Hanif Kanjer

I am lucky I meet a star everyday

2011-10-18T08:26:00.001-07:00

When I began your class I think I knew
The kind of challenges you'd make me face.
You gave me motivation to pursue
The best, and to reject the commonplace.

Rarely does someone
get to influence a person's life
in a positive way for a lifetime,

Your thinking really opened up my mind.
With wisdom, style and grace, you made me see,
That what I'd choose to seek, I'd surely find.

I'm happy that you're my teacher;
I enjoy each lesson you teach.
As my role model you inspire me
To dream and to work and to reach.

With your kindness you get my attention;
Every day you are planting a seed
Of curiosity and motivation
To know and to grow and succeed.

You help me fulfill my potential;
I'm thankful for all that you've done.
I admire you each day, and I just want to say,
As a teacher, you're number one!

I'll remember you always.
Thank you Hanif Sir

by Faryaal Shaikh

Standing out in the crowd : Whatâ€™s your differentiator?

2010-09-18T01:08:00.000-07:00

Standing out in the crowd : Whatâ€™s your differentiator?

No threat from foreign universities entering India: IITs, IIMs

2010-03-16T00:30:00.000-07:00

"Higher educational institutions, including IITs and IIMs, on Tuesday hailed the government's go-ahead for a bill to allow entry of foreign education providers in India and sought to allay any threat posed by the institutions from abroad. After the Cabinet approved the Foreign Educational Institution (Regulation of Entry and Operation) Bill, 2010, these institutions appeared upbeat about prospects of entry of foreign universities in India. "

http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/india/No-threat-from-foreign-universities-entering-India-IITs-IIMs/articleshow/5689267.cms

Questions:

1. A whole lot of Indian colleges/universities are complacent, that this entry will not affect them? Are they living in fool's paradise?

2. There is a recent article on Georgia Tech offering USA salaries to their professors opting for Indian campuses. How will this influence the pay packets of Indian professors and teachers?

3. Will this result in a reduction in export of Indian students to foreign shores for further studies? And could this lead to more foreign students opting for Indian campuses of these reputed foreign institutions?

4. Will the education pie get bigger or smaller?

5. Who would be the target student for these foreign institutions? IITs, IIMs, ISBs, or State Unviersities?

6. Will this lead to education getting more expensive or cheaper?

7. According to the bill, these foreign universities won't be allowed to repatriate their Indian revenues? How would the universities address this challenge?

NCFM Derivatives Module

2010-03-01T05:40:00.000-08:00

Rustomjee Business School students wrote the NCFM Derivatives module examination conducted by NSE. 50% of our students who wrote the exam scored distinctions, with the highest score at 90.25% achieved by Hemal Masalia (PG10)

Placement Success at RBS

2010-03-01T05:36:00.000-08:00

Rustomjee Business School celebrates placement success, with multiple job offers from Indian and multinational firms including,
Standard Chartered Capital Markets
ICICI Securities
Joseph Advertisers
India Infoline
Kotak Securities.

We are 85% placement, and still counting. We received more than 30% International Job offers.
RBS rocks!!!

Malaysia and Thailand

2009-11-28T23:07:00.001-08:00

Rustomjee Business School takes its second batch of PGDBM students on an international study tour to Malaysia and Thailand, starting 30 November 2009.
Whilst the students are excited about the trip, I have chosen to add to the excitement by getting them to write two mid-term exams, one today, 29th November 2009 (Fixed Income Securities for finance students and Marketing Strategy for marketing students), and one tomorrow - 30th November (International Finance for finance students, and Category Management for marketing students).
They have been complaining about lack of time to shop/pack their bags, and I guess that's another way of preparing them for the corporate world. Don't we often have to fly at the last minute, whilst continuing to work until the nth hour before the flight!
I am sure they will appreciate this in the future, althought right now - they are all in crib mode.
Life's like that :)

Relief measures for airlines - a necessity?

2008-10-25T06:51:00.000-07:00

22 October 2008

http://www.telegraphindia.com/1081023/jsp/business/story_10007744.jsp

The government today allowed airline companies to clear their outstanding fuel bills in six monthly instalments — free of interest charges — by March.
State-run oil companies also agreed to give the airlines a 90-day grace period to pay for their current fuel purchases, instead of 60 days now. Moreover, jet fuel tariff will be revised every fortnight instead of 30 days now to quickly pass on the benefit of falling international crude prices to the airlines.

