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Game for a good cause
Moment of triumph with the trophy at the carnival in St James School. Picture by Rashbehari DasCelebration time at the Battle of the Brains inter-school quiz held at Science City auditorium on April 21. Defending champions St Xavier’s School emerged victorious. Picture by Rashbehari Das
It was a time for fun and games, but all for a noble cause. The St James carnival brought together students, teachers and parents from across the city for an event the proceeds of which will be used for the education of underprivileged children.
The Telegraph in Schools (TTIS) presented The Sreeleathers Carnival for Education organised by the All-India Anglo-Indian Association, Calcutta branch, in association with Red FM, on April 24 and 25, on the St James’ school grounds.
The two-day festival had the young and the old pouring in to take part or to cheer the participants. In total, more than 27,000 people visited the fourth edition of the carnival. Over 150 schools joined in, including 35 who put up stalls.
The purpose behind the carnival added to the zest and zeal of the occasion. The association offers scholarships for school and college education and for vocational courses for needy children, and helps arrange schoolbooks and uniforms for them as well. Last year’s event helped 326 students receive scholarships, and the organisers expect the number to be higher this year.
The carnival commenced with the Landmark Sit-and-Draw contest. Around 1,200 aspiring artists were grouped into three categories, and given a choice of topics ranging from festivals to cityscapes of Calcutta.
The first on-stage event was the the Calcutta School of Music quiz. The three quizmasters — Barry O’Brien, associate editor of TTIS Andrew Scolt and TTIS Quiz Club coordinator Severin Coatesreid — took the students through a 20-question preliminary round to determine the five finalists.
The teams were quizzed on classical, rock, metal, Indi-pop, Bengali and English music. St James won after a nail-biting finish.
Day One concluded with the Galileo Choreographed Dance Competition. Although a few did the jig to folk songs, the majority concentrated on popular tunes. Winners BD Memorial won hearts with their theme of cricket as the religion of the sub-continent.
Dressed in cricketing gear, the boys paid homage to the recent friendship series between India and Pakistan, while the girls, bedecked in ethnic Indian outfits, added the traditional touch of honouring the heroes. The TTIS peace ambassadors to Pakistan, like Nihar Jain, Gangotri Bajpai, Puja Gupta and team leader Barry O’Brien, were present. It was possibly the first city school carnival where the flags of both countries were hoisted side by side.
The TTIS inter-school trilingual creative-writing competition started the final day, with more than 1,000 students participating. The Red FM inter-school music bands competition wrapped up the proceedings. The St James’ group won with their rendition of Winds of Change.
The Patton Trophy for the most innovative game stall went to Julien Day School, Ganganagar, for Kill the Rat, and Bhawanipur Gujrati Education Society for Shave the Balloon. The Shaw Education Foundation best decorated stall prize was handed over to Park English School and Future Foundation.
Central Modern School and Chowringhee High School won the Sreeleathers Bestfriends most popular stall, while Saifee Hall was voted the most enthusiastic school. Finally, the Chicky Martin Memorial Champions Trophy went to Frank Anthony Public School.
— Sangeet Shirodkar,
Apeejay School
Power of speech
The gates of Victoria Memorial, firmly shut at sundown, had been raised from their usual sleepy silence. The arclights were focussed on a makeshift stage where a furious debate was on. Veteran MP Somnath Chatterjee agitatedly fends off a bouncer from a member of the audience on the industrial decline. “The people of Bengal do not agree with you,” he starts off. “Let’s hear it from the people. Audience…” the anchor cuts in. The camera swings to the people yelling in the affirmative and pans back on the flustered politician. “But the people, it seems, do not agree with you, Mr Chatterjee,” the accent is clipped and the utterance deliberate.
Meet Gaurav Banerjee, the youngster who is manning the seat that matters in Hum Se Achha Kaun and other election specials on STAR News. The polls are at their hottest best and the 28-year-old has been spending hectic hours feeling the pulse of the people. “Talking to people to tap the mind of the electorate and figure out why they vote the way they do — this is the biggest challenge for a journalist,” he explains.
