Sunshine Worldwide School scales new heights, emerges as Goa’s first school to adopt IB curriculum
Panaji: Goa’s Sunshine Worldwide School, has joined the elite league of 5,000 educational institutions across the world who have adopted the prestigious International Baccalaureate (IB) school curriculum.
With the endorsement, Sunshine Worldwide School is now Goa’s first and among 300 schools in India, which include hallowed institutions like Mumbai’s Dhirubhai Ambani International School and Aditya Birla World Academy, GD Goenka World School in Sohna, Mercedes-Benz International School in Pune, The Doon School in Dehradun, among others, which follow the prestigious IB curriculum.
Headquartered in Geneva, Switzerland, IB aims to develop inquiring, knowledgeable and caring young people who help to create a better and more peaceful world through intercultural understanding and respect. IB endorsed schools employ over 70,000 educators, who teach more than one million students worldwide.
Sunshine Worldwide School has now adopted IB’s prestigious Primary Years Programme (PYP) for children aged 3 to 12 in classes from Nursery to STD VI.
In India, 91 institutes are authorized to run the PYP programme, while there are 606 such institutes in South East Asia and 1,912 schools across the world.
Speaking about the process which Sunshine Worldwide School had to adopt to obtain the prestigious endorsement, the school’s Founder Director Deepak Khaitan said, “The authorisation process takes 2 to 3 years where the school and faculty have to be onboarded and aligned with the philosophy. We were able to complete the authorisation process within a year, as the school was already aligned to the philosophy and has been conducting its educational programme along similar lines,”.
“Our faculty has undergone extensive training over the past year. Sunshine Worldwide School focuses on building an entrepreneurial mindset from a young age as well as a sense of positivity, etc. We were also better prepared for the ‘new normal’ ways of education in the times of the pandemic, because students as well as faculty were already digitally savvy,” said Ms. Patricia (Head of PYP).
Added Ms. Sindu Hemant, Principal, Sunshine Worldwide School, “The IB works closely with district, regional and national representatives to implement IB programmes and professional development in countries all over the world and is aligned with the Indian National Education Policy 2020, which is expected to be rolled out in Goa from the academic year 2021-22”.
Ms. Ashalata (PYP coordinator) said, “When it comes to the elite IB curriculum, research plays a pivotal role in the development, quality assurance, and assessment impact of IB programmes and services. The IB, both, conducts its own research and partners with leading universities and research institutions across the world.”
IB authorised schools promote intercultural understanding and respect, not as an alternative to a sense of cultural and national identity, but as an essential part of life in the 21st century.
IB curriculum encourages students across the world to become active, compassionate and lifelong learners who understand that other people, with their differences, can also be right.
Sunshine Worldwide School was founded in June 2003 by the Khaitan family with a vision to run a comprehensive academic facility with a difference, which children can relate to as a home away from home. The School believes in the use of technology to facilitate and enhance the quality of classroom interactions and grooming students into confident, responsible, talented and complete individuals and deepen their understanding of the complexities of the world and to inspire them to realise their potential.