By Gajendra Singh Rathore, Vice-Principal, CM RISE School Vinoba, Ratlam
This is the story of CM RISE School Vinoba, Ratlam, which has scripted success story following innovative series in public education while being one amongst the top three schools in the world.
Originally founded for girls from marginalised community in an urban chal (Basti) community hesitant to embrace formal education, the school’s leadership, rejuvenated in 2022, launched a transformative journey grounded in resilience and empowerment for its 577 students.
Initially the school had a low enrolment and attendance, alongside severe infrastructural decay however now the school has a long waiting list of students who are eager to get their admission here, courtesy the innovative Cycle of Growth model adopted by Gajendra Singh Rathore, Vice Principal, CM Rise School Vinoba, Ratlam.
Cycle of Growth
The school’s response to its challenges is encapsulated in its innovative “Cycle of Growth” model, which fosters continuous professional development for teachers and dynamic engagement for students. This model is pivotal in reversing the school’s fortunes, dramatically raising attendance and improving exam pass rates. The school participation in sports and other events at every level has grown tremendously. Through a revitalised commitment to community collaboration and local resource utilisation, CM RISE School Vinoba, Ratlam has made education both relevant and accessible. Its innovative work was delivered by the state of Madhya Pradesh in partnership with Peepul.
A different Approach
Leadership at CM RISE School Vinoba, Ratlam under guidance of vice principal and school leader Gajendra Singh Rathore, adopts a distributed model, empowering teachers and engaging parents to cultivate a culture of high expectations and collective responsibility. Innovative practices, such as integrating education with model of parental engagement, community as a learning resource, the innovative idea of tracking data, local festivals and hosting early morning sports sessions, have enriched student experiences and outcomes. Special mention must be made of vice principal Gajendra Singh Rathore who regularized the innovations in the strong school culture concept with Team Vinoba, garnering recognition from state educational authorities, further validating the school’s impact.
CM RISE School Vinoba, Ratlam will use the prize money to expand its Learning and Development Lab. This investment will empower students to further engage with and address community challenges through innovative projects, extending its influence beyond the classroom and into the wider community.
Vikas Pota, Founder of T4 Education and the World’s Best School Prizes, says:
“It is my great honour to bestow upon CM RISE School Vinoba, Ratlam in India the World’s Best School Prize for Innovation 2024. The difference you have made to lives in your classroom, in your community, and far beyond will inspire educators and policymakers alike.
“It is my hope that governments now look to your shining example to see what can be achieved when schools are committed to high performance and when education seeks to tackle some of the greatest challenges our societies face. Your work lights the way to a better future.”
Gajendra Singh Rathore, Vice Principal, School leader CM RISE School Vinoba, Ratlam, said:
“We never had thought that in our lives there will be a day that our school will top the world. When we came to school in earlier days, we only thought of dealing with our challenges. We used to come up with new ideas and we struggled every day to turn those ideas into reality. It’s an exciting and thrilling experience to be ranked top among thousands of schools worldwide. The selection made by the international organisation T4 Education has given honour to our government which is continuously empowering educational system by their various schemes in Madhya Pradesh and has proved that effective innovations made in small towns can also be recognised globally.”
Cycle Of Growth : Transforming Public Education Through Community Engagement by Gajendra Singh Rathore
Welcome to all of you; I am Gajendra Singh Rathore, Vice Principal School leader Government CM rise Vinoba Ratlam, MP, India. I have been in the field of education for the last 29 yearS and have received India’s highest honour for teacher, National Teacher Award in 2017. But i am not telling about myself today. I want to tell a brief story about my Government public school.
Our school’s name is CM Rise Vinoba situated in urban slum of Ambedkar Nagar in Ratlam. It is a Government Public School, we have kindergarten primary and secondary classes with 577 students and 33 teaching staffs in 2023. It is a co-education School.
Our journey of transformation started from 20th May 2022. We know that in our Madhya Pradesh India, there are thousands of schools and in last 29 years of service, I have realised that there are 3–4 common issues with which the entire system is dealing with. Students come from marginalised community and confronted with difficulties like low attendance rates and failing to keep grade level learning. Although a lot of efforts have been made in the last 25 years but challenges still remain.
Let’s come to 28 May 2022. Some colleagues and myself were transferred here to CM Rise Vinoba. We came here under CM Rise Program of department of school education Madhya Pradesh government and received training resources, supporting staff, infrastructure and remarkable hand holding from Departmental state authority, But all the same challenges of Indian public schools were there too. In initial days, I as a school leader worked with my core team to understand challenges, context and set our priorities . Engaging in immersive community visits, we realised children preferred playing or working on “chalni making” rather than coming to schools. Stones were thrown at the school. When we entered the school premises in the morning, empty alcohol bottles etc were found there. The communication between the school and the colony was negligible.
