History
Welcome to South Point, Kolkata
Kolkata, in the year 1954, was quite a different city. The Independence of the country was only seven years old. India was practically reborn and so were its cities. Kolkata, still, had much more green and open expanses of land. Its southern parts were sparsely populated and this cozy community was waiting for an educational institution where learning and growing up would happen in a happy and positive environment. This new nest was where their little ones would learn to fly on confident wings.
South Point School, an English-medium and co-educational institution, that opened its gates at 16 Mandeville Gardens on 1 April 1954, was an answer to the community’s prayers..
It captured the popular imagination since the moment of its inception. Shri Satikanta Guha and Smt. Pritylata Guha, Founder and Associate Founder of the School, nurtured the earliest Pointers – just twenty in number — with an inspired mix of love, care, and utmost responsibility. To help the Founders fulfil their vision and mission was a handful of dedicated teachers. And, the initial faculty was an enviable collection of stalwarts from the cultural, literary and artistic milieu of Bengal. Their genius improved manifold the ambience of creative purposefulness so that every child who crossed the gates of the early, quaint bungalow knew his or her potential would never be left unnoticed or unfulfilled.
Over the years, the School which welcomed twenty children on a distant summer day has spread its rainbow wings in much the same way as its students have. The journey has been a magical one, marked by splendid milestones. The comely bungalow soon grew into newer, bigger buildings that could bring more and more children into its fold. The early faculty handed the batons over to a burgeoning number of teachers who were equally committed and fully trained to keep up with the changing times. South Point High School was the first co-educational School in the city to be affiliated with the West Bengal Board of Secondary Education. The first final batch was sent up in 1958.
April seems to be the happiest month in the evolution of South Point. On another 1 April – this time in 1960 – it was upgraded to the Higher Secondary level. The High School found its new, and the present, premises on 8 April 1970 at 82/7A Ballygunge Place. The School is now run by the South Point Education Society.
The growing family of South Point has the rare distinction of winning a place in the Guinness Book of Records (1984-1992) as the world’s largest School.
A persistent commitment to excellence, success, hard work, compassion, a collaborative atmosphere and bold technological strides is a tough job but the large South Point family – now consisting of nearly 12,000 students, 475 teachers and 259 non-teaching staff-members – carries it on tirelessly every day. The huge team of students and staff is not a deterrent; it just means more minds, more hands and more hearts to plant and rear saplings of excellence in every classroom of South Point.
Education at South Point is a delightful pool of academics, assessments, co-curricular activities, fests, sports, celebrations, excursions and a seamless interaction among the faculty, the pupils and the guardians. The goal is actually to inspire Pointers to strive beyond goals; a look at the South Point alumni proves the point.Former Pointers have excelled with exceptional ease in all spheres, be it academics, films, music, public service, scientific research, medicine, literature, journalism, entrepreneurship or sports.
The campus that greets little Pointers and grooms them for the team sport called life is South Point School. It has Nursery, Transition and Classes from I to V. Students then graduate to South Point High School to join Class VI. From Classes VI to X they study under the Central Board of Secondary Education. A majority of Pointers return to their dear alma mater for the Plus-Two years, Classes XI and XII, under the Central Board of Secondary Education. It may be mentioned here that South Point had earlier been affiliated to both the West Bengal Board of Secondary Education and the West Bengal Council of Higher Secondary Education. Now, its pupils appear for their Board examinations under CBSE only.
Every day begins in South Point with bolder strides towards excellence — in carefree Nursery playrooms, in Smart Class rooms, in the most rewarding Mindspark programme, in assemblies where each and every important occasion is celebrated with gusto, across classrooms, laboratories and libraries, in CCA sessions, in sports practices, in Saturday Activity Classes, in the friendlier yet sharper evaluation methods, and in all the candid interactive and orientation sessions meant for parents. The result is clearly seen in Pointers fetching top honours in Board examinations, inter-school competitions and in all areas where they can discover and project their talent and skills. The School perennially encourages them with awards and scholarships, workshops and enrichment programmes.
The School’s campuses turned into an even happier and more secure zone, as South Point received the OHSAS 18001:2007 Occupational Health and Safety Management Certification from the British Standards Institution (BSI). At present South Point is an ISO 45001:2018 Certified Institution.
South Point reached another milestone in its momentous journey when it stepped into its Platinum Jubilee year in 2023. The School began its celebrations in a meaningful way. It paid tribute to Mother Nature by gifting her with 70 green friends at a ceremony named ‘Roots and Wings’ at the Joka Agricultural and Horticultural Society, Pailan. These saplings will be nurtured with care and replanted at the new Priyamvada Birla Campus. The year-long celebrations were marked by another epoch-making event when the school stamp was unveiled on the premises of South Point School, in the presence of dignitaries from India Post. All the pupils of the School became an integral part of this occasion as they indulged in a letter-writing activity, put the letters in envelopes, bearing their School stamp, and physically posted these letters in the letter boxes placed in the School.
South Point is poised to step into its new state-of-the-art campus, the Priyamvada Birla Campus, on a sprawling 6.65 acres of land in Mukundapur, off EM Bypass, which will offer the latest infrastructure while continuing to provide holistic education.
A beacon of learning and an institution par excellence – that is what South Point has been and will always be — taking on newer challenges and fulfilling newer expectations.