With the arrival of the year 2022, Jasudben ML School (JML)—one of the finest ICSE Schools in Khar, Mumbai—organized its second ‘Virtual Sports Meet 2021-22 ’ to provide students with a fun break and exciting rewards. Owing to the prevailing pandemic conditions, all activities related to the sports day event in the school calendar took place on Saturday, January 15, 2022, on the Zoom platform.
The coming year was expected to be a ray of hope for everyone, especially schools. However, a rise in the coronavirus cases saw the BMC announcement in the past week that several schools—that had begun to function physically to some extent—had to close their doors again and go back to their virtual classrooms. At the same time, students were facing virtual exhaustion due to the monotonous routine of online lectures. With the intention to break this monotony, JML School organized a novel virtual sports event that also counterbalanced the absence of their Annual Sports Day.
The exciting day began with a virtual sports meet briefing followed by a speech by the principal, where Mrs Bhattacharya introduced the chief guest for the programme—Ms Sindoor Mittal—an alumna of JML School and a former international swimmer. A fusion dance display and a Yoga demonstration followed this introductory speech.
Furthermore, by organizing a range of innovative activities, the school aimed to foster the physical as well as mental well-being of its students. These activities—divided amongst the girls and boys across the grades 1st through 12th—included Balancing the Ball on a Racquet, Flamingo, Fixing Bangles on the Clay, Lighting the Candles, building a Biscuit Tower, Vipreet Naukasan and Side Plank, amongst other many more.
Commenting on the successful event, the Principal of Jasudben ML School and Bloomingdales Pre-Primary, Mrs Damayanti Bhattacharya, said, “As the schools were compelled to shut down once again, the students continued to remain confined at home. In these crucial years of their growth, it is important to help them stay active and upbeat, which is why we had already begun to plan a series of online programmes—one of them being the virtual sports meet. By focusing not just on studying digitally and interacting online but also on their extracurricular activities despite moving to virtual classrooms, the school envisions playing an effective role in the nurturing of the student’s personality and their all-round development.”
The Chief Guest of the virtual sports event, Former International Swimmer, Ms Sindoor Mittal mentioned, “I would like to thank the entire school today who invited me to this sports gathering. I think it’s an excellent format and couldn’t imagine the possibility when I was sitting in your shoes over a couple of decades ago now as a student. Sports not only builds our skill, but also our personality and character as well. The value of sports cannot be overemphasized . My coach always said to achieve high in life, you should focus on 3 things. The first is to have a clear goal – You need to know and visualize to reach a destination. The next step is to visualize and focus while the third action remains to get in fully and doing it vigorously. I think it also resonates a lot with life.”
The ‘Virtual Sports Meet’ provided a refreshing time for both—the students and the teachers—as they took a break from regular online classes and recharged themselves with unconventional yet revitalizing activities.
