Personality Development

Lucknow's only Cambridge school gets glittering board results

Aryan Verma

Prabal Agarwal

Syed Mahmood

Tribhuvan Singh

The city's only school to be affiliated with the Cambridge International Assessment Education (CAIE) exam board - the Cambridge Section of City Montessori School - has achieved very cheering results in its maiden year of the class X board exam, with students being overall in the top 21 percentile of performers internationally.

Cambridge International, a division of Cambridge Assessment, recently announced the results of its March 2019 exam series in India for its International General Certificate of Secondary Education (IGSCE). The IGCSE is the world's most popular international qualification for 15 to 16 year olds, recognised by leading universities and employers worldwide, and is a global passport to progression and success.

The CMS Cambridge Section had put up 21 candidates with 178 entries across 9 subjects as its first cohort for the IGCSE examination.

IGCSE students need to appear for a minimum of 5 subjects and can stretch the number of subjects according to their capacities. Cambridge awards them grades from A* to U. In the CMS Cambridge Section, all students opted to take 8 or 9 subjects.

Divyam Chaudhary topped the school, being on the 92.4th percentile 5 A* grades, and Tribhuvan Singh came second, being on the 90th percentile, scoring 3A* grades. ICE (Distinction & Merit) Certification has been awarded to 12 students. In all, CMS Cambridge Section students brought in 17 A* grades and 46 A grades, which means that 30% of all entries scored A* or A grade in these prestigious examinations.

Senior Principal Ms Manjit Batra, said,"We are very proud of our students who have worked hard to achieve this good IGCSE result. 89% of our students fall into the higher-grade category, and the aggregate combined score of all students across all subjects that they have appeared in, puts them at a very pleasing 79th percentile, which means that they are in the top 21% of performers in the IGCSE exam internationally."

The school's President, Geeta Gandhi Kingdon, expressed great pleasure at these exam results and said : "Through our affiliation with the Cambridge board, we are delighted to be offering the children of Lucknow the option for a different kind of education, one in which the exams assess (and thus the teachers teach) skills of analysis, application, problem solving and critical thinking. I thoroughly congratulate the students, parents, senior Principal Ms Manjit Batra, Coordinator Ms Sushama Rajkumar, and all the staff of the CMS Cambridge Section."

Ms Sushama Rajkumar, CMS Cambridge Section coordinator said: "Cambridge Assessment (CAIE) is different from the Indian exam boards as the major part of the assessments are designed to test students' application skills and require clear conceptual understanding and in-depth knowledge of a subject. Each subject's board exam consists of 2 or 3 papers which are set to test every aspect of the concerned subject. Here, selective study or rote learning is of no help to students. The March series is exceptionally rigorous and challenging as exams are held in two shifts, back to back i.e. with no revision days in between."

CISV Youth Meeting at CMS

CISV India (UP Chapter), will organize a Youth Meeting in association with CMS from 24 June to 1 July 2019. Five delegations (each comprising four children and 1 leader) from Brazil, Czech Republic, India, Indonesia and Thailand, will participate in it. Children are aged 11-12 years, an impressionable age, in which they can manage themselves and are also open to new ideas and experiments. Ms Samta Rai of Innovation Department is the Director of the youth camp and Ms Huma Jafar, Teacher, Gomti Nagar Campus I, Ms Neelu Katiyar, Teacher, Gomti Nagar Campus I and Mr Arun Sharma, WUED, are the staff members. Mr Anirudh Singh, Head, WUED, is the Camp Planner and Principal Correspondent.

Divyam wins the Silver in Compudon National Championship

Divyam Chaudhary

Divyam Chaudhary, student of CMS Cambridge International School, won the first Runner-up trophy in a national level COMPUDON Championship held in New Delhi on 2nd June 2019. Earlier, he qualified the state round along with fellow student Divyansh Tripathi. Divyam was awarded a trophy, medals and a couple of tech goodies by COMPUDON.Four students of Cambridge International School namely, Vangmay Sachan, Ojal Agarwal, Divyansh Tripathi and Divyam Chaudhary had qualified in the first round of the national level competition held on 22 May 2019. The institution is justly proud of these deserving students and wishes them a bright future ahead with many more accolades.