The cash-strapped airlines owe Rs 2,962 crore to the oil companies. “Measures taken today should ease the burden on the airlines a bit,” Patel said.

1. Do you think the Government is justified in offering these relief measures to the airlines that are unable to pay their dues?

2. Who is responsible for the losses that airlines are suffering? Is it the Government or the management of airlines?

3. Would the airlines be willing to share their profits in the future, if they are seeking relief measures from the Government?

4. Airlines have resorted to competitive pricing in the past to gain market share. Have spent recklessly in promoting their airlines with the hope of generating profits. Now that they are in the red, do they deserve to be bailed out?

5. Should the airlines industry be a priority for the Government, when India has more pressing problems like farmer suicides, power shortages in industry, etc.?

6. What will be the future in the Indian skies? Anyone willing to bet on buying Jet Airways shares?

'Are B-schools mere suppliers of human resources to corporations or do they have a larger role in society?'

2008-10-22T05:38:00.000-07:00

Business schools are entrusted with the responsibility of grooming future managers who will build social and intellectual capital, a formidable task indeed. A country the size of India needs more entrepreneurs who will create more jobs. But, if one were to make an honest assessment, b-schools are only paying a lip-service to this lofty ideal, with most of them choosing to pursue the 100% placement record and the highest salary record. Placement season on campuses is one where the emphasis is often to get the highest paid jobs, and students are often taught to negotiate salary packages.

I get asked this question on “salary negotiation” from students every time I visit leading b-school campuses as a Guest speaker or as a professor of business strategy. My response is usually “you don’t negotiate salary. You negotiate job responsibility and growth opportunities. If you learn and grow, the money will come.” Sometimes the students find that hard to digest because they are fed from day 1 that if they don’t land a good job from campus, they will have wasted their time. Classic stories of exorbitant salaries offered to fresh management graduates at leading B-school campuses by organizations such as Lehman Brothers only propels this myth further that B-schools is about getting the highest paid jobs.

I am afraid if we scratch the surface most students would get exposed with their poor conceptual understanding and even poorer skills in application of knowledge in the real world. And I don’t blame the students. The fault lies in our approach, our system. We are raising a generation of managers who are too afraid to take risks one the one hand, or on the other hand extremely reckless with their risk taking, plundering other people’s hard-earned money

The blame all doesn’t squarely fall on the B-schools. The media has also always played on the hype of salary packages offered at B-school campuses. In the play for ranking, the focus again is on the salary packages, placement record, infrastructure, and then faculty, when it should be reversed with faculty gaining the most importance in terms of creating a learning atmosphere on campuses.

Young India has tremendous potential, and we as educators need to provide them the right impetus to become agents of change in society, rather than following the cookie-cutter method of creating robotic clones, who don’t think, only follow instructions.

The focus needs to change from a capitalist mindset, “what’s in it for me?”, to a socialist mindset, “how can I add value to society?”

Our contribution would be nurturing this rich resource pool, the MBA graduates, and getting them to ask the right questions, and then build businesses that will create a win-win solutions for all the stakeholders.

There are some schools that are making the effort in this direction, and the future will belong to those who embrace this philosophy. The establishment of incubation cells at B-schools, and the awakening of the social conscience through a variety of learning formats will lead to B-schools playing their true role in society.

Hanif Kanjer
Dean, Rustomjee Business School
Mr. Kanjer holds an MBA from the prestigious London Business School, and manages The Rustomjee Knowledge World, an educational institution with 6,500 students across various age groups from Kindergarten to Post-Graduation.

DoCoMo to buy 25% stake of Tata Teleservices

2008-09-18T20:53:00.000-07:00

Japanese Telecom Giant NTT DoCoMo is in advance stages of talks to buy 25% of Tata Teleservices for US$1.5 billion (Rs.6,700 crores) , which translates to a valuation of $6bn (RS 26,000 crores) as per Business Standard, 14 September 2008.

Tata Teleservices has accumulated losses of RS.5,604 crores between 2005 and 2007.
It's Maharashtra operations run through a subsidiary has a cumulative loss of Rs. 880 crores.

DoCoMo, Japan's biggest mobile phone operator is expanding its overseas presence as growth in Japan slows. India adds 8 to 9 millions users every month, and is expected to have 737 million mobile connections by 2012.

