THE GLOBAL TIPPING POINT SUMMIT
GTPS Speakers - Day 1
19th February 2022
Inauguration
Varsha Gaikwad
Smt. Varsha Gaikwad spent five years of her career as an educator. Today, she is deeply involved in bringing change in education from within the walls of the state assembly. Smt. Gaikwad has risen from being a teacher to becoming the School Education Minister of the state of Maharashtra. Perhaps, very few may know that she is the first woman to be School Education Minister in the state.
Smt. Gaikwad holds a Bachelor in Education and a Masters in Mathematics. She made her way into active politics by contesting in 2004 Maharashtra State Assembly election and was elected from the Dharavi constituency. She repeated her victory in 2009 and was Minister of State for Higher, Technical Education & Medical Education. She has also worked for Pratham Sanstha and Sneha Sanstha organisations. From 2010 to 2014 she served as Minister of Women and Child Welfare.
Seeta Ramachandraa Dalvi
Mrs. Seeta Dalvi has been a secondary teacher for 12 years, and has been a key changemaker in the lives of her students. After her first born, she decided to assist her husband in his work and look after her children but her passion to work for quality in education was so strong that she started initiating support and creating awareness through various programmes for teachers.
Mrs. Dalvi always felt that a teacher is necessarily a changemaker who creates the future by nurturing values and skills in students. This idea led her to forming a foundation and that was when the S R Dalvi (I) Foundation was created with the sole motive of supporting the welfare of teachers across the state and the country and empowering them.
Session 1
Donna Reen
Donna Reen is a postgraduate in Financial Accounting and English Literature from the University of Mumbai and holds a Certificate in Multiple Intelligences.
She started her career as an Internal Auditor with Lufthansa, Cologne, Germany and Travel Corporation of India, Mumbai. She then worked on various assignments as a consultant to educational franchises involving setting up, curriculum and Teacher Training and has been an educational consultant with Scholastic (India) Pvt. Ltd. where her main focus was to inculcate reading habits in children.
She also has vast editorial experience having been associated with various publication houses like Jaico, Physician’s Digest, Lifeline, ADDR Technologies, Solitaire International, and Computer Business Management (CBM) Publications.
She has worked on a media project with Comet Media Foundation and Children’s Film Society of India to turn media into a resource for education. For this, she organised a Film Workshop for teachers and a Film Festival for Children.
For ICFFI, she has selected films and prepared the catalogue for the Children’s’ Film Festivals held in 2011, 2013, 2015 and 2017.
She is a Corporate Trainer for Language, Business and Cross-Cultural Communication and has conducted training at Times of India, BNP Paribas, JP Morgan to name a few.
She is presently Visiting Faculty for English Language and Business Communication at the Alkesh Dinesh Mody Institute for Financial & Management Studies, Ali Yavar Jung Institute for Hearing Impaired and Head of Aviation, Safety and Hospitality and Airport Operations at The Bombay Flying Club, College of Aviation, Mumbai. She is also a DGCA approved Language Trainer and Examiner for Airports Authority of India and has set up Educational programmes for rural children.
Carolyn Shaw
A retired headmistress and teacher of English Literature, I live in West Sussex, UK with my husband. We are both actively involved with our village community, as well as sharing an interest in our beautiful garden which overlooks the water meadows of the River Arun and up to the South Downs. While my husband is an academic with a world-wide knowledge and experience of the quality of health care, my interests lie in the arts and education. We have two grown up children who give us much pleasure and pride.
I taught in a variety of secondary schools, both independent and state, and in the American High School in Bermuda. After seven years at Cheltenham Ladies’ College I became headmistress of St Mary’s School, Calne for another seven years. I was then appointed headmistress of Roedean School in Brighton until I retired. During those years I served on the committee of the Girls’ Schools Association and on the Independent Schools Examination Board. After retirement I took on the role of chairman of governors of my local village school for several years.
All my experience as teacher and mother underlies my belief in the importance of giving children the knowledge and confidence to develop a thoughtful voice of their own. Parents, teachers and governors must ensure that all children are encouraged to develop the skills they will need to negotiate the challenges of our complicated world.
Session 2
Ruchita Dar Shah
Ruchita started out as an advertising professional working with advertising agencies such as Vyas Giannetti Creative, RK Swamy BBDO and Mudra until 2010 when she took time off to raise her boys. Shortly after, she decided to start a small group on Facebook for new mothers like her. She christened it First Moms Club, a platform for moms to bond over similar experiences and help one another. This group evolved into a thriving online community, and today connects lakhs of Indian moms across 100 countries. Shah is now popularly known as Chief Mommy Officer of First Moms Club, with an ever-growing presence on Facebook, Instagram and Twitter, as well as its own website www.firstmomsclub.in.
Shah began First Moms Club with the firm belief that only a happy mother can raise happy children. To that end, the community strives to offer support to the woman behind the mother to make the early stages of parenting and childhood enjoyable and enriching for her and the child. And from early on, this platform has been a safe space for them to be able to express their views without the fear of being judged.
Dr. Ranjini Krishnaswamy
Dr. Krishnaswamy is a proud recipient of the National Award for contribution to Education from the President of India. Currently, she is an Educational Consultant working on turnkey projects – from the drawing board to the accreditation of a school, Director-Education, Dosti Realty Group School. Having been involved in setting up St Gregorios High School, Chembur, she has been its Principal for 25 years. She has also been involved in turning around Billabong High International School, Thane.
For the past 10 years, Dr. Krishnaswamy is a Visiting faculty, teaching at the ECCed programme in the S I I Es Institute in Mumbai.
