British Council India concluded the second successful 'Schools mission' in the last week of August. In the last five years, India has seen the emergence of a number of schools offering an international school leaving qualification like the IB or the A-levels.

In the light of this development, the British Council announced the Schools mission targeted at Undergraduate recruitment by providing an opportunity to UK Institutions to interact with students face to face, additionally faulty discussions and networking with staff of Indian institutions was the other facet of the schools mission. 

Region wise detail of the mission:
The North India and South India missions was held in parallel from 20 to 24 August 2012

At the North India mission, delegates from six UK institutions met more than 850 prospective students and over seven key faculty members across six schools in the region. Each delegate from UK Institution got an opportunity to make a presentation at one of the schools and a one to one interaction with students was organised through a table- chair event.

Name of participating UK Institutions:

1. Durham University

2. University of West of England

3. Aston University

4. University of Birmingham

5. University of Winchester

6. Manchester Metropolitan University

Details about Indian schools and highlights of the mission:

1. Woodstock School, Mussoorie: School follows IGCSE and IB curriculum. Around 70 per cent of students apply for undergraduate courses and school counsellors are well versed with UCAS process
2. Welham Boys’ School, Dehradun: School follows IGCSE curriculum. Subjects like Business, Economics and Science subjects being the most popular ones there was interest in courses in `Entrepreneurship’ and Art and Design.
3. Unison World School, Dehradun: School follows IGCSE curriculum. The School has students of five other nationalities. Very diverse choices in subject areas ranging from music, journalism, visual arts and sports
4. Step By Step international School, Jaipur: School offers IB, IGCSE curriculum. The visit was set up at the school hostel, as the school premises were not accessible due to flood situation. School offers an internship opportunity which is a unique attraction. Various kinds of subjects of interest were observed,  Law, Business were the most sought after
5. Delhi Public School, Jaipur: School offers CBSE curriculum. Students in the school had concern on acceptability of UK qualifications and were keen to know about career options on course completion.
6. Yadavindra public School, Chandigarh: School offers CBSE curriculum. There were some concerns raised on current visa rules and employability. Law emerged as one of the key subject choices apart from business, finance and engineering

Apart from the above school visits, the mission reached out to an additional 13 schools through a school counsellors’ workshop organised at British Library, Chandigarh. These counsellors were briefed about the various undergraduate courses and application process for UG courses. The list of schools that send their counsellors for the workshop is as below:

1. St Stephen School, Punjab

2. DAV public School, Amritsar

3. Ishwar Singh Dev Samaj Senior Secondary School, Chandigarh

4. Yadavindra Public School,  Patiala, Punjab

5. Gurukul Global School, Chandigarh

6. BCM Arya Model Senior Secondary School, Ludhiana

7. The Punjab Public School, Nabha, Punjab

8. Bhavan Vidyalaya, Chandigarh

9. Uma Rana Public School, Sanghol, Punjab

10. St Vivekanand Millenium School, Pinjore

11. Bava Lalvani Oublic School, Kaputhala, Punjab

12. Guru Teg Bahadur School, Chandigarh

13. Hans Raj Public School, Chandigarh

The South India targeted cities of Bangalore and Ootacamund (Ooty), the two South Indian hubs of educational institutions. A group of six UK universities visited a total of seven schools and met over 900 prospective students and over 35 key contacts at the schools. The visits comprised of Faculty discussions, tour of campus and a mini exhibitions in a table-chair format in each school.

