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City Montessori School (CMS) (Hindi: सिटी मॉन्टेसरी स्कूल, लखनऊ) is a co-educational English medium private school that offers education from Pre-school up to K-12 (Grade 12) level in Lucknow, India. The school was founded in 1959 by Dr Bharti Gandhi and Dr Jagdish Gandhi. It held the 2010-11 Guinness Book of World Records for the largest school. In 2016 its enrollment has reached nearly 52,000 pupils. CMS is affiliated to the Council for the Indian School Certificate Examinations. The City Montessori School, Gomtinagar Campus has been ranked 1st by academic reputation nationally by the Educational World magazine recently in its September 2015 edition and has received numerous awards. According to an independent analysis of ISC (Grade 12) results of 2015 carried out by the website TheLearningPoint.net, City Montessori School, Gomti Nagar Campus stood second by the parameter of average across Eng+best3 subjects of all the appearing students. On the same parameters, as declared by TheLearningpoint.net, the Aliganj and Mahanagar Campuses of City Montessori School stood 5th and 6th nationally.

In 2014 CMS society was accredited with the United Nations Department of Public Information as affiliated NGO.

Background
The husband and wife duo of Jagdish Gandhi (b. 10 November 1936)[3] and Bharti Gandhi founded the City Montessori School with just 5 students and a borrowed capital of just Rs 300 or US$5 (approx) in rented premises in 1959. The first words that the students wrote on their slate on the first day of the school were 'Jai Jagat' or 'Glory be to the World' which later became the motto of the school. Currently CMS has 20 separate branch campuses spread across the city. City Montessori School is well known for its comprehensive peace education curriculum which can be witnessed in all the school activities like All-Religion Prayer, World Peace Prayer, World Parliaments, Peace Marches etc. In 2002 CMS was awarded the UNESCO Prize for Peace Education. The CMS philosophy revolves around the "twin poles" of globalism and godliness, and the school's mission is to promote world unity and peace by shaping future generations as "world citizens" whose minds have the virtues of unity and peace impressed upon them from day one.

"A school must act as a lighthouse to society; providing direction, guidance and leadership to students, parents, and society and also concern itself with the affairs of the age" is one of the core beliefs of school."

For nearly six decades now, the school has been relentlessly working towards building bridges of unity and constructing the defenses of peace in the minds of its students as also the general public at large. The theme of “world unity, peace, communal harmony, tolerance towards all religions,” pervades all aspects of school activities. The concept of a global family and the universal brotherhood of humankind are celebrated at events which are organized with the aim of helping children in developing an international outlook and global perspective in keeping with the educational philosophy of the school. Regular divine education conferences are also held for parents and students to emphasize the idea that society must be founded on principles of equality and justice. The school distinguishes itself from other educational institutions around the country as it aims to inoculate its students with the concepts of world unity and through it, world peace.

Teachers at the school believe that every child should be treated with love and care in order to bring out the best in them. Even parents agree that when it comes to taking care of children, CMS is amongst the best.

CMS teachers are highly qualified and well paid too. The school strives to harness the power of educational technology to enhance students’ learning experience. IT training for its teachers and the availability of nearly 900 classrooms internet-enabled smart boards along with Class Edge Content from Tata Interactive Services make it a premier education institution anywhere in the world.

City Montessori School organizes over 2 dozen international educational events in a calendar year. Thousands of children from different countries of the world regularly participate in these international events.

INTERNATIONAL CHILDREN'S FILM FESTIVAL
Deeply concerned by the adverse affect of vulgar films produced by the film industry, on the delicate and innocent minds of children, the City Montessori School has been organising Children's Film Festival for the last four years in the month of April. Admission to such Children's Films is free.

CMS organizes International Children's Film Festivals every year as part of the school’s effort to mobilize public opinion against vulgar films that adversely affect children. The school believes that clean films should be shown to children which may add to their knowledge and help build their character. (http://www.cmsfilms.org/icff/)