It is worth mentioning that COMPUDON is India’s first ever Official Championship on ‘most-in-demand’ Office Application Skills- MS Word, MS Excel & MS PowerPoint and was launched by Cyber Learning in 2011. It is a platform for students to showcase their mastery in using Key Microsoft Office Applications with the proud partnership and support of Certiport (Pearson Vue Company) & Microsoft India. Students ranging between the ages of 13-22 are invited and are eligible for participating in the competition. Each year approximately 800,000 children worldwide participate in the competition, with around 40-50 thousand students participating from India itself.

World Menstrual Hygiene Day: Awareness Workshop held

On 28th May, World Menstrual Hygiene Day, a workshop for female staff was conducted at CMS Head office by Dr Jyotsna Mehta, leading Gynaecologist and obstetrician of City Hospital, Lucknow. Dr Jyotsna said that Menstruation is a natural part of the reproductive cycle. However, in most parts of the world, even today it remains a taboo and is rarely talked about.

Cultural practices and taboos around menstruation negatively impact the lives of women and girls, and reinforce gender inequities and exclusion. Moreover, studies have proven a direct link between poor menstrual hygiene to urinary tract infections and other illness. Lack of social awareness and, myths have led to poor menstrual hygiene. Awareness needs to be created specially for girls in the age group of 10 to 16. She further emphasized that this is a day of celebration. She also guided the participants about the menopausal phase. The presentation was followed with queries from the participants.

Earth Day celebrations

CMS Rajendra Nagar Campus II students took out a March on Earth Day (22 April ) urging the citizens to take care and conserve the earth and its environment. Led by the CMS Founder, Dr Jagdish Gandhi, they sent a strong message to keep the earth verdant and clean. The Director of Strategy of CMS, Mr Roshan Gandhi; Principal of CMS Rajendra Nagar Campus II, Mrs Jyotsana Atul; Principals of various other CMS campuses and invited guests participated in it. Slogans like 'Dharti Bachao, Jeevan Bachao, Jeevan Ko Khushhaal Banao', 'Say No to Plastic Bags', 'Join the Green Revolution' etc. were raised to create an awareness among the people to conserve natural resources and make the earth green and healthy.

CMS conducts training session for security staff

A training session was conducted at CMS Chowk campus on 18th May 2019 for all the security workers. The interactive session was chaired by Mr Alok Singh, Head of Work Force Department, Head Office CMS focusing on the benefits of Employee State Insurance (ESI) and Provident Fund (PF). A Question-Answer session was held which was extremely helpful in solving the problems of security staff, removing their doubts and difficulties. Mr Alok Singh also shared practical experiences and stories which were an eye opener for all the security workers. Principal, Mrs. Aditi Sharma was also present.

Child Well-Being Department organizes Child Protection Workshops

CMS Child Well-Being Department headed by Mrs Aruna Gupta, organized a series of Workshops on Child Rights Protection, POCSO Act 2012 and Posh Act 2013 in the month of April - May 2019. These workshops were conducted by Ms. Rooma Bal from HRD Department, Head Office for the Nodal officer, Caretakers and helper staff of Anand Nagar, Asharfabad, Chowk, Indira Nagar, Kanpur Road, Gomti Nagar II, Mahanagar , Rajendra Nagar I, Rajendra Nagar II, Rajajipuram I, Rajajipuram II, RDSO and Station Road campuses. A nearly 450 staff attended the workshops. They discussed the safety and well-being of children in school, the need for good hygiene especially in the washrooms and safety in girls’ toilets a well as the salient features of the POSCO Act 2012 and POSH Act 2013.