1. Do you think this is too expensive a deal for DoCoMo?
2. What are they really getting for this money?
3. Should the other telecom players be concerned by this deal? Who would be most affected by this deal?
4. Do you think Tata Teleservices should opt out of this business? Justify your position.
5. By when will DoCoMo achieve returns on this investment?

Air Deccan is History

2008-09-16T22:49:00.000-07:00

Economic Times, 17 September 2008, Brand Equity has a headline, “Simply Bye Deccan”. Kingfisher has pulled the plug on this low cost airline which they acquired a few months ago. In our class discussion just last month, we did conclude that Kingfisher would not continue with the Deccan Brand. And our discussions stand validated.
There are some brand consultants, and advertising managers who are lamenting the death of the Deccan brand, and are commenting that “doing away with the Deccan brand” is a short-sighted approach. The article states: “with so much support for keeping brand Deccan going, it’s but natural to question the collective wisdom at Kingfisher”a
1) Do you think the brand consultants, advertising managers are justified?
2) Kingfisher offers Kingfisher Class and Kingfisher First, and now Kingfisher Red. How will these services differ? Will there be an overlap of passengers? What will be the differentiating factors?
3) Do you see Low Cost Carriers losing out to high fuel costs, and eventually, either shutting business or transforming from LCC to FSC?

Redefining Indian Railways

2008-09-09T21:58:00.000-07:00

I am sure several of you would remember our classroom discussions on the paradigm shift in Indian Railways almost a year ago as a part of the business strategy class, and more recently as a part of the newspaper reading sessions.
We discussed how Indian railways should look at partnering with airlines (Jet Airways), hotels, and tour organisers to expand the size of the pie.
Economic Times, Page 24, Wednesday 10 September 2008 article states that Indian Railways Catering and Tourism Corporation plans to diversify into air package tours, and has already tied up with Jet Airways for the same. They have also launched rail pacakage tours and road package tours (which include boarding and lodging) for different income groups.
Q1. What business is Indian Railways in?
Q2.Identify what other areas of collaboration should the IRCTC explore?
Q3. Who would be the competitors for IRCTC in its new offerings?
Q4. Do you think Indian Airlines (now known as "Indian") would face stiffer competition in the skies because of IRCTC partnering with Jet Airways?

GM eager to sell Hummer brand by next year

2008-09-04T03:05:00.001-07:00

1. Why are they selling their Hummer brand?
2. Who will or who should buy this brand, and why?
3. What would be the price they would get for this sale?

Please read the article and discuss. You may want to discuss these questions with your groups, and do some research to arrive at the answers.

Coca Cola buys Chinese Juice Company in an expensive deal

2008-09-03T21:25:00.000-07:00

Coca Cola buys Huiyuan Juice Group for $2.3bn; paying HK$12.2 a share in cash, triple its last closing price of HK$4.14.
The deal values Huiyuan at 46.6 times this year's estimated earning.
Zhu Xinli, Huiyuan's founder and president will sell his 42% share
Group Danone, the second largest shareholder with 23% also agreed to sell.
Coca Cola has a 9.7% share of the market in China, and Huiyuan has a 10.3% market share.
1. Why did Coca Cola make such an expensive purchase?
2. Do you think this purchase will help them increase their share of the market in China?
3. Why did Huiyuan give up its business?
4. How long will Coca Cola take to break-even (recover its investment and make profit)?

Please read the full story and discuss.

Air Arabia plans daily service to Hyderabad

2008-09-03T00:28:00.000-07:00

Air Arabia provides direct services to Ahmedabad, Bangalore, Chennai, Coimbatore, Jaipur, Kochi, Kozhikode, Mumbai, Nagpur, New Delhi and Thiruvananthapuram.

1. Find out which routes do Jet Airways and Indian Airlines fly to the UAE?
2. Which would be the most profitable sectors and why? Discuss in terms of passenger traffic, ticket prices, etc?
3. Do you think the revenues of Indian carriers on these routes will be affected by the introduction of Air Arabia flights?
4. Which destination in India should Air Arabia next operate its flights and why?

These questions are for academic discussion purposes only to help students understand business strategies better.

Google launches its new web browser Chrome

2008-09-02T23:30:00.000-07:00

Google wants to counter the dominance of Microsoft's Internet Explorer to ensure easy access to its market-leading search engine. Please comment on the following questions:
1. Who do you think will win this war for dominance adn why?
2. Will Microsoft bring down its licensing fees to counter Google's free webbrower?
3. If you were a consultant to Microsoft, what would be your recommendation to them?

