Pritam L. Benjamin As a firm supporter of educating not just the mind, but the body, heart and spirit as well, I write this in the belief that teachers, principals, founders and “owners” of schools will consider their responsibility in helping to steer education beyond its current limited horizons. College and career are vital goals, but what of the fulfilment of the potential in all that is human? Sadly, there are too few schools who see their mission as extending beyond the old literacies (reading, writing and numeracy), science and technology, and the horizon of college and careers which are lucrative and are said to give return of investment for parents and society as a whole. Howard Gardner’s Theory of Multiple Intelligences was, in this and the last decade, well received by some progressive schools in our country. There was an attempt to weave it into the curricular approach of the miniscule number of such schools. Unconvinced parents, generally continued to flock to schools which could produce ‘toppers’ and stick to “serious academic regimen”. This clearly implied a denial of the need for children to blossom in the sports, co-curricular, spiritual, and creative fields. College-readiness did not admit these needs and dismissed this as distracting and unnecessary. They were goals that were seen to be in conflict with optimal academic performance, individual and institutional. Numerous approaches to education are holistic in nature, such as integral education, transformative education, constructivist approaches, Gandhi’s Basic Education, peace education, mindfulness education, and values education. Newer thinkers (after Dewey, Bruner, Piaget, et al) like Gandhi, Shri Aurobindo, J. Krishnamurti, and Rabindranath Tagore offered theories and belief in the need for whole education, long before the west accepted this vital need for children. They spoke of the need to nurture the development of the whole person – this includes the intellectual, emotional, physical, social, aesthetic, and spiritual. Simply teaching a new set of ideas is not enough unless the emotional, behavioural, and spiritual aspects of these ideas are addressed in the student’s life. “Heart” education featured strongly in their approaches to the social development of children. Raising them to be empathetic, caring, altruistic adults was to be the objective of parents and teachers alike. We have long needed and used education as a tool to train the mind or prepare for a job. But education can teach us how to use our mind, how to respond peacefully, how to find and follow our passions and to move beyond viewing each child

R.S. Praveen Kumar Shaila Kumari lost her father at a young age. This shock could not shake this gritty tenth grader. As an SR Sankaran fellow, she also has to act as a teaching assistant in her class. As the vice-captain of Kammadanam Social Welfare School, she has to organize weekly inter-house competitions. In summer, she also aspires to be a co-counsellor for the prestigious Young Leadership Camp and Voice for Girls Camp. Despite her many responsibilities, Shaila maintains her position among the top ten in her class consistently. Like Shaila, thousands of student-Swaeroes*of our schools are involved in innumerable extra-curricular activities that bring boldness into brains and a breather from the blitz of lectures in the classrooms. But many wonder if the students get time to complete their studies. Are the parents not worried about academic achievement at all? Indeed, education is serious business at the Telangana Social Welfare Residential Educational Institutions Society (TSWREIS). For the past three decades, this state-owned organization has been providing quality education to thousands of marginalized children across the state, in its 134 schools. This Society has chiseled out innumerable icons in various fields from these communities. When it comes to the state Board examinations, these schools have consistently maintained a lead over others including many private schools. However, despite these achievements, critics have always felt that the true potential of these schools has never been fully tapped. Out of pure passion, I opted to head the social welfare residential schools. My first ever visit in 2012 to one of the Hyderabad-based schools left me shocked. Classrooms were comatose and children looked disoriented and the many faculty members were obsessed only with getting 100 per cent results. The major annual task was completion of syllabus by January and pushing the children into the cycle of revision till the board examinations. Sadly, the children of 5th to 9th classes missed the attention of teachers once the board examination schedule began. Many parents turned skeptical. Things almost reached a tipping point. The need for change was palpable. After a thorough scrutiny, we, at the head office, regrouped into a committed team and began visiting the schools and brainstorming with the teachers on the ground. We visited some of the well-managed schools outside our society as well. We invited some NGOs doing great service in their domains. We returned with loads of stories, huddled together and came out with a strategic plan called P-5 that covered all five domains of residential education: