Coimbatore: Ten year-old P Amose always dreamed of becoming a professional dancer. A student of the corporation school in Ram Nagar — whose father is a labourer — Amose knew how hard it would be to realise the dream and had nearly lost all hope.
But, he was dancing with joy on Thursday when the city corporation,
along with Arc Foundation, opened Meraki India School of Arts and Skills for corporation and government school students at his school.
Apart from dance, the facility will impart free training in folk art, singing, musical instruments, martial arts, languages, storytelling and yoga.
UM Sriram, a class IV student, loves playing drums. He has even played at some competitions. “I want to become a musician. When I heard of this school, I wanted to join,” he said.
They had been working closely with corporation and government school students for the last two years, managing trustees of Arc Foundation MA Aparna and S Bharanidharan said. “We conducted several art competitions and also set up libraries in schools. We know how talented these students are.
But they do not have the means to develop their skill into a profession. So we decided to start an art school that imparts free training,” Aparna told TOI.
Twenty classrooms in Ram Nagar corporation school has been converted into training rooms. “It took us more than six months to set this up. We await more sponsorship and will improve the infrastructure,” said Bharanidharan.
The NGO has asked schools to nominate one student for each discipline. “We will start a summer camp this week until schools reopen. For each course, we will have one professional and two trainers. Batches of 30 students will be formed and one hour training will be conducted. We can accommodate up to 1,500 students. We plan to extend the training to other schools also. From June, classes will be held after school hours and on weekends,” said Bharanidharan.
The foundation will also conduct ‘Train the Trainer’ programme that will involve corporation and government school teachers.
Corporation commissioner K Vijayakarthikeyan, who inaugurated the school, said that the foundation had done a wonderful job. It will be a boon to the students of 83 corporation schools and 17 government schools in the city corporation limit, he said.