School Admissions at GOC

Thiruvanandapuram, the capital city of Kerala, is where we live now. Being born and brought up in Thrissur, the cultural capital of Kerala, I have never lived in Thiruvanandapuram before. Yet, I was hopeful that people here would be just as nice as Thrissurians and they were. I don't know whether I should say the same about all auto-rickshaw drivers :(

Anyway, a friend of ours works as a teacher in a prominent Christian school in Trivandrum and he recommended his school as a possible choice for our kids. The other choice was Trivandrum International School. It would be a good choice since we hoped the transitioning for the kids would be much more smoother at the International School.

Texas Schools ends in the first week of June. But most schools in Kerala starts on the first week of June! So we decided to skip one week's classes at US schools and return to Kerala, end of May. We hoped to get admissions and possibly get a break, before kids start schooling.

Now that rental home was decided, we started out early morning on June 2nd to visit the school. Our friend, who is a teacher at the school would meet us there and take us thru the admission process. The school was very crowded, with lots of parents bringing in their kids, since it is the first day of school.

We met with him around 7:45am on Monday morning at the school. He was very nervous, since he was not sure whether my son, who is seeking admission for 8th grade will get a seat. Apparently, the school admissions are usually complete by the month of March!. The school will accept applications, conduct admission tests and finalize the list, by March. Since we were seeking admission in June, there is no guarantee that a seat will be available, or so we were told.

We met with the Principal, who did not commit on the seat, but requested us to submit an application to the Official in charge. Of course, the person in charge was no where to be found!. So we waited, and waited.. Towards noon we got word that he is in the campus. Now we need to get his approval on the admission request. He will confirm if a seat is available and if available, we can proceed with the rest of the admission process. So we waited nervously for the signature and finally we got it. You would hope that would be the end of it, right? No, not so easy, now you can submit an application. The application will be accepted by the school and then they will conduct admission tests.

We met with the Principal again. She signed on another form and we submitted an application for admission. The Principal suggested a time of 10am, the next day for conducting the admission tests. The admission will now be decided based on how the kids do in their admission tests. Well, no need to stay at the school now, so we returned home.

The next day at 9:45am, we were at the Principal's office. The kids were taken away by the Vice Principal, for conducting the admission tests. Again we waited for about two hours, nervously hoping the kids would make it out in the admission tests.
"Science was a bit hard", said both of my children. Well, we will see how it goes, I said.
"You will not know the results today, it will be available only tomorrow", we were told. So we are back home again, without much development in the admission process.
That evening, our friend called and said the kids have got admission. "You can come tomorrow, and pay the fees", he said. Great, we thought, Yet another problem solved. Not quite, as we would find out the next day:)

On Wednesday, June 4th, the third day into this admission process, we get to the school again, this time to make the payment and seal the deal. We were told to collect some paper with the admission number from the office. Apparently someone needed to sign it too. Luckily, our friend took care of it and we were ready to make the payment. We went to the admissions office to get the fees information. We were told to make a payment of xxxxx Rs, which is a security deposit. OK, fine, it is refundable, and it is not that much, I thought. But, the tedious part was filling up the form that needs to be submitted with the security deposit. You are required to fill in the serial numbers of all the 1000Rs or 500Rs currency notes!! Apparently, there are a lot of fake 1000Rs and 500Rs notes in circulation. So the office staff requires you to write the serial numbers, that way they can track the parents, if one of the notes that you turned in turned out to be a fake!!!

We paid the security deposit and now proceeded to pay the tuition fees. We were required to pay the fees at the bank, just outside the campus. When we reached there, the queue was so long. The bank is open only till 1pm! Again, having someone who knows the people turned out to be quite handy. Our friend quickly talked to the Manager and got the payment done. Now, we were ready to get the uniforms, text books and much more..

At least, my children got admission at the school, and they were required to come to school the very next day. Poor kids, they never got a break!. I was hoping that it would be okay for the kids to join on Monday, June 9th. "Anyway they missed 3 days of school, let them miss 2 more days", I said. But apparently the Principal wanted them to start the next day, according to our friend. I felt bad for the kids. However, luck was on my side this time. It turned out that it may not be required for them to go to school the next day.

Why?? Here comes the influence of political parties... More on it next time..