Name of participating UK Institutions:

1. The International School Bangalore

2. Mallya Aditi International School, Bangalore

3. Good Shepherd International School, Ootacamund

4. JSS International School, Ooty

5. Delhi Public School, Bangalore

6. Hebron School, Ootacamund

7. The Lawrence School, Lovedale

Details about Indian schools and highlights of the mission:

1. The International School Bangalore: School offers IGCSE Curriculum and IB programme. 90% of their IB students go abroad for further education and Economics, Business, Law, Engineering, Art & Design, History, Geography, Environment Studies were the most sought after subjects
2. Mallya Aditi International School, Bangalore: Schools follows the ICSE curriculum and AICE at Standard 11 and 12. School emphasises on extra-curricular activities and their students have been successful in obtaining full scholarships. Subject interests varied across disciplines from art & design, engineering, law, fashion to business studies.
3. Delhi Public School (DPS), Bangalore: School follows CBSE curriculum. DPS is one of the largest institutions in India and few schools abroad in countries like UAE, Kuwait, Nepal, Singapore, Saudi Arabia etc mostly running as franchise
4. JSS International School, Ooty: The school affiliations include the IGCSE 'O' level, 'AS' and 'A' levels, CBSE. The school is part of the JSS Mahavidyapeetha, headquartered at Mysore, which runs more than 300 educational institutions.
5. Good Shepherd International School, Ootacamund: The school offers CBSE / ISC and IB Diploma. It is a fully residential campus and one of the best international schools in the country. The school provides counselling and guidance for IIT-JEE, IELTS, TOEFL, SAT-I, SAT-II, medical and engineering entrance examinations.  GSIS is also a registered centre for SAT and IELTS examinations.  Majority of the students go abroad for their undergraduate programmes
6. Hebron School, Ootacamund: School offers the English National Curriculum culminate in the GCSE, IGCSE and GCE AS/A2 examinations for higher secondary. Majority students go abroad for their higher education and have a large number of teachers from foreign countries.
7. The Lawrence School, Lovedale: The Lawrence School is autonomous institution running under the aegis of the Ministry of Human Resource Development, Government of India and is one of the premier residential public schools in the country and follows CBSE syllabus. The school has very good sports facilities and they host city and district level sports activities. 

The East India and West India missions was held in parallel from 27 to 31 August 2012

The participants of the East India mission visited faculty and students of a total of seven schools in Kolkata, Bhubaneswar and Guwahati. Over 850 students and 23 key contacts were met during the mission. The format at each school consisted of with a brief meeting with the Principal, Counsellors and teachers during which the UK universities spoke to them on their subjects and strengths and the school representatives asked several questions and clarified doubts. The briefing was followed by a half hour joint presentation made by UK Institution representatives to the students of Class 11 and 12. Post the presentation each representative was given a separate space with a desk which was flocked by students interested in UK education.

Name of participating UK Institutions:

1. Birmingham City University

2. University of Manchester

3. Newcastle University

4. Robert Gordon University

5. Swansea University

6. University of Wolverhampton

Details about Indian schools and highlights of the mission:

1. La Martiniere School for Boys and La Martiniere School for Girls, Kolkata: La Martiniere Calcutta comprises two separate private (independent from the government) schools (one for boys and one for girls) in Kolkata, India. They are affiliated to the Council for the Indian School Certificate Examination, New Delhi, which conducts the ICSE and ISC Examinations at the close of Classes X and XII.
2. Calcutta International School, Kolkata: Calcutta International School offers ‘A’ level curricula for the graduating classes and follows the UK National Strategy for the entire school curricula and plans to offer the IB curriculum from September 2013.  The school has exchange programmes and foreign excursions to New York and London. The Duke of Edinburgh Award is offered to the students.
3. SAI International School, Bhubaneswar: SAI International School is the first day boarding school in Bhubaneswar, the capital city of Orissa. The school is affiliated to CBSE board integrating the updated and advanced teaching practices of International Baccalaureate (IB) and Cambridge University ESOL Examinations. Extracurricular activities include music, dance, art & craft, debates, yoga, sports, dramatics
4. Delhi Public School, Guwahati : The school is affiliated  to CBSE board, up to the Senior Secondary level. The school offers interactive classrooms and a wide range of subjects in Science, Commerce and Humanities and a range of sporting and extra curricular facilities for students.
5. Sanskriti, The Gurukul, Guwahati: The school is affiliated to CISCE for the ICSE (X) and ISC (XII) examinations. At the ICSE examination level, options are given to the students to specialise in the subjects they would like to opt for in higher education. At the ISC level, there is a flexibility of choosing subjects across various streams
6. Sarala Birla Gyan Jyoti, Guwahati: Sarala Birla Gyan Jyoti, a co-educational (10+2) English medium school was established in 2004 and is affiliated to the Central Board of Secondary Education (CBSE). Apart from Science, Commerce and Arts, the school has a wide range of co-curricular activities like indoor and outdoor games, swimming, art and culture, music and drama, Yoga and Martial Arts, community service, etc.