These questions/discussions are for academic purposes only. It is important for students to understand the implication of business news, and feel free to contribute your views

Learning to read between the lines....by RBS PG09 student

2008-08-28T22:11:00.000-07:00

http://rustomjeebusinessschool.blogspot.com/2008/08/learning-to-read-between-lines.html

A post on newspaper reading sessions conducted at Rustomjee Business School

Orientation Day at Rustomjee Business School

2008-08-10T23:31:00.000-07:00

http://rustomjeebusinessschool.blogspot.com/2008/08/orientation-day-at-rustomjee-business.html

We need more schools and more colleges

2008-06-26T19:45:00.000-07:00

The past week I have been interacting with many young students who have scored high percentage marks in the Grade X board examinations, and are unable to secure admission into their college of choice or their subjects of choice? Several bright young students despite scoring 85% and above, are without admission into the science stream, and are considering option of pursuing commerce studies. Not that studying commerce is bad, but when a student has been dreaming of pursuing a science stream, and has secured distinction scores, it is sad to see the toil of the hard working students get beaten by an administrative system that cannot provide our youth opportunities they truly deserve. Are we going to raise a generation of disheartened individuals who are pursuing courses of study not out of choice, but because we as educators have failed to provide them with the right environment to pursue their dreams?

What has our education system evolved into? Whilst on the one hand one reads exhilarating reports on Mr. Mittal reaching the 3rd position of the richest person in the world, we are faced with sad tales of student deaths caused by the high levels of stress in today’s competitive scenarios.

So, then what gives us the right to put our children through this kind of examination stress at a tender young age of 16. When they should be looking at exploring their talents, and developing their personality, we force they into crammed rooms to learn by rote for an examination that evaluates nothing but the capacity to memorise. And even at that, there are so many loopholes in the evaluation process itself, that the assessment is not fair to the student, and the students get into depression, despite scoring high marks. When, in fact, performance in this school level examination is no indication of future success in life.

I have talked with so many parents, teachers and educationist; and almost everyone echoes the same sentiments. Will it take a tsunami of sorts to wake us up from the dreadful slumber of ignorance and apathy and pain we put our children through?

In the 21st century, we are still burdening our young children with two board examinations within a span of two years, and what’s worse, we do not have the infrastructure in place to help them achieve their goals. We ask them to study hard, work hard and then we are caught helpless because we don’t have the colleges to house our children.

There is an urgent need to call for a change, a radical one at that. Are our administrators listening?

First, let us reevaluate the necessity of holding two board examinations in a span of two years, at the standards X and XII, and an entrance qualifying examination, CET, to get into professional courses.

The standard X examination serves the only purpose of gaining admission into junior college, and if we can evolve an evaluation pattern that addresses this objective, we may find the Board examination at standard X totally unnecessary.

If after slogging through the year and scoring 85% and above in their board examinations, our students are not assured of a seat in a college of their choice, why do we insist on torturing them through their bright young years by asking them to appear for the board examinations. Why not let the grade 10 examinations be held at the school level itself in all subjects, and then for college admission the students could sit for an entrance examination, limiting it to their subject of choice. So, a student who wishes to pursue science would sit for a city-level competitive exam only in the science and math subjects, whilst a student who wishes to pursue commerce would sit for a competitive exam in the subject of math and economics. And a student who wishes to pursue in the field of arts, would sit for economics and social studies.

It might be an idea for the education department to incorporate standard XI and XII into the schooling system itself. Students should progress normally into these levels within their own schools. This would directly double the capacity of junior colleges in the city. However, an argument against this could be the space constraints within existing school buildings. For this, the government could grant additional FSI for existing schools to expand their infrastructure. Particularly, the science stream students who need to focus on their studies and minimize waste of time in commuting to college.

This way, the school level grade 10 exams would ensure that a student prepares for all the subjects, and the entrance exam would focus only on their subject of choice. This would certainly reduce the burden on our children studying for the board examination in 3 languages, and social studies, when their interests lie in the field of science. This would most certainly result in lower stress levels amongst the students and parents, and definitely a more focused approach in preparing for a subject of choice entrance examination. Science students would write their entrance examination in Math, and Science. Commerce students would write Math and Economics, and Arts students would write in English and Social Studies.

The school level examination could only awards grades instead of percentage marks, and the students can focus on preparing for the qualifying exams to professional courses. This pattern would, also, reduce the resource requirement in evaluating and assessing board examinations, besides eliminating unnecessary expenditure on conducting the board examination.

