One can always tell that the landscape is undergoing a slow and a perceptible change when graduates of some of the premier educational institutions of India venture into starting a business and that too related to making sports a more fun and integrated part of the school going population.
EduSports is one such venture, that clearly shows how far behind we have fallen in bringing organized and structured sport for our children in schools. Clearly, we need more initiatives like EduSports across the country to have healthier citizens.
Q. Please tell us how and when EduSports came into existence? Who founded EduSports?
EduSports was founded in January 2009. The EduSports founding team consists of 4 alumni from IIT/ IIM with significant work experience across organizations like Wipro, Planetasia, ABB and Philips, in addition to a strong passion for Sports.
The 4 founding members of EduSports are:
Saumil Majmudar serves as the CEO. Saumil, an avid Sports lover, was in the Maharashtra Badminton team & in the IIT Bombay Football team. An Alumnus from IIT Bombay & IIM Bangalore, Saumil has personally engaged with over 20,000 children and 5000 parents and over 100 schools in the Sports context over the last 6 years. In addition to conducting workshops in many leading schools in India, Saumil has also taken guest lectures at IIM Bangalore, ISB Hyderabad, LNCPE (Laxmibai National College of Physical Education, Trivandrum) and TiE (The Indus Entrepreneurs). Prior to EduSports, Saumil was the Founder-Director of Sportz Village (one of India’s leading Sports Consulting & Management Services Firm), Founder-CEO of QSupport (one of India’s first remote tech support businesses) and worked with Wipro (Global R&D) in the International marketing team.
Meer Waqiruddin Khaleeq serves as COO. Before EduSports, Meer was managing the Sales, Marketing & Operations in various organizations in India and the Middle-East, and was also the Founder-Director of a Technology Solutions firm in Bangalore. Meer is an avid adventure sports freak and had volunteered for the 3rd West Asian Games held in Doha, Qatar in 2005 & also for the 15th Asian Games held in Doha, Qatar in 2006
Parminder Gill serves as the Chief Marketing Officer. Before co-founding EduSports, Parminder was working with some of the global IT firms handling business development, marketing and consulting. He has a Bachelors degree in Engineering from University of Pune, India and a Masters degree in Management from Arizona State University, US.
Jyoti Majmudar serves as the head of Product Development & Delivery at EduSports. She brings over 16 years of experience spanning Product Management, Project Management, Operations, Supply Chain Management and Mergers & Acquisitions. She has worked at global locations for multinational companies like ETH, ABB, Philips Semiconductors and DSP Group before co-founding EduSports. She holds a B-Tech degree from IIT-Bombay and an MBA from IIM-Bangalore.
In addition to the founders, EduSports was set up with the help of a distinguished advisory board which included
Dr. George Selleck who has more than forty years of experience as a counselor, educator, author, coach, referee, and athlete. Dr. Selleck is the co-founder of Parents for Good Sports, a nonprofit organization created to help parents raise good sports. He is also the founder of Sports for Life, Inc., an organization dedicated to enhancing youth development through positive participation in sports. Dr. Selleck has authored various books including Coach Sense, the manual on effective coaching.
Suhas Nair (who currently serves as the advisor & programme director) with an impeccable qualification in Psychology (M.A. Mumbai), Physical Education (M. P. Ed. Mumbai), Coaching (Netaji Subhash National Institute of Sports NSNIS) and Journalism. An accomplished Sports Personality himself, he has been working through out as a coach, trainer, faculty, advisor, consultant, journalist, all in the area of sports.
Dr. Usha Sujit holds a Ph.D in Physical Education from Jiwaji University besides also having a Masters degree in Physical Education, a P G Diploma in Sports Management and a Certificate in Physiology of Physical Activity and Ageing from the Western Ontario University, Canada. In addition, she is also a Certified Fitness Instructor from Western Ontario University. Dr. Usha Sujit has over 18 years of Post Graduate teaching experience and has previously been Research Assistant at LNCPE, Gwalior and Lecturer at BPCA’s College of Physical Education, Wadala, Mumbai.
