By Firoz.T.Totanawala

The Bangalore Metro Reporter

15th May 2011 issue-

                              A LIFE TO CHERISH  

       MRS SHEELA BOLAR – THE WOMAN FOR EDUCATION

The stories of visionaries are always worth knowing and inspiration for many. We thus bring you the story of one such visionary, Mrs Sheela Bolar, a woman of extra ordinary caliber and the Founder/Principal of Innisfree House School, JP Nagar.

Mrs Sheela Bolar cleared her SSLC at the age of 12. Being too young for college, she did a spot of nursing and compounding for 2 years and then graduated from Bangalore. She was awarded Government of India merit scholarships for Pre-university and Degree education. An avid sportsperson, she was active in the NCC and passed out as Senior Under Officer with a license in solo gliding and a private pilot’s license. She was in fact, the first woman aero-modeler in India and was offered a scholarship for a Commercial Pilot’s License, but, couldn’t take up the offer.

A graduate at 18 years, she worked as a librarian and completed a Librarian’s course in the process. Mrs Bolar is also proficient at the sitar having learnt it for 3 years. She was a crackshot of the Civilian Rifle Club, Mysore and won several prizes in the State Rifle shooting competitions.

She passed her B.Ed with distinction and followed up with a M.Ed., under Government of India Scholarship. Mrs Bolar secured 1^st rank for the first time in the history of the State Post Graduate Department.

Married to Dr. Ashok Bolar, she moved to England for 20 years soon after. She worked in several departments of the British Telecommunication Service as Executive Officer till her Indian qualifications were verified. Thereafter, she taught for the 11+ entrance examination of only 5 prestigious King Edward Schools in Britain.                                           

On her return to Bangalore, Mrs Bolar headed the Nursery and Primary sections of a school in Basavanagudi for one and a half years.  She already had an intimidating set of qualification and a desire to open an ICSE school in South Bangalore. And it was finally realized in May 1985 under the name Innisfree House School, in J.P.Nagar. Innisfree under the leadership of Mrs Bolar is now a well established school with a record of all its nineteen batches students passing with 100% first class.

AS A PROFESSIONAL

Mrs Sheela Bolar was the first woman on the 5 members Executive Committee of the ICSE council of India.

The 1st recipient of the National Award for teachers of ICSE schools

HER CONTRIBUTIONS ON THE ICSE COUNCIL-

* Defining a set of experiments for students to be tested for Science practical of the ICSE examination, approved for country wide implementation.

* Ensuring ICSE to bring out a scope of the syllabus for most subjects and thereby bringing uniformity in studies across the country.

* Ensuring Kannada as a second language come on par with Hindi and recommended Kannada texts that are now being prescribed for the ICSE exams.

* Logical apportioning of the high school syllabus.

* Instrumental in selection of Innisfree House School and a few other schools by the council for provision of the much needed examination centers for ICSE exams in South Bangalore.

* Responsible for the nomination of two individuals from the ICSE council for affiliation inspections which results in accurate reports.

* Suggested and brought out text books for II Language Sanskrit that is now prescribed by the Council for the whole of India.

* Initiating, organizing and conducting ASISC Sports for all ICSE schools across India.

* Mrs Bolar has also written a series of 5 books for the teaching of Kannada as a third language in ICSE schools. She has also written English workbooks for classes 1 and 2 based on the state syllabus and a Science workbook for VI standard.

* She is the Founder Secretary of the Association of Schools for the ISC in Karnataka in 1997. She is also instrumental in organizing workshops in Bangalore for teachers of Karnataka ICSE Schools, which were earlier conducted only in Delhi or Kolkata.

AND THAT’S NOT ALL

Mrs Bolar is an active Rotarian for the past 19 years and Secretary-Treasurer of the All India Association of Heads of ISC schools.

Member of the Council of the ICSE, New Delhi for 16 years on all the core committees including the Executive Committee and Standing Committee on Exams.

Indian Resident Trustee of Health, Education, Literacy and Population Services, U.K. 

Indian Co-ordinator for entry into Brighton College, U.K. for classes 4 to 12. 

Founder member of ISTE, India.   

She was a Member of the Board of Studies in Education (Post Graduation), University of Mysore.

She has put together the content for a B. Ed. program approved by Mysore University for teachers of ICSE schools. It is the first ever innovative teacher education program in the country and now being considered for authentication by the Institute of Education, London.

Accolades and awards:

1. Excellence in Teaching by Rotary Club of Bangalore Cantonment.

2.  National Award for Teachers 2001 – the first one ever for ICSE schools.

LEADERSHIP AT INNISFREE HOUSE SCHOOL-

*Only 25 children per class.

*Rainwater Harvesting: The school sump holds about 8000 liters of water collected from both the buildings on the campus.

*Paper Recycling: A French NGO has donated a Paper recycling machine to them. For the past 7 years, the school is making their own recycled paper for use in craft work, all School Day props and all project work.

*Every classroom has a plasma screen with access to Smart class lessons. In addition, teachers also prepare their own lessons and worksheets.

*Its students have been taken to the NASA facility in Huntsville, Alabama, USA, twice so far for space camps, on an invitation from NASA.

*The school team won the National Championship in the Limca Book of Records Quiz- 1998.

*They have also won the Regional round of the Discovery Channel Quiz for 1999 and won the National Championship in 1998.

*The school Girls’ Basket ball team won the bronze medal at the National Inter ICSE schools sports meet.

*Innisfree is the lead school for the Bangalore cluster of United Kingdom India Education Research Initiative (UKIERI) for the 4th year running. It was the first and only cluster in the South. The staff and students have visited partner schools in the UK thrice.

*Gap year students from the U.K., a part of the Global Fellowship Program of the British Council have come twice for an orientation and immersion into Indian culture program.

The contributions of Mrs Bolar to Education are applaudable. Under her leadership, Innisfree House School today has become a prominent name for quality education.