An interactive session with seven school counsellors was held on day one at La Martiniere School as certain key schools could not be visited due to shortage of time, these schools were

1. Modern High School for Girls
2. Sushila Birla School for Girls
3. Birla High Boys’ School
4. St James School, DPS Megacity
5. DPS Newtown

The West India schools mission visited 8 schools in Nagpur and Pune from 27 to 31 August 2012.  The programme at each school consisted of a presentation from the school, a student presentation by the UK institution delegate, a table/chair exhibition, a campus tour, and a faculty discussion. More than 950 students and 60 key contacts were met during the schools mission in West India.

Name of participating UK Institutions:

1. University of Greenwich
2. Keele University
3. University of Kent
4. Middlesex University
5. University of Surrey
6. University of Westminster

Details about Indian schools and highlights of the mission:

1. Centre Point School - Katol Road: The school is affiliated to CBSE curriculum. There were two separate exhibitions held due to the examinations schedule of both grade XI & XII. This was done in order to maximise the opportunity for both the grades. Faculty discussions revolved around UCAS presentation via British Council, subjects of focus were engineering, medicine, CA, social sciences, law, and computing.
2. International School of Scholars: The school follows CBSE/IGCSE curriculum. The key points of discussions were Accepting transfers in second year, Placement options – Alumni support and Employability. Main subject enquiries were related psychology, law, actuarial science, physiotherapy, engineering
3. Bhartiya Vidya Bhavan School: The school is affiliated to CBSE curriculum. The school covered points of discussion revolving around UCAS presentation by the British Council, Scholarships offered by UK Institutions and the main enquiries were related to subjects like medicine, social sciences, law, CA, engineering and computing.
4. Centre Point School-Wardhaman Nagar: The school is affiliated to CBSE curriculum. The focus points of discussion in the schools were expected Portfolio guidance from UK Institutions, Scholarships offered, Employability schemes – internships, UCAS presentation by British Council and main subject areas were architecture, civil services, photography, economics, politics 7 history, actuarial science, engineering, computing
5. Vishwashanti Gurukul International: The school offers IB curriculum. The faculty discussions revolved around  Tie up s with corporate, Portfolio guidance and scholarships offered by UK Institutions and the most sought after subjects were architecture, psychology, actuarial science, engineering, business
6. United world College Mahindra: The school follows IB curriculum. The main points of discussion were about scholarships offered by UK Institutions and the main subject areas of focus were  psychology, medicine, engineering and computing
7. Sharad Pawar International School, Pune: The school offers IB curriculum.  The main subjects that were enquired about were engineering, computing, medicine, political science, psychology, architecture.
8. Symbiosis International School, Pune: The school offers IB curriculum. The most sought after subjects were architecture, photography, economics, politics and history, engineering, computing, visual arts. Faculty discussions revolved around Assistance in essay writing and portfolio guidance counselling, Summer schools offer, Credit exchange and Acceptance levels IB score.

The final day was planned at the British Library in Pune where the following five schools were invited for presentations and discussions:

1. Podar International School
2. Indus International School
3. Cathedral Vidya School
4. Vikhe Patil School
5. Victorious Kidss Educares

Main areas of discussion were:

• Actuarial science: comprising 16 professional programs  with mathematics at HL (higher level – i.e. score 6 and above)
• Architecture combination programs
• Portfolio guidance
• Acceptance of certificate candidates
• Applications – UCAS + direct
• Courses in journalism, video gaming, visual arts, photography
• Scholarships offered – need and Merit based
• Summer schools offer