“Preschools have to be taken seriously, preschool educators have to be taken seriously so I think that would play very important role for us now,” says Sneha Rathor, CEO, Sanfort Group of Schools in an interview with Chandan Anand, CEO & Group Editor, ArdorComm Media Group at the ‘ArdorComm New Normal – Education Leadership Summit & Awards 2022’ #ELSAJaipur #ELSARajasthan
Would like to understand from you the energy mantra of yours, the way you have been taking the journey of Sanfort Group of Schools to a certain level, what motivates you?
I think not only me that goes for all the educators. I think the biggest strength that we have is our children that we see and all the energy is being derived from them. We spend most of our time thinking about the kids in our schools or spending time with them so they give a lot of energy to us because whenever we see what is it that we want to do for them as educators and how we really want to change things for them so that they have a better education and they turn out to be a global leader with more information and a lot of innovation in their minds. So, I think that’s the greatest form of motivation for all of us to go ahead in education.
I have seen the journey of your group specially the way you have transformed from the preschool to schools, how do you guide the people who actually look to venture into preschools especially post covid?
I think education right now is a wonderful space to come in specially post covid because during covid greatly there has been a shutdown in preschools and because of which there’s a lot of vacuum that has been created and the number of births that have happened during the pandemic has also been great so a lot of children are coming and the number of schools that we have right now, the number of preschools that we have right now to cater to the needs of those children is less so it’s a huge vacuum a huge opportunity for people to come in and venture into. But, it has to be on a professional level so earlier pre-covid that we used to see there was a little gap in the terms of what kind of pre-schooling that should be there in our country. In a country as huge as India with a massive population of young children so what we need to see is whoever is venturing into preschool has to be somebody who’s very professional, somebody who actually understands that why preschools are required in our society and what is the importance of it and how really pre-schooling should happen so it shouldn’t be just like our next door place where the children go they play and learn some rhymes. It has to be taken seriously and I think it will now be taken seriously because NEP has come into place so it becomes more of a serious education rather than just a neighbourhood preschool concept.
How would you execute NEP in your schools and what are the benefits which you see in near future which NEP will definitely bring in overall preschool education?
We’ve been discussing it for a really long time for all the old players in preschool industry. So, I think when we talk about NEP and after reading NEP most of the leading preschools in India or good preschools in India they had been following it for years now, so for us it has been nothing new in terms of incorporating it. But I think it gives a huge sense of importance to us now that the NEP has come into play so earlier it was taken as an option that okay fine like you can send your child to the school but now NEP coming into place it gives us importance that this is a formal education also, it has to be taken seriously. Preschools have to be taken seriously, preschool educators have to be taken seriously so I think that would play very important role for us now. So, teaching techniques we’ve been following it for a long time but making it formal is what brings a huge change for us.
What are the values or the mission of Sanfort Group of Schools?
I think it’s very important as I said that India is a huge country and with such massive young minds that we need to nurture. So, I think what we look at is giving quality education to more and more children to be accessible to all kind of children. It should not be restricted to a particular society it should be accessible to everybody because its important, early years are very important and that’s how we need to look at it.
We all have gathered at New Normal Education Leadership Summit and Awards, what does the word new normal for you stands?
I think new normal has a different meaning to us now because when it was covid the New Normal was that oh now the schools are not open everything is shut and we need to sit at our homes, it would be even two years old children learning through screens and all of that was the new normal. But post pandemic era the New Normal is that, oh the world is open now and that we feel so happy that now the children are coming back to school you could see people roaming around freely and then the new normal is that we’re now respecting that what freedom is and how important it is because in those two years the sense we were lacking that, oh we never knew that this freedom could ever be taken from us. Yes, so I think pandemic really made us realize how could we be restricted from going out of our homes towards offices or something like that meeting our own relatives our families but now we respect all of that so that’s the new normal.
I’m happy and glad to share that ArdorComm Media Group have recently celebrated its successful one and a half years of journey, any advice would you like to give to ArdorComm Media?
I think you guys are doing fantabulous job, as I said it’s a great platform that you have built and I give lots and lots of good luck and wishes to all of you that it grows into leaps and bounds in coming years and becomes one of the leading media organizers in terms of education especially and I think what I would look at is something you create that becomes more influential in the education sector where we can influence the decision making or the community.