Tribune schoolteacher bags prestigious education award

Tribune News Service

Chandigarh, August 16

Anupma Chopra, a Kindergarten teacher of Tribune Model School, Sector 29, Chandigarh, and four teachers from Government Mutli-Purpose Senior Secondary School, Patiala — Amarjeet Kaur, Irvandeep Kaur, Karamjeet Kaur and Sharanjit Singh — have bagged the prestigious Education Prizes by the Global Education Leadership Foundation (tGELF), New Delhi. The teachers were awarded at the 6th Annual Summit — LIFE 2016 in New Delhi.

They were given a letter of recommendation and a cash prize of Rs 1 lakh each in the concluding ceremony in front of a select audience of educationists, government officials and entrepreneurs from across the globe.

Chopra, the winner of The Primary School - Urban Indian Category of The Education Prize 2016, says, “I was ecstatic when I got to know I was a tGELF finalist. I immediately informed school principal Vandana Saxena, who was equally happy about it and immensely encouraging.”

She quickly adds, “But the best feeling was when my name was announced as the winner of the award. It is an appreciation and acknowledgment of 29 years of my hard work.”

Chopra attributes her success to the school, her principal and students.

The Education Prize is an annual competition organised by tGELF for teachers of their member schools in the country and abroad. The theme this year was ‘Engaging Classrooms’ inviting teacher portfolios depicting their endeavour towards evolving creative teaching learning experiences engaging students therein.

Tribune Model School has been associated with tGELF since 2013. This year, five teachers in different categories (primary and secondary) participated in the annual competition for teachers. There were three qualifying rounds.

Out of the 40 teachers who qualified for the second round, Tribune Model School was represented by three teachers - Punjabi teacher Amandeep Kaur, part-time Yoga teacher Ashish and Kindergarten teacher Anupma Chopra.

The 19 jury members with experience in the field of education, nationally and internationally evaluated the portfolios for the final selection.

As many as 23 finalists were invited for the concluding day of the Leadership Conference at Delhi from August 11-14.

Vandana Saxena, principal, Tribune Model School, and also a resource invitee at the conference, says, “Anupma’s project ‘Clean India, Green India’ through which she reached out to the community involving them in a drive towards a cleaner environment won her this accolade.”

Saxena further said, “The conference proved to be a meaningful one in sync with the vision towards focus on universal human values in school as much as aligning ourselves with the UN sustainable development goal — Quality Education. Her loving connect with tiny tots was appreciated as much as her ability to transform them into global citizens by imbibing the human values programme at school.”

Other participating schools included Vivek High School; Strawberry Fields High School, Chandigarh; PPS, Nabha; YPS, Patiala; DPS; and Shri Ram School from Delhi and Scottish International School from Mumbai, to name a few.