This is the function of all education: we need to bring about a good society in which all human beings can live happily in peace, without violence, with security. - Krishnamurti
Introduction
Intentionality behind how and why we are educating is extremely important. We must shift our perspective on education to the biggest picture and rethink the purpose behind education. Are we educating people to simply have skills and secure a job? Are we educating people so they know how to make the most of the land they live on? And ultimately, are we educating people how to live a happy and fulfilling life, no matter what their circumstances?
This section brings together my own explorations and those of others about the intentions of education and international development.
Education
for What?
J. Krishnamurti (1953) asks, “Now, what is the significance of life? What are we living and struggling for? If we are being educated merely to achieve distinction, to get a better job, to be more efficient, to have a wider domination over others, then our lives will be shallow and empty…Though there is a higher and wider significance to life, of what value is our education if we never discover it? We may be highly educated, but if we are without deep integration of thought and feeling, our lives are incomplete, contradictory and torn with many fears; as long as education does not cultivate an integrated outlook on life, it has very little significance….Education is not merely a matter of training the mind. A mind that has merely been trained is the continuation of the past, and such a mind can never discover the new. That is why, to find out what is right education, we will have to inquire into the whole significance of living”.
Education
& International Development
Empowering students through education is crucial in raising children to be active citizens in a democratic society. For developing countries to move away from dependency to self-sustaining models of development it is essential that they develop independently thinking and self motivated citizens. Developing countries need citizens who have developed the ability to think for themselves and solve problems creatively, rather than submissively taking orders from above. According to J. Krishnamurti (1953), “Conventional education makes independent thinking extremely difficult. Conformity leads to mediocrity”. Education is not necessarily only as a means to economic gain but also enables empowerment, happiness, independence and fearlessness through cultivating understanding and the ability to think critically.
Education in developing countries tends to overly rely on memorization and other rote learning techniques. Learning is so often geared towards national and university exams. This trend is not exclusive to the developing world and unfortunately in many ways it seems to me that we are actually going backwards in education. Teaching to the test does not foster creative thinking, cooperation and development of one’s own ideas. Freire calls this the “banking system” of education where students consume information fed to them and memorize and store it (Hooks 1994). According to Ira Shor (1992), children begin life as motivated learners, not passive beings but year by year their dynamic learning erodes in passive classrooms not organized around their cultural backgrounds, conditions or interests. This type of learning reflects the culture of dominance and submission of colonialism. The fact that many developing countries are characterized by centuries of foreign domination, racism and strict gender roles needs to be addressed by education.
Locally
Relevant Education
Educational philosophies, policies and activities must reflect the cultural and historical heritage in any given circumstance in order to ensure its relativity and acceptability. While many organizations working in education and development are trying to incorporate child centered learning into traditional classrooms, the shift has not been easy. Education systems are deeply engrained in society and cannot be changed overnight. While teachers often try to implement new techniques, they often fall short of the model. This is often because progressive educational practices are such a stretch from the cultural norms. While outsiders have much insight to offer through experiences in educational systems, policies and implementation, it is difficult to integrate this experience into a culture without truly understanding the depth of local knowledge. Education ministries and educators are often overwhelmed with a cacophony of different philosophies, projects and expectations.
Many successful educational initiatives have been born out of developing countries that are locally based and inherently locally relevant. Perhaps this is because these approaches are bottom-up and community based rather than top-down, centralized or imposed from the outside. For example, Indian thinkers such as Gandhi, Krishnamurti and Aurobindo have developed their own child centered pedagogies that fit in the cultural context of the country. Much of the success of these models lies in that they were not imposed from the outside yet hybridized Western and Eastern methodologies and understanding. The Indian experience highlights how child centered learning help address questions of inequality, poverty, democracy, cultural identity and personal evolution over the long term. This is explored more deeply throughout this site.
Viewing
Education Holistically
Shifting our perspective on education to the biggest picture embraces the holistic nature of learning and living. Rather than seeing students as an “empty slate” to be filled with knowledge, students are recognized as conscious beings and their own creative wisdom is given the space to come forward. Rather than passively receiving knowledge, students are learning in a more active and engaged manner. Rather than the teacher being “above” the student, they act as partners in learning. A number of different pedagogies address these issues such as student-centered, child-centered and participatory learning, holistic education, engaged pedagogy, critical pedagogy, Free Progress and the Gandhian Basic Education.
Riane
Eisler, the creator of Partnership Education, has developed three educational
goals we can to strive for in the 21st century. Although these goals do not address
enrolment rates, female literacy or financial targets they look at the biggest
picture that embraces the holistic nature of life and how education can serve
to make this world a better place for future generations.