She has been a part of the Curriculum Planning for the CISCE in 2014 and also a part of the MSIEB in 2017 when the State government was setting up its own board.
Dr. Krishnaswamy is associated with the Global Scholars. Inc a part of the Bloomberg Philanthropies – a Distance Linked group Program for students in the age group 9 to 13 years.
Session 3
Anahita Subedar
Media Specialist Anahita Subedar, currently shares her expertise as the Editor-in-Chief of ‘Parsi Times’ (2016) and been instrumental in rendering it the leading news-weekly of the worldwide Zoroastrian Community. As Founder and CEO of ‘PrimeCorp99’ (Est. 2009), she continues to offer expert Public Relations; Media and Brand Management solutions to numerous organisations.
As an Educator, she conducts the ‘Public Relations and Media Management’ program (conceptualised, developed and curated by herself), which is affiliated and certified with India’s apex media body, ‘The Press Club’, making this course Asia’s only Industrially Certified course.
Anahita has received numerous awards, including ‘Leader in Media’ Award by the prestigious ‘International Women Leaders Forum’ (2019); and ‘Bharat Ratna Rajiv Gandhi Sadbhavna Award’ for Outstanding Achievement in Media (2016)
Sreeja
Sreeja is the founder and currently the Chief Functionary of India Education Collective (IEC), a national level organisation working across 9 states, focusing on a systemic approach to enable government schools function as high quality, community-owned institutions of learning.
Prior to starting IEC in 2015, she was the CEO & Secretary of the Rajiv Gandhi Foundation. She was the also the Founder-Secretary of Prajayatna and its Chief Functionary for almost a decade. During her engagement with child rights and education in the past 26 years, she has been instrumental in developing a core approach to structural change in education governance and in pioneering a capability-based learning initiative across the country. Sreeja is an Ashoka Fellow.
Session 4
Dr. Atul Nischal
A mathematician committed to improving the quality of school education to build a better future of India. A visionary leader with a strong belief in innovation, technology, team-work, and knowledge-sharing to pursue excellence in dealing with challenges. A strong believer in Bhagwad Gita’s philosophy of self-less pursuit of your life’s purpose armoured with passion, patience and perseverance
In 2018, Dr. Atul Nischal founded International Council for School Leadership (ICSL). In 3 years, ICSL has become India’s most trusted and admired organization for the professional development of educators and school leaders. Under Dr. Nischal’s leadership, ICSL has become the largest community of school educators. Its innovative initiatives such as Lead the Change, Leading in Chaos, TeleLead, ReSET, Connect2Learn and Friday@5 have impacted more than 62000 educators across more than 550 cities and towns from 34 countries.
Naghma Shaikh
Naghma Shaikh has been teaching Cambridge Assessment International Education (CAIE) English Language and Literature for 29 years.
As a teacher, Naghma Shaikh was associated with Arab Unity School, Dubai, UAE, and VIBGYOR High, Mumbai, India. Currently, she is with JBCN International, Mumbai, India. She has reviewed books for Cambridge University Press, UK, and Collins, UK. She has been a Teacher Trainer for CUP, India; Collins, India; and Members of International Schools Association (MISA) for Primary, Lower Secondary, IGCSE and A Level English. She was recognised as the First Gold Level Panelist of the Cambridge Panel. She worked as a Change Facilitator, training one of the GTPS Action Groups on Education ~ ‘Leveraging Interdisciplinary Modeling Experiences (LIME)’.
Teaching is her calling and passion. She believes it is a beautiful, collaborative, and lifelong journey of learning.
Sangeeta D. Krishan
Ms. Krishan is a Freelance Education Mentor and Leadership Coach with a rich and rewarding experience in Education for over 30 years and this includes educational administrative experience for 25 years.
Ms. Krishan has served as a Principal in the Banyan Tree School, has been the Head of Training and Curriculum at the Bharti Foundation and Director (Academics), at the G D Goenka Education Pvt. Ltd.
Her areas of expertise in education include Envisioning and planning school systems, processes and policies, Whole School assessment and improvement planning, Activity-based Curriculum based on progressive pedagogical practices, strategising Internationalism in curriculum, integrating creativity (Visual and Performing Arts) in curriculum, holistic child development, tools and techniques for assessment for learning, planning for CSR Activities in Education and PPP dynamics in education.
Dr. Sonal Sethia
Dr. Sethia is an Educator (particularly in the heart of conflict zones), Chief Operating Officer at Sunbird Trust and a Student for Peace through Education
Sonal aspires for every child to achieve their full potential and aims to facilitate an education to that end. An IIT-Bombay postgraduate in Biotechnology with a Ph.D. from University of Glasgow, Sonal began her journey as a teaching fellow with ‘Teach for India’ in Pune. She has worked with children and communities in the heart of conflict zones in Kashmir and Northeast India. She served as the Chief Operating Officer at Sunbird Trust working for Peace through Education in the Northeast. Currently she is pursuing a Masters course in Public Policy and Governances at the Azim Premji University, Bangalore.
Ms. Shubhra Irani
I am a passionate early years’ educator with a thirst for lifelong learning. My area of expertise lies in early years curriculum planning and delivery, research and development.
I have been in the field of education for 12 years and, at present, I work as the Head of Pre-primary at JBCN International School, Borivali, Mumbai. My areas of expertise lie in early years curriculum planning and delivery, research, jolly phonics, teacher training, etc. I am currently involved in research on the Reggio Emilia Approach to learning and incorporate provocations for inquiry-based learning.
I won the Edustar Award in September 2019, organised by Teachers Help Teachers. I also received a special category award for Excellence in Early Years.
I am grateful to be amidst wonderful children and educators who inspire me to live life to the fullest and be a lifelong learner.