One of the things you need to think about is affiliation with a board of education when starting a school. The Central Board of Secondary Education (CBSE) is one of the widely accepted and preferred boards of education in India. There are several formalities to be completed to obtain CBSE board affiliation for your school. The process of affiliation may seem a little complicated if you do not have apt knowledge about it. Though, an online manual is available on the official website of CBSE, school owners still find it cumbersome to follow the entire process. The online manual contains the list of steps and rules to be followed while you apply for the affiliation with the CBSE board or start a CBSE school in India. This article lists those steps briefly.

• Basic Requirements

Setting up a school requires certain basic compliances like formation of an organisation to run and manage the school. The organisation can only be in the form of a trust or society or a Section 8 company. Another requirement is of the land on which the school has to be built. The land needs to be leased either for a minimum of 15 years or owned by the organisation running the school.

The CBSE board requires 1 acre land inside the city and 1.5 acres land outside the city for a K-12 school. The land should also be one piece of land surrounded with a boundary.

• Permission from the State Government

The permission of the State Government in which you are opening the school needs to be sought. You also need to register with the District Education Office (DEO) and pay the required fee. The State government will grant certification to your organisation to open the school after thorough inspection. Further, you need to obtain a No Objection Certificate (NOC) from the State Education Secretary Office if you wish to affiliate your school with the CBSE board. This NOC allows you to start a CBSE school under the jurisdiction of the state. A copy of the NOC also needs to be submitted at the DEO.

• Application Process

Once you obtain the NOC, you can fill up the online form available on the official website of CBSE. You need to fill up all the basic details about your school in the form. There will be an application fee that you need to deposit while submitting the form, which changes from time to time.

The printed copy of the form which is duly signed by the authorities of the school along with the fee payment challan needs to be physically sent to the CBSE board.

• Approval of Affiliation

Once you have completed the application process, a letter from the CBSE board will arrive in some time. This letter pertains to the inspection of your school. You need to follow the guidelines and arrange for the inspection as mentioned in the letter received by the board.

The inspection is done by a team appointed by the CBSE board. The team will thoroughly investigate every important aspect of your school and ensure all compliances are duly met. A report is submitted by the inspection team based on the information gathered during the investigation process. The status of your application can be checked online. Usually, a school gets the affiliation certificate within a period of 45-60 days from the date of submission of inspection report.

The process of starting a new school and applying for affiliation with the CBSE board is quite cumbersome. Lack of knowledge about the processes can lead to chaos and mistakes. The other smarter route that can be taken is to take up a school franchise. For example, Millennium World School franchise is a reputed and experienced school franchise in India with over 40 schools running across India. The franchisor guides and supports you in opening and running your school efficiently and effectively without you getting into so many complicated processes.