A delegation from TOS and NKOCET comprising of Management and Faculty members have gone to Sweden for a planning meet with Tyreso Gymnasium, Stockholm to explore the possibilities of an exchange program for the students and faculty from both the institutions.

A planning meeting with Tyresö Gymnasium-29^th September -9^th October, 2016

Day1.(29^th September ,2016): 

We landed in the beautiful city of Stockholm.  It was night and we are very thankful to Michael and Jan to take us to Ta Inn, the hotel we all stayed in Stockholm.

Day2. (30^th September, 2016) The day started with meeting,  Ms Leene, Principal of Tyreso Gymnasium. She welcomed the team TOS with a short introduction about Sweden, its geographical location, students in Tyreso Gymnasium and its culture. Sweden is surrounded by cold sea and the water is generally sweet.

The education system in Sweden is now going in the transition from URL  (All soft copies and IT driven) to IRL ( In the real life).

After the brief introduction, Ms Leena and the team Tyresö took us for a guided tour to the Gymnasium.

After the completion of the tour we were introduced to the various members of the team Tyresö. Ms Alexandra was the PE teacher, Mr Michael is from the Electrical Department, Me Emma is from the English Department, Mr Mattias, Principal of the Media Gymnasium.

95% of the students go to school in Sweden. Students are not charged for education. 48% of the gymnasium, that were private schools and are free schools now. In Sweden at least 50% of learning is hands-on.

  Day3. (2nd October,2016)

After  a late start of the day , we had delicious breakfast at the host family. After that we went for a natures walk, learning more about the demographic and ecological distribution of fauna and flora.

It was a walk by the lake Alby sjön.  It was a great experience to be close to the nature and a fond memory of picking blueberries.

Later we visited the museum of photography ‘Fotografiska’. It was great learning experience to see work of different artist and their perspective of life.

Evening was a presentation and dinner at Media Gymnasium. All the directors from the TOS family and delegates along with Böjon, Margret, Mattias and Ferdreck were representing the Media Gymnasium. All the plans about the collaboration with the Media Gymnasium were discussed. Mattias did a presentation to throw some light on the functional style of Media Gymnasium.

Day 4 ( 3^rd Oct’16)

Introduction and presentation was by Ms Namrata, in the morning, addressing the staff and teachers of the Tyresö Gymnasium. Ms Namrata, presented and discussed the TOS ethos, Mission, plan and the pedagogic structure we follow in TOS.

Some of the faculty present there were Ms Michael from Electrical Department, Ms Alexandra from the PE department, Ms Bharnaz  and Ms Emma from Language department to name a few.

Post the breakfast we all attended a language class by David who is a teacher for Swedish language. It was a hands-on experience and we had great experience in learning this language with students. David also explained his teaching plans and his strategies for his curriculum. He also explained how he divided his class learning into four components of listening, speaking, reading and writing.

Today’s lunch was prepared by special students that comprised a yellow pea soup and pancakes served with berry jams and crème fresh. This was facilitated by Ms Lena, where we discussed how the cuisines around the globe connect to make cultural exchanges more successful.

Post lunch we visited the class of students learning construction.  The class was conducted by Dick and Ganna. The class was focussed on making frames for the concrete slabs. We tried a hand in helping the students built them.

After the construction class we moved to a class with Ms Monica. We tried making in glass decorations and also understood the work done by the students in the special school. We also met Ms Britt, Ms Pernilla and Ms Susanne , the teaching staff working with the school of students with special needs.

The day came to a close with scrumptious cinnamon and sugar pretzels and coffee.

4th October ‘16

Today the first session was with Michael, Sabestian and Stefan from the electrical department. The students were given a task for preparing  combination circuits for the household. Task was allocated by the teacher and the students were given flowchart sheet to perform the task. It also focused on the whole circuit for housingis controlled by the cell phone. The complete circuit takes up to two lessons of 1.5 hours each. ETG courses are also covered to give students fast pace learners an early employment. This is the quality control system to help students when they go to work. If a student passes ETG training, and examination than, he or she can skip 1600 hours of their training from the regular gymnasium course.

The afternoon session was a session in English class by Ms Pernilla. Mostly all the students attending this class were the students from the electrical class. Students have asked a lot of questions about the Indian education system and about the religion and culture.

5th October’16

The day starts with a class of 1st and 2nd year students from the vehicular department. Mr Karl was the teacher coordinating the class. This class was all about the hands on problem-solving in the non-functional cars. Students have great hands on experience on wheel alignment, brakes repair, and engine issues. Students named Mohammad help us to learn how to fix the brake issues in the car.

Post the automobiles class we went to the IT class conducted by Mr Ahmed. He was teaching students about the IP address and was working on LAN. He was a certified trainer and consultant in many areas related to IT.

Post lunch we went to visit the Second Chance School, by Ms Marlin. It was an eye opening experience as to how students come and make the best of any opportunity given to them. Marlin spoke about the innovation, life skill teaching, problem solving, inclusive education, student strength, student’s confidence. These students learn Swedish, English and Math to gain employment once they have completed the course. Second chance school is one of the two schools supporting this type of learning. Other institutes that support second chance schools are in Malmo, Norrkoping and Linkoping.

The day finished with the visit to the Technology Museum, which was a unique experience on its own.