Harshini Brahmavar
Daijiworld Media Network - Kundapur (MS)

Kundapur, Jun 6: Who does not like a train journey? It's the children who enjoy a train ride the most. And no one knows it better than the government school in Nagoor here.

The number of children in the government school is dwindling year by year. In order to attract more children towards the school, a unique attempt has been made by the teachers of Nagoor Higher Primary school near here. The building of this school is built in the form of a train.

The environment of this school makes the students feel as if they are listening to their teachers sitting inside a train and not classroom. The school authorities have made a rare attempt to instill novelty and thereby increase the number of students in the school.

This school, which is designed as a train, is situated by the side of Nagoor-Kambadakone highway. When the students come out of the classroom, they feel as if they are alighting from a train.

Nagoor higher primary school was established in 1973. In the beginning, there were 200 to 300 children studying in this school. However, the number of students reduced drastically over the years and in the academic year of 2015-16, only seven students were studying in this school. At present, 20 children are studying in this school. So the brainchild of the teachers of this school to increase the number of students has come out in the form of this unique design of the school building.

Nagoor school has classes from first to seventh grade and three teachers including an Urdu teacher are teaching in this school. There are various amenities in this school like E-learning, Edusat, clean drinking water (provided by donors) and reading corner in every classroom. However, the number of children is the main deficiency in this school. The teachers of Nagoor school, who took the challenge of increasing the strength of students of the school, adopted the method that was followed by a Kerala school, which did the same to attract more students.

Inspiration from Kerala School

Vishwanath Poojary, additional head teacher of the school and also the president of the association of higher primary school teachers of Byndoor zone is the main person behind this effort. He took the help of teachers who are well-versed in painting and turned the school building into a train. This exercise has cost Vishwanath a sum of Rs 36000 and he has borne the expenses himself.

Vishwanath said, "The number of students in the school has reduced drastically. I got inspiration from a piece of information that I came across on the internet about a school in Kerala where they changed the design of the school to make it look as a train to attract more students and were successful in their mission also. The Nagoor school building which is in the shape of English alphabet 'L' is convenient to be designed as a train.

"Badiger, painting teacher of Uppunda and other expert teachers have co-operated in this mission. The conversion of the new building in the form of a train was completed on the Republic Day of 2018 and has attracted everyone. This has blossomed our vision of attracting more students to the school. Parents, old students and the citizens of nearby areas are completely astonished by the new design of the building. If the number of students of the school increases due to our effort, then I feel the hard work which we have put in has borne fruit."

The standard of education of Nagoor school, which has got numerous facilities is excellent. Parents have to recognize the efforts put in by the teachers of the school to give better future for the students and support the administration of the school. Nagoor school has the proud privilege of being the first school in the state of Karnataka which has a school building that is designed in the form of a train.

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