Dentsu Webchutney's The Progressive Report Card vouches for a holistic approach to education

Dentsu Webchutney, the digital arm of Dentsu Aegis Network, has introduced the Progressive Report Card: a redesign of the linear school report card into a circular document that is now representing a paradigm shift in the perception of school level education in India.

The agency’s strategy and research team first identified the inherent biases in the structure of the report card. It reflects a societal preference with “mainstream subjects” like languages, mathematics and science-based subjects – subjects that have traditionally been considered true markers of a child’s intelligence, employability, and life-long success. The standard report card’s tabular design itself places these subjects on top and ‘literally’ pushes the rest below. It was now evident that even from a design perspective parents are conditioned into paying lesser attention to subjects like arts, music, and physical education in front of math and physics. The Progressive Report replaces the standard tabular format with a circular one, reorienting parents and teachers to value all subjects by giving equal weightage to them visually.

The Dentsu Webchutney team also identified that parents’ knowledge about childhood development has expanded, and their need of the hour is to prepare children for an emerging world in which they will hold a host of jobs that don’t exist yet. More and more educational institutions are seeing the need and merit for a curriculum that supports all-round development where every subject is equally important. The human-centred approach to design of the circular Progressive Report Card stems from this insight.

PG Aditya

PG Aditya, Senior Creative Director, Dentsu Webchutney, said, “It is our personal mission to change the concept of ‘arranged education’ in India. Design, for all its disruptive qualities, has not been applied to schools beyond the inclusion of interactive boards. We’ve gone one step further to apply it to the heart of the most important success parameter of a student: the report card. No parent, teacher, or school administrator is going to see a report card the same way again.”

Ashwin Palkar

In partnership with KA EduAssociates, one of the oldest educational consultancies, the Progressive Report card shares a rich design story. Ashwin Palkar, Creative Director, Design, Dentsu Webchutney, said, “The circular design of the report card nudges parents to distribute their attention equally to all subjects. The circle symbolises unity and equality, and draws from a well-established theory of perception. We’re fortunate to work in an industry where diversity and creativity is valued. To realise our mission, we’ve made design resources available free on our website for schools to implement the Progressive Report Card. Our goal is to reach education boards to drive mass adoption. We want to reduce any friction that exists between bright, independent futures of children and dogmatic beliefs around academics of their parents.”

The solution has already been adopted by Divyapath Science School, DP High School, Nest Public School and Educo India Sai Baba Path Mumbai High School and has reached over 6,600 parents across India, driving the importance of overall academic performance. It has helped start an important conversation about the priorities of Indian parents with regard to their ward’s educational development.

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