Being an educator is a unique experience, because one never stops learning. As teachers and administrators, almost half of our life span is spent in the school. Every day is a feeling of being schooled again. If your teacher was able to make a profound impact on you, there is a very good chance of the baton being carried forward. Schooling involves a certain sense of dynamism where constant interaction with bright young minds keeps the educators charged every single day.
At Dunne’s Institute we believe that it is not so important what a child brings in to the school with him in the morning, instead what he takes back with him in the afternoon forms the skeleton of the entire teaching and learning process. Children learn less by instruction and more by action. In their formative years if we instill the right values, it goes a long way in evolving conscientious citizens of tomorrow, who are ever eager to return to the society, more than what they received.
Children as responsible citizens
Socially useful productive work is an important part of education at Dunne’s Institute. Children are made to understand that there is more joy in giving than receiving. Our chief focus areas are cleanliness, the girl child, education and the stray animals who have no one to turn to for help. Since 2015, the school has participated whole-heartedly in Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s ‘dream project’ of Swachh Bharat Abhiyan. The school on several occasions has participated in community cleanliness projects. Both the teachers and students went to different colonies in Colaba and physically cleaned some areas. They were appreciated by Colaba residents as well as the people of the locality where the cleanliness drive was undertaken. We were also part of ‘My dream Colaba’ project of 2013, where the students worked with experts from MIT (Massachusetts Institute of Technology), Boston. Two of our students did commendable work and their maps were put up in two prominent government offices.
Children require continuous physical, emotional, and social encouragement to overcome various challenges of life. It is the responsibility of the school to inculcate initiative, leadership, and vigour in a child, to undertake projects which are outside the classroom. They must be encouraged to look for solutions to problems which have a wider angle. In my long teaching career, I have observed that children enjoy the feeling of being assigned special tasks. The idea of being the chosen one pushes up the self-esteem of a child. He walks that extra length to prove that he or she is both bankable and dependable. School too benefits from different co-curricular and social activities because we are able to develop a balanced individual with a greater outreach to different aspects of life. Children, once aware of their special talents, can nurture them for better career prospects in future. Schools are the real nurseries where synergy between vocation and avocation can be created to secure a child’s future.
Our children both from the Primary and Secondary travelled to Sassoon Docks on several occasions to convince the fishermen and women to keep the area clean, and send their children to school instead of employing them from a very young age. They also visited the slums of Cuff Parade on a door-to-door campaign to request parents to send their children to school, especially the girl child. Dunne’s Institute offers special scholarships to the girl child. The cost of their education is borne by the school. We have also had some film shows in school sensitising our children towards stray animals. Compassion learnt in formative years goes a long way in creating a peaceful society which shuns violence in all forms.
Charity begins at home
Like charity, cleanliness too begins at home. Dunne’s Institute is proud to be housed in a Heritage building. We try and keep our school spic and span including the washrooms. Children deserve a clean and healthy space to grow and progress. Cleanliness is after all Godliness. A big thank you to our Prime Minister for undertaking the Swachh Bharat mission at the national level, which hopefully will turn into a movement and refurbish the image of our country in the eyes of the world. It will attract more tourists giving better economic opportunities to the locals. Here, I would like to make a mention of the good work being done by our local Corporator, Mr. Makrand Narvekar. He has worked hard to improve the civic amenities in Colaba. He has been a true friend of both the school and the community. He has taken a number of initiatives to clean up a number of localities, including the slums. We are happy to have teamed up with him for many cleanliness and tree plantation projects. He has got the main road both in the front and back of the school repaired twice, and has put speed breakers for the safety of our children, in the last five years.
As the Principal of Dunnes Institute I see tremendous scope in collaboration of local communities with the schools of that area. The community can take the lead in identifying both civic and social problems with the help of elected representatives. The next logical step would be to work for solutions with the support of residents, as well as the school children. Children are quick learners and are ever eager to explore the creative avenues outside the classroom. For them, it is a welcome break from routine classroom learning, to learn something more exciting and challenging. Children have a knack of coming out with novel and innovative solutions. Through both social and civic projects, we give them an opportunity to look for solutions rather than handing them one. At a very young age, if we instill right values, it will make them conscious of both rights and duties. Ours is a country of a billion people with, perhaps a billion problems. Even the most efficient government will not succeed to solve it for us. Solutions must come from citizens. We must also allow our children to bear a small torch. Together, we will find our way.