Now come to the point. We moved towards innovation by knowing our challenges in problems as a school. Lack of holistic thinking about school development, demotivation in the school culture, lakh of enthusiasm in the teacher community, lack of effective leadership skills, children not being connected to the school had become challenges.
We soon realised for this transformation journey to be successful we needed to do two things (1) Instill trust in our teachers ,students ,and community by building a joyful and creative school environment and (2) Create a culture of learning and development.
I decided to reach to the last child and ensuring a platform for all my students but it was impossible to do without a dedicated team of teachers. I decided to work with teachers first, with the believe that if I am able to reach every teacher, every teacher gonna reach to every student. I designed and innovated Teachers professional development mechanisms like “cycle of growth” and other models to connect everyone, All these ideas took birth from this firm believe, school leadership team and team vinoba gave full support.
We had identified the challenges and effective possible solutions for our school, But to make a team of world class teachers we had to bring them together on a common platform, create a shared vision, a common goal and shared understanding of what we want to teach and what we want a students to be.
My theory of changes anchored on trust and culture of Learning and Development, where teachers serve as key doers and change maker. This was unheard of in a Government public school. Along with our own experience of school management, School Education Department, MP got us trained by reputed institutes like IIM Indore and Peepul, which helped us to think about .
Appreciation : A path towards reinforcing faith in teammates and driving excellence
Now move to the cycle of growth, for establishing trust and Foster meaningful relationship with in team we started by addressing the needs of teachers to make them agents of change. In evening team building spaces, we started capsule training and team building activities, such as role-playing on positive behavior management, positive school culture, and many more. Now capsule training is followed by classroom observations, which are based on glows and grows. In addition, complete observations of students’ growth are included, including copy checking and a student diary with their progress. Followed by Debrief and constructive feedback, and again training and so on.
Now, in our theory, teachers are more important than anything else. we decided to implement “ Teacher of the month” mechanism with a tool. How you overcome your challenges and change your practices to get better and effective results is called innovation. In that manner, our tool, a Google form, became a new idea and the whole process of appreciation became a change maker. It required teachers to fill in a form mentioning details like the creation of TLM’s , New strategies used challenges and how did they overcome challenges. Then selection process followed by our walkthroughs, SLT meetings. After a transparent process, the names and photos of selected teachers were displayed at the school entrance. This culture of appreciation creates atmosphere of trust and enthusiasm among the team. We have Created several “ Point of appreciation “ according to our goal and team work.
Basic Model Of Cycle of Growth”
This cycle of growth is encapsulated with culture of appreciation, regular staff meetings, Academy dialogues once in a month and daily huddle spaces where teachers come together ,present their work, have data based discussions and problem solve together. This space is entirely planned and led by teachers. Team with purpose, Both SLT ( Sandhya Vora, Anil Mishra , Seema Chauhan and Some Senior Teachers With me ) and various sub committee with regular feedback are other spaces to get ownership. My “cycle of growth” mechanism creates first layer of trust and culture of learning amongst teachers with believe in theory of change and began replicate in classes along with community engagement.
Cascading the change : From Teachers to students
We know our model entails catalyzing a ripple effect where we empower the teachers who become a catalyst of empowerment within the classroom. Huddle spaces and cycle of growth mechanism enabled me to build first layer of trust and culture of learning amongst teachers. They started believing in our theory of change and began replicating in their own classrooms.
Teachers begin to create a shift in classroom culture, student appreciation and engagement became key levers. Teachers build specials like social emotional learning spaces, classroom libraries ,preparing to present at a big platform in a big group like 150 in numbers. Entry exit routines, student reward system, Regular morning sports session, healthy student teacher relationship. In public schools ,where healthy student-teacher relationships were non-existent, where student lacked aspirations or undisciplined ,Such acceptance and culture became a hit among them. Hence, resulting in increased engagement and learning. The feeling of “Team Vinoba” also arose among the students.
Engagement & learning
In earlier days, we started “Team huddle” because our teachers were demotivated but Now it is a point of appreciation for all.
Teachers began to find merit in this theory. They have idea to track data, monitor students growth & promote culture of learning . They created customized trackers based on their student’s need. Like trackers for homework, attendance, behavior ,parental engagement etc. This process partially owned by students. Through this students developed confidence, leadership and habit of self-reflection. Teachers have innovative assessment processes L-1, 2 , 3 where students can unlock the next level only when they cross previous level. They made a herbal garden with students and the community. They create 400 + TLM’s to make classrooms more joyful. Teachers-led initiatives flourish with continued support and appreciation from leadership.