Gaurav’s best moment on the microphone has been with Pramod Mahajan. “As he declared how his party would sweep the elections, I quickly quoted the NDA’s decreasing tally in the opinion polls. He got upset and declared all opnion polls as unscientific,” he chuckles.
The St Stephens graduate who idolises Larry King explains how the viewers want accountability from politicians and love to see them discomfitured. “STAR News has devised programmes like Hum Se Achha Kaun where we visit the states and give a local audience a platform to quiz the leaders on daily problems which would not get raised on a national forum.”
Having done a tour of the country, the sophologist is now fixed in his seat at the Delhi studio as the hours of reckoning approach. “Who’ll win?” “Too close to call” is his diplomatic response.
25 and counting
Twenty-five years is a long time in the life of an institution teaching toddlers to take their first tentative steps. Joyland Play, Nursery & K.G. School, stresses the management, is still practising what it preaches — “all-round development”.
“We are constantly in search of new ideas and innovative methods to create a fun atmosphere and implement learning through doing,” says principal Joyoti Ghosh.
The school’s playgroup is modelled on guidelines laid down by Johnson & Johnson of the US. Social skills and emotional growth, self-help skills, development of perception, gross and fine motor skills, language acquisition, music and art skills are the fundamentals in this child development programme.
The institution was also “the first” to introduce yoga as part of the curriculum. Techniques to relax the mind and body are explained in the form of a story by experts from the Bihar School of Yoga. The school also encourages singing with percussion instruments to “tap the child’s inherent sense of music and rhythm”.
Joyland children are also encouraged to participate in extra-curricular activities like the Indian Chamber of Commerce’s Better Kolkata Contest, sports, concerts, fetes, Tiger projects etc.
The institution has adopted Anandan, a school for underprivileged children. The parents help out with clothes, books and necessary items and children of the two institutions amalgamate in fancy dress shows, sit-and-draw events and concerts. “This interaction makes them aware of caring and sharing as they grow up,” observes Ghosh.
“We also have an alert and interactive parent group, unique in the Montessori age group,” adds the principal.
Science summit
The youth should take up the challenges of progress in science. This was the topic of discussion at a two-day seminar held at Bidhannagar College, on Vistas in Science and Technology; New Challenge & Prospects, last week.
Professors and students from prominent colleges of Calcutta participated in the seminar, interacting with scientists and exchanging progress reports on the upcoming fields in science like the string theory, nanoscience and nanotechnology.
Around 11 national and international scientists, including Dr Ashoke Sen, Dr Sushanta Dattagupta and Dr Dipankar Chakroborty, spoke at the event. The spontaneity of the students proved that there is a need to organise more such seminars at the under-graduate level.
— Sayan Ghosh,
1st year, Physics, Bidhannagar College
Bard’s b’day
The Shakespeare Society of Eastern India, in collaboration with Tagore Gandhi Institute for Culture Studies and Service-Learning (TGI) and the British Council, celebrated the Bard’s 440th birthday on April 23 and 24 with a splendid spread of programmes.
The festivities kicked off at the British Council on Friday with a fun quiz on Shakespeare. Three-member student teams from seven institutions participated. Quiz master Prof Arnab Ray regaled the jam-packed auditorium with multiple-choice questions like “Whom did Shakespeare marry”? (a. Queen Elizabeth; b. Anne Hathaway c. Mary Gotaway d. No one in particular); “Shakespeare has been accused of being a poacher. What did he poach? “(a. Eggs b. Rabbits and deer c. Rhino horns, d. Serpent’s tongue) and 68 other sizzlers along similar wild and wacky lines.
The TGI team (Nandini Bhattacharya, Kaustov Chakraborty and Rajesh Roshan) walked away with the first prize after a slow start, closely followed by RBU correspondence MA. This was a single-member team with Rajashree Bose overwhelming everyone with her virtuosity. Participants received book prizes, including four audience members, for getting some difficult questions right.
The quiz was followed by a thought-provoking but entertaining panel discussion on Selling Shakespeare in the Global Market. How to make the Bard relevant and whether Shakespeare needs to be made relevant were the twin horns of dilemma that the panellists grappled with.
— Farah Humayun,
Tagore Gandhi Institute