1. Helping children grow into healthy, caring,
competent and self-realized adults
2. Providing them with the knowledge and skills
that can see them through this time of environmental, economic and social
upheavals
3. Equipping them to create for themselves and future generations a sustainable future of greater personal, social, economic and environmental responsibility and caring
By re-looking at our intentions behind education we are able to adjust our educational practices to ensure that they will help to create a peaceful and sustainable future.
Related
Links
BRAC Education –
Bangladesh Rural Advancement Committee
BRAC runs the largest nonformal education in the world, reaching over a million children. Today BRAC operates over 30,000 primary schools and 16,000 pre-primary schools. More than 3 million children have graduated from BRAC’s primary system. BRAC’s education program supplements the government curriculum with their own materials. BRAC’s programs have been so successful that they are being implemented in countries such as Tanzania, Sri Lanka and Afghanistan
Educators for
Nonviolence
http://www.efnv.org/efnv/en/index.jsp
The mission of EFNV is to make the teaching and living of nonviolence part of mainstream education.
Shikshantar: The
Peoples’ Research Institute for Rethinking Education & Development
http://www.swaraj.org/shikshantar/
Shikshantar is “an applied research institute dedicated to catalyzing radical systemic transformation of education in order to facilitate Swaraj-development throughout India”. Swaraj is based on Gandhi’s concept of self rule which centers on self sustainability. Shikshantar uses the city Udaipur as a learning city and challenges us to rethink the meaning of education and development.
UNESCO: Teaching &
Learning for a Sustainable Future
http://www.unesco.org/education/tlsf/
A multimedia teacher education program with downloadable curriculum on a broad range of subjects related to education for a sustainable and peaceful future.
Resources
Burbules, N. (Ed). (2000). Globalization and Education: Critical Perspectives. New York: Routledge Farmer.
Cummings, William K. et al. (eds.) (2002). Values education for dynamic societies: individualism or collectivism. Hong Kong, China: University of Hong Kong.
Dowsett, N. et. al. (Eds.) (1996). Education of the Future. Pondicherry, India: Sri Aurobindo Ashram Trust.
Eisler, Riane (2005). Tomorrow’s education: Education for a partnership world. In John Miller et al. (Eds.) Holistic learning and spirituality in education: Breaking new ground (pp. 47-67). New York: SUNY Press.
Gidley, Jennifer. 'Education For All' or Education For Wisdom? www.metafuture.org.
Hooks, Bell (1994).Teaching to Transgress: Education as the Practice of Freedom. New York: Routledge Press.
Hopkins, C., Damlamian, J. and Lopez Ospina, G. (1996). Evolving towards education for sustainable development: An international perspective. Nature and Resources, 32(3), pp. 2-11.
Stanley Jeyaraja Tambiah (1985). Culture, thought, and social action : an anthropological perspective. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.
Morrow, Raymond A. and Torres, Carlos Alberto (Eds.). (2002). Reading Freire and Habermas: critical pedagogy and transformative social change. New York: Teachers College Press.
O’Sullivan, Edmund (1999). Transformative Learning: educational vision for the 21st century. New York: Zed Books.
Reich, B and Pivovarov, V. (eds) (1994) International Practical Guide on the Implementation of the Recommendation Concerning Education for International Understanding (*.pdf download), UNESCO, Paris.
Rhea, Marsha Lynne (2005). Anticipate the world you want : learning for alternative futures. Lanham, MD: Scarecrow Education.
Rogoff, Barbara (2003). Cultural Nature of Human Development. New York: Oxford University Press.
Saint-Hilaire, P.B. (1991). Education and the aim of human life. Pondicherry, India: Sri Aurobindo Ashram Trust.
Sefa Dei, George J. et al. (Eds.) (2002). Indigenous knowledge in global contexts: multiple readings of our world. Toronto: University of Toronto Press.
Seymour, Mike. (2004). Educating for humanity: rethinking the purposes of education. Boulder: Paradigm Publishers.
Shor, Ira (1992). Empowering Education: Critical Teaching for Social Change. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.
UNESCO (1998) Learning to Live Together in Peace and Harmony, UNESCO - APNIEVE Sourcebook for Teacher Education and Tertiary Zone Educators, UNESCO Principal Regional Office for Asia and the Pacific, Bangkok.
UNESCO. (1996). Sintra Plan of Action. Sintra, Portugal.
UNESCO (1997) Educating for a Sustainable Future: A Transdisciplinary Vision for Concerted Action. Paris: UNESCO.
Warren, D.M., Brokensha, D. and Slikkenveer, L.J. (eds) (1992) Indigenous Knowledge Systems: The Cultural Dimensions of Development, Kegan Paul International, London.
World Commission on Culture and Development (1995) Our Creative Diversity, UNESCO Publishing, Paris.
Wenden, Anita. (2004). Value-Based Perspective Development. Educating for a Culture of Social and Ecological Peace. New York: SUNY Press.
(1999). Education for sustainable development (Special issue), Cambridge Journal of Education, 29(3).