The purpose of education is to enlighten and to ignite a curiosity to discover the treasures of the world we live in. However, our education system has turned the process completely into one that leads to stress, and is devoid of excitement of the learning process. Our assessment system evaluates nothing but the capacity to learn by rote. And what do students get after all the hard work and the distinctions, the run around to get admitted into colleges, and the sense of failure for not getting into a college of their choice.

Coming to the next level, I fail to understand what purpose do the grade XII examinations serve?

For science students who are interested in pursuing professional courses such as engineering and medicine after Standard 12, there are all the competitive entrance exams such as the CET.

For students of commerce and arts stream, most of them continue with the same college for the degree programs, and so the board exam again defeats the purpose.

Why can’t these examinations be held at the individual college level itself?

The colleges are anyway conducting the internal examination for grade 11 as well as for first year and second year degree college, so why not let them conduct the grade 12 exams in-house as well. If anything at all, this might actually serve the students interest better as the college could introduce project-based assessment as well as assessment based on class participation, not just attendance. Looking at the cost of conducting these examinations – the paper setting, distribution and logistics of getting the question papers to the exam centers and the answer sheets to the evaluators, the evaluation costs of the answer sheets, and other miscellaneous costs associated with the examination.

Rather than spending resources year after year on execution of the board examinations, and evaluation and declaration of results, it would make more sense to spend that money on building more schools or more colleges, which is the need of the hour. This year, almost 250,000 students have written the Grade X examinations from Mumbai alone.

The need of the hour is for all the educators to come together to form a forum for positive change. It is high time we stopped debating and start implementing positive changes.

Education policies of the past need to change with the changing times because our children deserve better. We must take responsibility for making things better for them. I urge like-minded professionals to get together to form an Education Task Force to implement change.

Hanif Kanjer
The views expressed in the article are the personal views of the author.

An update for friends and family,

2008-06-17T23:10:00.000-07:00

I read somewhere, “it is better to be over the hill than to be buried under it”, and that certainly perked up my spirits on this birthday. I am choosing to send it across to all my peers in my age bracket.

I have been flooded with so many messages, and it is such a pleasure to receive the love of so many. I taught more than 1000 students over the past one year across Dubai and Mumbai, and so I guess my circle of friends has expanded dramatically adding to all my school and college friends, and my colleagues from my 12 years in the corporate world.

In fact, quite a few of my very close friends celebrate their birthdays around my date, so the celebration goes on for almost a week.

A student from my batch in March 2008 in Dubai gave me a wonderful letter (and I won’t name him to save him the embarrassment – some of us grow wiser as we age), and it made me feel so nice, I thought of sharing it with all of you.

“Dear Sir,
The quality of teaching faculty coming to our campus has been good till date. I know it’s not just to compare teaching styles as each and every professor has his own style. But, trust me Sir, it won’t be a hyperbolic statement if I say that you stand apart from the rest. You are different!
There are many compelling reasons for me to say so: your style, your communication, your material, your stress on CSR, the type of assignments and probably your age too. You are the youngest of the professors we have had till date.
By this note, I simply meant that I admire you and appreciate you.
Every soul on this earth needs a ‘guru’. I request you to be my guru for the rest of my life.”

There is a lot happening in my professional life.

We are launching the Rustomjee Cambridge Junior College in July 2008 offering the A-level program from the University of Cambridge, and the Rustomjee Business School offering one-year autonomous diploma programs in management in retail, logistics, human resources and finance.

The past two months were busy with getting the admissions in for Rustomjee Business School, and this month we are busy preparing for admissions to the junior college. It gets difficult because there is always a pressure on admissions with limited seats. We are taking in only 20% of the applicants for the junior college.

We are planning an adventure camp for the business school students in October 2008, and these will be coupled with sessions on team building, leadership, and personal goals setting. I have received very encouraging response from the industry, and we are introducing an industry mentorship program and quite a few successful professionals have kindly agreed to mentor our PG students.

I am currently having sessions with individual teaching faculty members to design their course content and incorporate current business situations into their course in the form of case studies. The guidelines to the faculty member also include incorporating relevant field trips, and movies into their course. Some of the movies that have been planned include: Erin Brokovich from ethics and negotiations perspective, The Devil Wears Prada from strategy and communication skills perspective, and Disclosure from HR perspective.