Teachers began to find merit
Beyond School Boundaries : Winning the trust of community In government schools, Parental engagement is a challenge. As a school, we have implemented the “CM Rise Vinoba Model of parental engagement” for professional development of teachers. We had incorporated various dimensions of parental engagement in our “Vinoba Model” 2 years ago. Teachers adopted this model continuously for 2 years and achieved success. Innovations like Capsule Online Parenting along with Online Parenting were done. 2 years ago, 0–5% parents used to attend parents meeting, that figure is now 85–90% in parent-teacher dialogue. In some classes, it is even 100%. We discuss this model from time to time and take feedback. In our academic dialogue, we do training related to online parenting and also learn to work on various online platforms. This is done through peer learning as well as by inviting experts. Teachers are the carriers of every change of ours and parent engagement in the government system makes every path easier. The attendance of students which was 25–37% two years ago is 90% on average today.
Basic Parental Engagement Model
Basic Parental Engagement Model A direct parent meeting, regular feedback in the student diary, information letter on low attendance, followed by one on one feedback, discussion at home are its offline ways. Discussion on phone, whatsApp group, online PTM, special online PTM are its online ways. Apart from regular PTM ,we are taking online PTM to a different level, where in small capsules, Now we are doing online PTM as per the requirement of the students. The feedback is amazing. Why Special Capsule online PTM ? We know that offline Parents meeting of a students takes place once a month. There are many students whose proficiency level is the same, Who need constant motivation. Their parents need to be connected for every possible help as common minimum program. There will be continuous connection with such parents through capsule meetings. Having students of similar ability Makes it easier to plan for discussion and motivation. After PTM, parents are very happy that the school is taking care of their students. they show gratitude for one on one feedback and respect. They are aware of students attention of learning and also aware of there health and other supporting things for them. After online PTM attendance has increased ,students familiarity with class and learning has increased. we have developed Google form for those feedback purposes also.
Advance Approach towards Parental Engagement
Let’s discuss different dimensions of parental engagement. When a student performs well, in attendance, in results. We invite their parents along with them to school and felicitate them in the prayer meeting. Community as a learning resource- Taking chapters from NCERT books to the community and teaching them live, inviting parents to student showcase where students exhibited not just academic achievements but also art and craft, sports etc., giving them ownership in different ways, Celebrating Students achievement at their place, Give ownership to parents in different programs. Students are parts of this model. In place of alcohol bottles here we have herbal garden maintained by community . Instead of Throwing stones and abusing , Children now sing the song “We are From CM Rise” . Now We can say We are transforming public education through community engagement.
We have a public School in India in a marginalized community has an admission wait list of 700+over the past two years, can anyone believe this ? This has been possible because of our(Team Vinoba) persistent efforts and attitude of thriving till succeeding. Our teachers now share best practices from international schools. A large number of our students participate in events of national importance.
Our Parents attendance in PTM , Regular Attendance Of Students and Board Results has improved in a tremendous manner. Earlier there was the negligible presence out side the school in sports and various competition. Now hundreds of our students are winning medals at district level and divisional level. Thirteen players have played at state level and Two at national level. We always Says “We The Team Vinoba ”. We all volunteer with our sports teacher in the morning sports session as it is a hobby of our students.
In other activities the school is leading at District level and is representing at state and national level in various literary, cultural , science and other competitions. Teachers and school leaders from other schools are coming to imbibe our best practices. Our students taught as teachers on teachers day and honored the teachers. CM Rise Vinoba , recently hosted an academic dialogue focused on innovations in education, featuring the practices of five schools recognized as among the world’s top 10 Schools . This was beyond imagination before this journey. Parents are giving teachers a sense of honor with gratitude. There is a culture of appreciation all over. Respect for each other.
Now Our School Recognized as “Daksh School” and Declared “Light House “ By State Education Department of Madhya Pradesh. (Our School is the world’s top school in innovation category by global organisation by T4 Education, A renowned international organization in the field of education). We got 10 thousand US Dollar prize also. “We feel proud that we are a Indian Government School – we the Team Vinoba ” .
Certificate From T4 Education Team CM Rise Vinoba Ratlam, MP INDIA
Designed, Created & Written By: Gajendra Singh Rathore, Vice Principal, CM Rise Vinoba Ratlam , M.P. INDIA
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