AAO DOSTI KAREIN (Come, let’s be friends)
Aao Dosti Karein, the Indo-Pak Children's Penfriends' Club, is one of the most unique peace initiatives of CMS. The idea, conceived around 'Kargil' time when the armies of India and Pakistan were locked in an eyeball-to-eyeball confrontation at the frontiers and passions / tempers were running high. To start with, mailing addresses of 35 Pakistani schools were downloaded from the Internet and 4000 letters from CMS students were mailed in the first lot in the year 2002. Five Pakistani schools - Karachi High School (Karachi), Habib Public School (Karachi), Aga Khan Higher Secondary School (Karachi), Beaconhouse School System(Lahore) and Foundation Public School (Karachi) - accepted the CMS students' offer of pen friendship and thus began the continual exchange of letters between children of CMS and these schools. CMS had started an Indo-Pak Children's Penfriends' Club called Aao Dosti Karein with the objective of facilitating person-to-person contact between the children of both our countries. It is believed that it would only be through such direct dialogue that mutual misgivings and misunderstandings between the people of India and Pakistan can be resolved and help create a feeling of goodwill and compassion that encourages the governments of both the countries to pursue good neighbourly relations. The number of letters exchanged had been overwhelming from both sides and the children's sentiments, touching. The school has been inviting schools from different cities of Pakistan to take part in the international events organised by it. The newspaper of 8th November 2012 shows that different schools from Pakistan have been a part of events organised by it. The Pakistani students appreciated the warm welcome and love they have received from the school. The initiative has facilitated letter exchanges between thousands of students from the host school with its Pakistani counterparts. Undoubtedly, mind-sets are changing and conversions of hearts are taking place and in some small way, through a simple act of exchange of letters, rekindling a spirit of mutual trust and unity.

An Agenda for World Unity and World Peace
Believing that world peace can come about only by planting the seeds of peace in the minds of children at a young age, the school upholds that peace is an outcome of unity and therefore world peace can only be a by-product of world unity. To achieve the objective of world peace, the school has been spearheading a campaign for inclusion of the “Right to a Safe Future” in the UN Declaration of Rights of the Child. In this regard, it had petitioned the then Secretary General of the United Nations Dr Kofi Annan in the year 1999, to take immediate steps to protect the future of the children of the world and the generations yet-to-be born by calling a meeting of the leaders of the world away from the veto power system of the United Nations.

It now organizes annually, since the year 2000, an international conference of chief justices of the world where chief justices and judges from the supreme courts of many nations of the world, world statesmen, interfaith leaders, experts from the fields of education, civil rights, and others, share perspectives and inspire governments, students, teachers, their parents and society to actively work for peace, not only in their community, city, province and country but also globally. Personalities like the Hon’ble Dalai Lama, the Tibetan spiritual leader has been guest speakers at these Conferences.

His Excellency the Late Dr A.P.J. Abdul Kalam, former President of India and an idol for millions of aspiring young minds has also visited the school.

Celina Jaitley is one of the most noted alumni of this school.

Campuses
The campuses of the school are spread all over the city of Lucknow. The campuses include:


 * 1) Station Road Campus
 * 2) Gomti Nagar Campus
 * 3) Gomti Nagar Campus 2
 * 4) Mahanagar Campus 1
 * 5) Mahanagar Campus 2
 * 6) Mahanagar Campus 3
 * 7) Aliganj Campus 1
 * 8) Aliganj Campus 2
 * 9) Rajendra Nagar Campus 1
 * 10) Rajendra Nagar Campus 2
 * 11) Rajendra Nagar Campus 3
 * 12) Rajajipuram Campus 1
 * 13) Rajajipuram Campus 2
 * 14) RDSO Campus
 * 15) Kanpur Road Campus
 * 16) Asharfabad Campus
 * 17) Jopling Road Campus
 * 18) Anand Nagar Campus
 * 19) Chowk Campus
 * 20) Indira Nagar Campus

Controversies
In August 2015, the Allahabad High Court issued a contempt notice to the school because it had refused to admit 13 students of economically weak backgrounds under the Right of Children to Free and Compulsory Education Act. The 13 students were admitted after a Supreme Court judgement. The school had previously stopped a Pakistani school from taking part in the 2014 International School Cricket Premier League for security reasons. The event was organised by CMS itself. The school is well known for its high fees. In 2013, it increased its fees by up-to 16% in comparison to previous year's fee. In an example of School corporal punishment, one of the school's teacher slapped a student so hard that he became deaf from his left ear. The student lodged an FIR against the teacher. Despite the incident receiving media attention, the school's founder maintained that "physical punishment is banned in the school".

Reportedly, a student of class 10 at the school's Mahanagar branch committed suicide in 2011, after his principal Nalini Sharad, threatened him to move around the school's campus, naked. After the student's suicide, his parents filed a complained with the police and the school's employees testified reagding the incident. Despite this, the police did not register a case against the then principal and a court ordered in 2013 that a case should be registered against Sharad.