The hunt is on for a strong HoDs, one for retail and the other for the finance specialization. If you know anyone who would be interested, ask them to email me their details. If any of you are interested in taking guest lectures, teaching a course or conducting a workshop, do send me your credentials. If there is a fit, I would be glad to invite you in.

I would also welcome suggestions/inputs from you on making the course relevant and interesting. Feel free to drop in a line, or if you are in Mumbai, drop into our campus.

Thanks for all our good wishes, and need them even more this year. And keep all those messages coming in.

Technology no substitute for good parenting

2008-05-26T07:20:00.001-07:00

Recently, I have been receiving an increasing number of proposals from technology services providers regarding the computerization of school administrative and academic activities. The proposals range from mildly irrirating to the ludicrous.
Let me discuss one such proposal, and for legality sake, I am going to not name the service provider. Last week, I received an international call from London regarding computerizing my school. I was offered the computerization of my school so that parents would be able to access the following over Internet or over the telephone.
- Attendance
- Grades and Assessment
- Homework
- Good and Bad behaviour notes
- Attendance
The USP of the system is that parents would be alerted when
- Their children are late/absent
- When teachers enter home work or grades

I am a strong proponent of technology, and in fact I am constantly challenging myself and my team of teachers to upgrade their knowledge of technology especially if we want to keep abreast with our children. But, this proposal got me thinking whose brain-wave was this service offering? I wouldn’t be surprised if it was that of a lazy parent.

Let’s tackle the issue point-wise.

The first service offering is SMS-alert to parent when the child is absent from class.
Now, this would probably be necessary if the child has been playing truant, and there are a handful of such naughty kids in every school. But, the system by design doesn’t take into account the fact that it could be possible that the child missed school because of an illness or a family function. So, wouldn’t the parent be a little annoyed at receiving an sms of the child missing school, and being charged for the sms! Does this provide any value-add to the child’s learning in the school? Definitely not! But, the school can proclaim it is technology savvy.

The system works on the basis of biometrics or swipe card. What happens if a child has boarded the school bus, but forgotten to carry his swipe card? The parent is on her way to work, and receives an sms informing her that her child hasn’t reached school? And who would be left answering the parent when the parent starts demanding an explanation for a false sms. No, not the service provider, it would be the security guard at most schools, and in some schools the office clerical staff. What happens when a school has 3000 students studying in a single shift, and say, 10% of students, a pessimistic estimate, forget to carry their swipe cards? 300 panic stricken parents rushing to school!

I would not even want to go into the chaos of children fidgeting with the cards or the system, or carrying out multiple swipes, and the older kids resorting to proxy swiping. The drawbacks are too many. Wonder if any of the technology service providers actually do their homework and research before approaching a school with a service offering.

Let’s look at the next service of Grades & Assessment on sms or on the internet.

On an average a student writes 4 examinations a year, which would require the parent to attend 4 Open House Days in a year to meet with the teacher and learn about the child’s performance. Is that too much to ask of a busy parent? Most of these Open House Days occur on Saturdays. Even if both the parents are working professionals, can they not take turns to miss half a day of work to attend to their child’s progress report? Why are we using technology to draw the divide between the parent and the teacher even further? One could argue that the teacher could put the qualitative feedback on the net for the parent along with the marks. If you look from a teacher’s perspective, each teacher teaches a class size ranging from 30 to 50, and in some cases even 90. Is it humanly possible to capture the essence of a face-to-face conversation in an online message for every child?

The Service Provider then goes a step further and informs me that the parent can get a graphical representation of the child’s performance by subject over the four or six tests taken, and this can be compared to the class average as well as the highest in the class or the lowest in the class. This one actually takes the CAKE.

For crying out loud, the assessment is meant only for an understanding of the child’s learning levels, and not to compare the performance of a child over a year or with other children. When we grow a plant, do we analyze it daily how big it has grown, how many leaves it sprouts every day, and how long the roots have grown every month? Aren’t our children like little saplings – that need to soak in the information, seek out the light of knowledge, without being put through microscopic analysis? Yet, I am always amazed at the number of parents who do just that, and now there are service providers who want to put daggers in the hands of such parents!

Children are tender, and they all respond differently to different learning environments and stimuli, and they need to grow in an environment of acceptance and encouragement, not an environment of comparison and analysis. I do hope other school heads do echo similar views, and refrain from implementing such stress-inducing technology for students and parents.

