Nirmal Bhartia School welcomes all to a unique three-day festival, celebrating the spirit of ‘SMILE, Together We Can!’

New Delhi : Nirmal Bhartia School, one of the leading educational institutions in Delhi NCR, is organising a three-day festival from Wednesday, July 28th to Friday, July 30th, 2021 (4:00 PM – 7:30 PM) to celebrate SMILE, Together We Can. SMILE is a holistic well-being initiative aimed at ensuring the psychological, social and emotional well-being of children by leveraging the unique power of the arts to bring together the head, heart and hand, and build community, on a blended platform.

When the horrors of the Covid-19 pandemic led to the immediate closure of all the schools, as a precautionary move, NiBS reached out to all the stakeholders to create a close-knit community of children, parents and teachers with the aim of cushioning them from the isolation, alienation, anxiety and fears associated with the pandemic and social distancing. The outcome was SMILE, Together We Can, a pioneering community based, blended learning initiative to help children sail through the grim times by ensuring that they felt emotionally and psychologically safe and secure and connected despite being geographically apart. Creatively conceived and holistically curated, the programme’s design seeks to offer children an emotional safety net through the companionship of the arts. Reflective and collaborative activities are shared on a weekly basis to encourage children to Sing happy songs, Make original art, Ignite and Inspire ideas for change, Listen to the voice of the heart, and Energise, Electrify and play their part.

The SMILE World festival salutes the spirit of extraordinary resilience, courage and grace shown collectively by children, parents and teachers as they came together to brave the odds and change our world, one SMILE at a time. The one of a kind event, which honours the ‘Power of Community’ brings together veterans from varied fields, including engineering, education, environment, art, music and dance. To register for ‘It’s a SMILE World!’ and spread a contagion of hope and healing, click on https://nibs.edu.in/smileworld/. The festival will also be streamed live on the NiBS Delhi YouTube Channel.

Speaking about the SMILE festival, the principal of the NiBS, Charu Wahi, said, “The idea behind the SMILE programme was to create a sense of connection, closeness and unity across borders while being distanced by the unprecedented circumstances, ensuring that children felt emotionally and mentally secure and ready to learn through engaging and creative activities. Hence the event is a virtual feast appreciating the efforts of all who contributed whole-heartedly in making the programme a huge success.”

The festival will start with a keynote address to be delivered by Sonam Wangchuk, a world-renowned educationist, environmentalist, and Ramon Magsaysay Award winner (2018). He will be giving opening remarks on July 28 at 4:15 PM on the power of a smile idea, which will be followed by a musical performance by famous Indian flautist Rakesh Chaurasia. He will hold the stage from 5 PM onwards. Shilpa Gupta is an Indian artist, will take over the forum from 5.45 to 6.45 PM to teach everyone the art of the smile. The concluding session of day one would include an engaging and exciting story session by celebrated storyteller Anushka Ravishankar from 6.45 to 7.30 PM.

Day two of the event will begin with a soulful discussion over the power of technology and cloud platforms in enabling education with award-winning Indian computer scientist Sugata Gupta from 4:00 to 5:15 PM. His session will be followed by Dr Amit Sen, who will hold the dais to share the significance of courage at the time of crisis from 5:15 to 6:15 PM. Day two will conclude with a special choir, which will be performed by Shillong Chamber between 7:00-7:30 PM.

Day three will comprise an interesting Q & A session, a classical dance, and a musical performance. The Q&A session will be addressed by Anshu Gupta from 4:00 to 5:00 PM on July 30 2021. The famous Indian dancer Aditi Mangaldas will charm the audience with her Kathak performance from 5:00 to 6:00 PM, which will be followed by a musical performance ‘Mann Ke Manjeere Music my life’ by far-famed artist Shubha Mudghal.

Starting with NiBS and its thousand children, today this bright, beaming SMILE has reached over 12000 plus children all across the nation as well as beyond borders. The event acknowledges efforts of all its national and international SMILE partners, including KC High School – Chennai, Chickar International School – Bareilly, The Study Hall – Lucknow, Oasis International School – Bangalore, GVHSSG School, Nadakkvu, Calicut, Kerala, Woodlem Park School- Ajman, UAE, Pallikoodam, Kottayam, Kerala, Druk Padma Karpo School, Ladakh, Bombay International School, Mumbai, Children First, founded by Dr Amit Sen, and the London International Gallery of Children’s Art.