Thank you for the latest issue of EducationWorld, a periodical which positively, critically and candidly discusses the multiple dimensions of the education sector in our country.

After reading through some of your recent publications I must confess I’m getting addicted to it.

Dr. K. Kasturirangan on e-mail

Dispiriting rank query

EuroKids, Friendship Nagar (EK-FN) is ranked among the Top 3 preschools of Kochi in your latest EW India Preschool Rankings 2019-20 (EW December). However, our #3 rank for the third consecutive year has failed to lift our spirits. For your information, EK-FN provides its 100 pupils instructed by 13 teachers and staff, a spacious learning environment equipped with child-friendly and safe furniture and play facilities. Moreover, our Facebook page showcases all our activities daily.

I wish to know who conducted the survey and under what parameters preschools have been ranked and rated.

Meera Krishnakumar
EuroKids, Friendship Nagar
Palarivattam, Kochi

The EW India Preschool Rankings survey has been conducted by the Delhi-based market research agency Centre for Forecasting & Research Pvt. Ltd which interviewed 8,497 parents with preschool-going children and teachers/principals in 16 cities (including Kochi) who ranked preschools on 10 parameters of early childhood education excellence. Please read page 38 of the cover story (December) which details the rankings methodology — Editor

Don’t villify private schools

As a teacher employed in a private school, I agree with the views expressed by Prashant Narang in his Expert Comment essay ‘Deconstructing disdain for for-profit education’ (EW December). In the country’s bureaucratic circles and among Left intellectuals, private schools are vilified as money-making enterprises fleecing parents. This is far from the truth. If it wasn’t for private schools, India would be in a far worse economic condition.

Therefore, instead of criminalising profits made by private education institutions and interfering with their autonomy, government should direct their own schools to emulate them. It’s an open secret that the country’s private schools offer far superior education than government-run institutions to over 40 percent of the country’s children in primary-secondary education.

Vidhya Ram
Trivandrum

Invest in anganwadis call

Thanks for the well-researched preschools rankings field survey (EW December). In most metros including Kolkata where many preschools have mushroomed, your survey is a godsend for parents who want to make informed admission choices.

I particularly liked your initiative to rank anganwadis. It’s high time the government begins to invest in improving their infrastructure and teacher quality. If anganwadis are given their due by government, you might even consider ranking private preschools and anganwadis inter se.

Mitali Sarkar
Kolkata

Education champion

Kudos to EducationWorld for highlighting the challenges crippling India’s obsolete education system in your 20th anniversary cover story ‘Will India regain its lost education momentum’ (EW November).

Over the past 20 years, EW has emerged as a champion of quality education for all, and reform of the moribund education system. The cover story reflects the high standard of education journalism that EW has undeniably pioneered. By dissecting the National Education Policy Draft 2019 and criticising the regulatory framework recommended by it, EW has presented a realistic and nuanced reality of Indian education and its not-so-bright future.

Thank you for your unrelenting efforts to make education the #1 item on the national agenda. Wish you good luck for the future!

Rohini Kundu
Bangalore

Corrigenda

• There was a tabulation error in the EW Ahmedabad Franchised Preschool Rankings 2019-20 league table published on page 116 (EW December). All ranks after #6 have moved down by one rank. The corrected table is available on www.educationworld.in/preschool-ranking/?school=Ahmedabad
• In the EW Bangalore Proprietary Preschool Rankings 2019-20 league table published on page 88 (EW December), the 2018 rank of Kai Early Years (#5 in 2019-20), Whitefield has been inadvertently published as #8. It was unranked in 2018-19.

We regret the errors — Editor