Then comes the Service of Home Work uploaded on the net so the parent can track the child’s workload.

At the lower grades, parents do need to keep a track of the child’s home assignment, and the humble school diary does a splendid job of it. At the higher grades, Grade 9 and Grade 10, if a parent still has to monitor a child’s homework assignments and responsibilities, then the parent has failed in his role of instilling the value of being responsible for oneself in his child.
By the time children reach grade 7, the most important training or life skill a parent can provide to his child is taking responsibility for one’s work. I fear for the future of children who are so dependent on their parents at Grade 9 and Grade 10, that they are unable to plan their studies and wait for parental instruction on their hourly study plan.

One may argue that at least the parent will know what the homework for the day is, and the counter argument would be the obvious one, just ask your child. The Service provider quotes his own example of his child studying at the GCSE Level, and his son refuses to answer questions on the school homework and assignment. I am sorry! I certainly do not believe that technology is meant for bridging this communication gap. This parent needs to work harder at his parenting skills than complaining that lack of technology is causing this gap.

Oh, by the way, this entire technology enabling service is not out of a philanthropic desire to make parenting easier. It comes at a price. Of course, the school pays nothing. It is the parent who is expected to shell out anywhere from Rs.650/year to Rs.6000/- per year, not including the cost of every sms that goes out.

It took me some time to get this pesky Service Provider off my back, but within a month, there were two others of the same breed chasing me with a similar service offering. I think they are multiplying faster than rabbits. Something needs to be done to stop this menace.

The message I would want to send out to all parents is that please do not substitute technology for good parenting. The best gift you can give your child is your time, your undivided attention, and your understanding. Make the time to watch them bloom into confident young adults because twenty years from now it won’t matter what they scored in their Geography or mathematics second unit test at grade 3 or grade 5 or grade 10.

Let them enjoy their schooling, with all its ups and downs, and treasure this time because it will be soon gone.

Hanif Kanjer
Director, Rustomjee Cambridge International School & Junior College.
Director, Rustomjee Business School

Interviewing Tips

2008-04-14T21:36:00.000-07:00

Success in admission interviews is not a matter of chance. It is a matter of practice.

Make it a practice to write your answers in a diary, Go back to your answers periodically to review and update

Arm yourself with an audio-recorder to record your answers and discover how you sound when you speak.

Voice modulation exercises are extremely important. You must enunciate the words clearly and loudly, without rushing through your answers

Ask a close friend or family member who could provide you with feedback on your voice quality and your clarity of speech

Do watch and observe the BBC newsreaders, and their style of speech. Learn to pause for dramatic effect.

Do a dress-rehearsal either in front of the mirror or with your best friend.

Don’t lie in the interview.

Make your answers interesting but not very long. Be crisp in your communication. Don’t keep repeating your points. For every question, you should have a different answer.

It is good to give examples of your achievements, your strengths as proof of what you are claiming.

Avoid clichéd answers to questions. Give believable and real answers. Telling the interviewer that you are a smart worker is not enough. Will anyone claim that he is not a smart worker? Unlikely. So, then give an example which will prove how you worked smartly in a particular situation. Keep your stories interesting and short.

Don’t say anything negative about anyone. Always keep a positive perspective of every experience or individual you have interacted with.

Be well-dressed. The men need to stick to black trousers, either white or off-white shirt, and a smart tie, either in red or yellow. Please carry all your documents in a smart leather folder.

Group Discussion Tips

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Whenever you are given a topic, list down three positives & three negatives of that topic
Try to think of examples to support your viewpoint, whether you chose to support the positive or the negative

If everyone in the group is supporting the positive, then you try to focus the group’s attention to the negative.

Always introduce your different point of view in a non-confrontational manner. You are not there to argue, but to highlight the merits or demerits of a particular situation. A good way to introduce your opposing view point is “Whilst I do agree with the general sentiment of the group towards this topic, it is very important for all of us to also weigh the possibility of…(and you introduce your different perspective)

Remember, it is not always necessary to be the first speaker. In fact, most students will try and jump in to be a first speaker. Use that time to list down your thoughts and examples for the topic.

In fact, the first few minutes of every group invariably turns out to be a fish-market. Don’t become one of the noise makers.

However, if no one is initiating the discussion, then you must take the lead.

How often you speak is not as important as what you speak.

People who take more airtime only to repeat points raised earlier tend to lose credibilityPeople who listen score better in a group discussion than people who only argue or who don’t let others speak