DAMMAM — The Gulf Council of the Central Board of Secondary Education (CBSE) conducted its 31st Principals’ Conference in Bangalore recently. Among 165 CBSE affiliated schools in the Gulf region, 122 principals attended the four-day meet which witnessed different sessions led by leading academicians, technocrats, doctors, diplomats, HR managers, educational film directors, etc. along with the senior officials from CBSE.

The inaugural session was attended by Dr. Biswajit Saha, director - Skill Education and Training, CBSE, K. Srinivasan, regional director, CBSE, Chennai and Deepak Vohra, a diplomat and secretary to the Ministry of External Affairs. He lauded the efforts of Indian Schools in the Gulf countries in imparting quality education to the Indian expatriate community in the Gulf.

During the inaugural function the CBSE-affiliated schools and their principals who have made remarkable achievements in the field of academics, sports and games were honored by awarding mementoes. International Indian School - Dammam received 14 mementoes for academic excellence and stood as one of the best performing schools in the entire Gulf. Last year also IIS – Dammam scored 16 mementoes and stood first in the Kingdom and among the best three schools in the Gulf.

The CBSE officials — Dr. Saha and Srinivasan, who attended the inaugural session briefed about the latest changes, modifications and improvements they are going to introduce in the curriculum and teaching-learning activities. Dr. B.M. Hegde, a sr. cardiologist, medical scientist, educationalist and the former Vice- Chancellor of Manipal University, also addressed the principals and motivated them by quoting interesting stories from his life experience.

There was a panel discussion on the topic “Our Children Deserve More”. Representing Saudi Arabia, International Indian School Dammam Principal – Dr. Mohammed Shaffe spoke on this occasion and he highlighted about the resources to be saved and conserved for the future children. He pointed out that in future the children would be learning artificial intelligence and remote sensing. In order to encourage and motivate the children the future education should be individual based, flexible in terms of time and space and where each student should be allowed to learn at his own pace with tools that suit his distinctive capacities in areas of his interest, he added.

The other main speakers were Saiju Aravind, Syed Sultan Ahamed, Dr. Jitendra Nagpal and Dr. Joseph Emanuel, director – Academics, CBSE. Anil Swaroop, former secretary department of school education and literacy, government of India, addressed the valedictory function. Y.K. Yadav, regional director, CBSE, addressed the queries of the principals and cleared many of the doubts and briefed about the reforms going to be introduced in the curriculum in the coming academic year. He told that in order to reduce the burden of children 15% of topics would be reduced from coming academic year.