While quality of education remains stagnant, in major cities, the average expenditure on general education has grown three times since past few years. This starts from the preschool level, with parents spending more money on donations and fees than the cost of degrees at central universities. Today, affording best quality education for children would burn a hole in the pocket of parents, especially for a one-member-earning family who often find it impossible to pay for even one child's education. Despite being working professionals, for Atul Tyagi and his wife Preeti Tyagi, it was even more difficult as they had twin kids to educate at the same time. "When we were in search of a preschool for our twins, we found two kinds of preschools; the best ones and the bad ones.

While the best preschools were very expensive and were not affordable for us, the cost-effective schools did not have the quality," says Atul.

Unlike most of the parents, Atul and Preeti were not ready to continue their life without addressing the pressing issues of India's thriving preschools education sector. After a rigorous research, the couple established WOW Kids in Goa, with an aim to provide international standard education at an affordable price. "The term 'WOW' is the reflection of a sensational success and we want to bring the wow factor in the lives of the children joining here," says Atul. Established in 2014,

within no time, the fascinating approach towards the child development helped WOW Kids in creating its own space in this field. Currently an ISO 2000:9001 certified preschool, WOW Kids runs as per international standards. "We launched the firstn branch in Goa and later on decided to go for more certifications and affiliations to make the brand look permanent in the market," adds Atul.

Being a member of American Montessori society in US, Early Education UK and the NAEYC in US, WOW Kids offers a high quality curriculum

Being a member of American Montessori society in US, Early Education UK and the NAEYC in US, WOW Kids offers a high quality curriculum. The team at WOW Kids believes in Montessori and sensorial based learning. The belief in self-directed learning promotes daily, weekly and monthly activities along with discovery projects. This participation gives children a natural exposure to skills, which support their on-going social-emotional, physical, language and cognitive development. Along with that, the Teachers of WOW Kids focus on the sensorial way, which helps in developing a child's intellect. "We really make our kids wow with the creative experiences. Everyone in WOW Kids treats the little ones so well that it remains as a life long experience for them," claims Atul. As a whole,WOW Kids ensures the overall development of a child.

The curriculum is well supported with the ultra state facilities of the preschool. WOW Kids provides a vast range of educational toys to help the child acquire different skills cognitive, fine motor skills and life skills. They are also bestowed with art and craft area, AV area and activity area. The outdoor play area

is a comfort zone with a variety of play equipments like tricycles, pacers, slides, football post and so on. Children are divided into groups and teachers along with support staff monitor the kids at all times.

The high quality activity based curriculum resulted in positive response and also led to many achievements like the "Best innovative teaching practices & quality education in west India", "Best upcoming preschool chain in west India" and "The Most promising preschool of Goa". In order to keep up with this quality, the founder team also takes utmost care in the recruitment of teachers. Wow kids prefer mothers as teachers to fortify a motherly care and a homely feeling. "It's not very difficult to teach kids. How ever,as a preschool teacher they need to be very happy and patient and most of our teachers are themselves mothers,"says Atul. The teachers are given an additional training once they are found apt for the job. Through the training, they ensure that teachers realize the role of preschool in the inculcation of habits and the moulding of a good character.

The overall learning in WOW kids has gained a positive response from people, which motivated Atul and Preeti to expand its wings to Mumbai, Noida, Sawantwadi, Chennai, Ahmadabad and Vadodara. While each centre includes an average of fifty kids, Atul owes the success of the preschool to the hard-core efforts of his wife Preeti. "Today, education has become an expensive service. We want to setup more centres across the country, so that children in our country can get quality learning in the most important years of their life which is 1-6 years, which is affordable to any parent," concludes Atul.