know all the names of the children in the school. They are there in the assembly every day to greet the children. We see them take part in the activities with full enthusiasm. The teachers of the school carry this on. Not once have we seen / heard the tachers saying anything negative about any child. Rather their focus has been on how to get the child to do even better.

We see that Sharan (and the other children who attend GEAR) learn the concepts well and not by mere rote. His ability to comprehend concepts seems better for his age. We can say this as I used to teach Math to a few children in my building (these are 8th std students) and we see that Sharan could cope with some their portions (though with some assistance). The homework assignment sheets are also geared towards doing research and answering and not by rote. We are sure that it takes a lot of work from the staff to prepare such assignments. The students are also encouraged to do original work every year, there is an opportunity, officially, to meet the teachers and get a feedback from them. We found that the teacher’s assessment usually in line with what we find Sharan’s strengths and weakness. This tells
me that they do watch and observe the children closely ( possibly enabled by the teacher
to children ratio and also the way the assessment report is generated ).

The activities in the school give children a lot of scope to develop their talent. We have been visiting the MI Act day every year and see the effort put by the teachers and students in the material displayed. It has been impressive. More so , since the students themselves have done the work. The ability of the students to explain the concepts involved and the confidence with which they do it is very good.

The Annual day celebration is completely coordinated by the children. Of course, this does introduce an element of amateurishness in the presentation, but it does give the children an opportunity to present their skills. The chief guests selected so far have been good. We have had Nobel Laureate Eric Cornell
chair it, an ex Canadian Diplomat to India , industry leaders from India, eminent educationist etc to be the chief guest. The quality of their address to the school tells me that the choice is made carefully. Also the presentation by the children is really good and their enthusiasm in this is seen to be believed. This can
happen only in a happy environment.

The school also encourages children in various other vectors, like creative writing,chess, squash etc. The weekend assignments or holiday homework are well thought out and require some amount of research by the students. Even Math problems are not dry number oriented only but given in a context.

Apart from this, we have seen that the school doesn’t add pressure on the students. Many times, when Sharan has been sick, there has never been a pressure to catch up on missed assignments. We haven’t gotten any complaints from the school either on small issues. These must have been tackled internally.

Of course, there are areas the school could do better but which institution is perfect. We do hope that teacher retention is better (though quality of teachers is not an issue, continuity is ), transportation scheduling is better. We am sure the school will address these. We believe that the basic requirement of giving a good schooling to Sharan , based on values, is satisfied very well in GEAR. And we will continue to recommend the school to others if they ask us for our opinion

We are sure the school will take efforts to improve further and reach greater heights

Regards

C.Srinivasan and Shubha Priya Parents of Sharan Srinivasan VI M , GEAR School