Admissions over

Ever since we have wait list for admission, there is lot of misunderstanding amongst parents of these children. Not only parents but many of our well wishers are also not clear about why there is a wait list. Thus we get lot of phone calls from such parents and concerned people also. To clear this confusion from the mind of these parents and to make our selves clear we are here under giving the whole admission procedure, admissions done this year and the latest wait list position. The whole thing is absolutely transparent and can understood easily.
Admission procedure: What is the procedure adopted for admitting a mentally disabled child in to Sandnya Sanwardhan Sanstha’s “Kalpataru” special school? Till about 4-5 years back, this question had no significance as far as parents of mentally challenged children were concerned. Though, we at SSS had evolved an admission system as early as in the year 1995. Parents normally came to us and followed the system with not giving much credence to whatever we said and did. The reason was everyone was getting admission.
But since last 4-5 years there is a wait list for getting in to SSS special school. And as this wait list is growing parents have started becoming impatient. When they are told that their child cannot get admission, they are shocked, they cannot believe. Further, when they hear the number of wait list they feel dejected and disappointed. From this point they really start thinking about why there is wait list and can it be over ruled or bypassed by any means? Is there a chance for manipulation on their part or from management? This situation is of rather disbelief in the system. Nothing wrong as far as parents are concerned, because, in our country things do not move with system but by and large it works by twisting the system. Parents find it hard to believe that there is an organization which works on ethics, morals and principals. Thus few parents try to bring recommendation, try to give threat and even try to bribe. We do not blame parents for this, but we are thus trying here to explain how we follow a procedure for admission.
Step one- Parent approaches our office for admission. We give a date for the assessment where in mentally disabled child along with both parents have to report on the given date. Parents are advised to bring disability certificate of the mentally disabled child. This certificate is issued by Civil Surgeon.
Step two- On given date and time assessment of the child is done by the special educator and Clinical Psychologist. This procedure takes about 1 ½ hour to 2 hours. Principal decides the appropriate class as per the assessment report of the special educator. If “primary class” is appropriate and if we have vacancy, this child is given admission.
Step three- Parents are given date for paying admission fees and conveyance expense.
Step four- On payment of fees, parents are informed about the uniform, tiffin, stoppage for the bus and its timings etc.
But in case, if there is no vacancy for the “primary class”, then this child is given a wait list number. This wait list number is for this particular class. It may happen that for “primary class” the wait list number is one, but the overall wait list number for this same child could be something like 42. Thus whenever there is a vacancy in primary class, this child will get admission in spite of the fact that, the overall number is 42. If another child is assessed much earlier and is on wait list no.1 for “secondary class” and his overall wait list number is 20 only. Since there is no vacancy in "secondary class", this child does not get admission. This second child’s parent feels aggrieved and thinks that there is something fishy. In such situations, this parent tries all prevailing corrupt practices including bribe. Though, our Principal tries his best to explain all these things to the parent at the time of assessment, most of the parents do not accept it and try to approach higher ups. Nothing wrong in this. We are happy, after explaining, most of the parents understand and realize the difference in SSS and other institutions. We have talked about this issue of admission in detail, to aware all concerned parents, their relatives and all our supporters as well. We once again assure that, SSS works for the cause of mental disability with no discrimination of cast, creed, and religion and socio economic condition of the parent. For us all mentally challenged children are same. Our commitment to this noble cause is total and absolutely honest. We do not bend rules which are made by us only. People must understand that no trusty member of SSS ever recommends any candidate for admission because they know that it will be carried as per the set norms.
Admissions for this academic year are complete. For this year we have admitted 14 new students in total. Out of this 2 are from Butibori. Class wise, it is 3- in Autistic, 3- in care group, 3 in pre primary, 1- in primary, 1- in secondary and 3- in pre vocational, thus total 14 new admission. This was possible because, 6 students withdrew their names for various reasons and “rakhi unit 6 members” were shifted to our Nagpur office. In last more then ten years, this is for the first time we could admit those many new students. We at Sandnya feel satisfied and relieved to a great extent.
The wait list position as on date for various classes is as follows:
Care group-3, Pre-primary-5, Autistic-2, Primary-5, Pre-vocational-3.
We at Sandnya are trying our best to get a third bus, if we get one, may be the wait list will be cleared.
By: Navin Deshpande, Secretary, SSS
e-mail: navindesh@gmail.com