Mr B V Suresh Kumar
PresidentDear Patrons,I am greatly elated to see our dream project, Hongirana School, is a reality and standing tall after completing 20 years. At this momentous juncture I would like to pause and reminisce about our journey through our humble beginnings, the bumpy road we travelled, and the confident strides we made and also think aloud about the pragmatic steps to be taken for achieving greater success in the future.
It is a universal truth that any nation’s progress, growth and even future are very much dependent on the quality of education provided to its denizens. Back in 2000 even as our country was implementing open market policies our literacy rate was still below 60% and the school education system, especially in rural areas, consisted of merely following rote learning practices. Few of us like-minded people felt that there is an acute need for holistic learning which would go beyond academics and syllabus stipulated by government education dept. So, we went ahead and started Hongirana in 2002 in a rural setting in Amtekoppa clearly stating our visions/goals in our school brochure back then -- to provide an innovative platform for our rural children with a clear focus on providing mainstream education along with focused attention on non-academic activities to help develop their softskills like leadership, teamwork, creativity, detailed & methodical analysis, discipline, empathy, moral values, respect for other individuals and nature alike etc...
Early on, we felt that the key to realizing our objectives is in empowering our teachers and so we soon exposed them to a myriad of alternative teaching methodologies with help of experienced teachers and resource persons equipped with the latest technologies. We also involved them in exchanges with other schools and academicians, subject conferences, interactions with the education dept etc... In our school, at every level, we strongly emphasize a proactive approach to challenges with creativity, logic, deep research and well-designed implementations. Some of our unique initiatives are the conception of an integrated syllabus for elementary children, the orchestration of intra-school music competitions, successful participation in national-level ATL science competitions etc... Overall, I am happy to say that through these various initiatives, our students have become very confident, innovative, productive and have achieved great academic results every year both in 10th and PUC.
Special mention is due to our outreach during the Covid pandemic using tools like Zoom, and Google Class, and continuous evaluation techniques have helped us to be in touch with our students continuously and effectively ensuring no disruption in academics even during these hard times.
“Change is permanent”; as management, we need to etch this in mind and come up with out of box ideas to formidably face the incoming changes. Accordingly, we are discussing new initiatives – establishing an “ATL Social Science LAB” focusing on social issues, local society, political science etc... with the end goal being able to provide more clarity on how to become a responsible, contributing citizen; creating a “Super 20 Science Minds” which will strive to produce top-level STEM students who can move on to become great scientists/engineers etc... In the coming days, we will try to give shape to some of these ideas and see how to bring these to fruition. We promise to continue to walk on the path of continual improvement incorporating new ideas, empowering all our stakeholders and comprehensively addressing any issues with help from all. To this, I humbly request wholehearted support from our society and all citizens.
Thank You