One Of Its Kind Investiture Ceremony At Meru International School

Great Leaders are made right from childhood. How? Fostering good values and teaching good things in life helps a child to find a path that leads towards a brighter future.

They will be the figure that people follow to learn the good qualities and incorporate within their lifestyle to improve themselves. The two main pillars of a good leader are listening and speaking. He/She always motivates, understands, builds trust, confidence and gives his/her best to make the surroundings better. He/she should assess the situation and make the decision accordingly. If such qualities are developed, and a right attitude is fostered in children, they grow up to be a good human being.

At Meru, we believe in achieving success through identifying strengths, nourishing them and reaching out to excel. We believe in an education system with a where strong values are fostered and taught. We believe in being up to date with the latest technology trends. We incorporate it into the curriculum in such a way that our students are well versed with these trends. Since the pandemic and lockdown have changed every other activity, schools have changed their way of educating their student too. We opted for online classes which help our students to keep up with their studies. We are trying to include various activities which take place online. In that light, we conducted a first of its kind Investiture ceremony fro students of classes IV-IX to elect our school captains, prefects and heads. Let us take you through all the stages of this ceremony.

1.Invitation For Nomination

The journey of ‘Investiture Ceremony’ begins with the first step where students are invited to submit their nomination and are asked ‘Why are they nominating themselves for that post? ‘. Students who qualified this round after writing essays on three topics were sent forward for the second round, which is ‘Panel Review & Debate’.

2.Panel Review & Debate

As a responsible cabinet member, students should possess excellent communication skills and confidence. The students that qualified the Round 1 now participated in Round 2, an energetic and healthy debate competition which tested their communication skill, critical thinking, reasoning skills, knowledge and confidence. It helped in evaluating as to where the students stand in terms of listening and speaking. Our talented teachers and mentors assessed the performance of these candidates and sent forward the ones who qualified this round.

3.Elevator Talk

Post the qualification in Round 1 and 2, the candidates participated in the next round which is the elevator talk during the digital assembly and stated how they will bring about a change and why they should be voted. Our students confidently spoke about the issues that need to be addressed and how can they be putting in the effort to ensure they fulfil their responsibilities.

4.One-on-one Interview & Election

To better understand the candidate, the teachers dedicated their time and sat down to have a one-on-one interview/session. This stage is the final and the most crucial where the staff members interact with the candidate and assess them.

After this stage comes the next milestone, the elections. All students (from grade IV-IX) get a chance to cast their vote once. Before this step, the candidates are given an opportunity to express why are they worthy and why they should be trusted through the election campaign.

5.Investiture Ceremony

The best part isn’t over yet. During regular school days (pre-pandemic), students would get their badges and stashes by the Principal and teachers. Since it was online, the one to felicitate was none other than the parents of the elected members. It was a different experience for students and their parents to be a part of an event which did not take place earlier in such a unique way. We couriered the ceremony essentials, i.e., badges and stashes, to the candidates and ensured that they were delivered in time for the ceremony. The chief guest of the event was Mr. Jayesh Ranjan IAS, who conferred the badges to the students. Along with the chief guest, our director Ms. Meghana Rao Jupally also congratulated the students and wished them the best in their new roles, and encouraged them to don their roles with pride.

We at Meru are overwhelmed with the response from our students and their parents. We want to say this to all those who participated and did not reach the end, thank you. Thank you for standing up to do something good for your fellow mates. You all are winners. And coming to the ones who are elected as the members, welcome to the stage where you will get to learn how efficiently you can deal with responsibilities of curriculum and co-curricular activities.

We wish our elected captains all the best for their coming year!