Q. What are the aims and objectives of EduSports?
EduSports aims to partner with schools, government and NGOs across the country and help develop healthy & fit school children through the magic of sports.
Q. How many schools and students are benefitting from the services that EduSports provides?
EduSports runs the flagship program-SOAR which is India’s first school sports management platform that helps schools improve the overall quality of the PE and sports experience through various services/products like age-appropriate PE curriculum, age-appropriate props, daily lesson plans, teacher training, parent workshops, individualized fitness reports etc.
Currently, 35 schools in 20+ cities run the SOAR program. This means EduSports touches over 30,000 kids, 1000+ teachers and 20,000+ parents across the country today.
Starting July, 60+ schools will have EduSports SOAR as part of their curriculum for 2010-2011.
Q. Are most your schools in any particular region of India or are they spread all over the country?
EduSports SOAR program was run in 35 schools in 20+ cities run the SOAR program in the academic year 2009-2010. Starting July 2010, 25+ more schools will start adopting SOAR as part of their curriculum for 2010-2011.
Q. How did you build the domain knowledge around a few chosen sports?
For starters, EduSports SOAR program is not focused on a particular sport. The program is designed to make use of a structured set of physical activities and a variety of sport based techniques for developing mental skills, behavioural skills and physical conditioning in children. Hence, the SOAR program does not focus on only a few sports but it covers all aspects of physical activity for children in K-12.
EduSports leverages the experience of Sports Village, its parent company, which has 7 years of experience with kids and sports in India. Spots Village has worked with over 500 schools and 100,000 kids in the last 7 years in the sports context and has deep understanding of the issues involved in kids sports.
In addition, a distinguished advisory board which includes Dr. George Selleck (Author of “Coach Sense” and over 40 years of experience with Sports in the US, Mr. V. Bhaskaran (Olympian, Hockey) and Dr. Usha Sujit (Renowned academician in the area of Sports) helps the EduSports team with regular inputs on the curriculum.
Q. What does a typical engagement with a school involve? Do you ensure that the school staff has enough written material audio-visual material to carry on after perhaps your coaching staff have left the school premises so that the school staff is as close to self sufficient as possible?
EduSports SOAR is not a set of recommendations/ off the shelf solution for schools. It is a holistic solution and on-ground implementation is one of the key reasons why the program has been super successful. What this means is we have at least 1 person onsite (at the school) throughout the year to lead and deliver the program.
In addition to the person on-site, the curriculum is structured to track the progress of the kids via lesson plans, individualized fitness reports throughout the year.
Q. Are most of the schools that are you clients, meant for middle class and rich kids? Do you have a solution or a product for the government school or schools that the not so well off kids also attend?
Our clientele currently comprises a gamut of schools ranging from the best of private/ international schools to private schools in Tier 2 cities which have a lot of constraints (financial/space). As mentioned, our vision is to create a generation of fit and healthy kids and for this to happen we will partner with governments/NGOs. We are working towards having a PILOT program in government schools in the next 18-24 months.
Q. Can you share any details on the poor health or lack of attention to organized sport in India’s schooling system with us?
The problems facing sports/physical education in India can be attributed to approach that we have followed with respect to sports/physical education. The major pitfalls with the current system which makes it difficult for us as a country to produce fit kids (let alone champions) are:
PE in schools is not-age appropriate ( if activities/sports are not age appropriate, the kids lose focus/fun)
PE in schools is not- Inclusive (only a small proportion of kids participate)
This results in a lot of kids not engaging in physical activities/sports and switching off completely from physical activities/sports over a period of time. This results in unhealthy kids (as the Obesity figures indicate- Roughly 2 out of 10 school going children in India is obese).
The problem is also aggravated in cities by the fact that there are very limited play spaces for kids to play in (in schools/neighbourhoods).
To really make an impact and create a generation of fit kids, the school PE curriculum in India has to be designed to be Inclusive, Age Appropriate and must be able to operate in limited play spaces.
Many thanks for sparing the time to speak with us.
