Last night I departed Salem, Tamil Nadu to head for Auroville once again. After boarding the train I started scribing a letter which would take me half the four hour journey. I addressed the letter to my four colleagues in the Art Department back at the Lawrenceville School, the place from which I am taking a leave of absence. However, it perfectly describes the place I am in right now, so I thought I would share an edited version of it with you.
Dear friends,
I’m punching letters with my thumbs (a behavior you’ve seen me practice many times before) on a train from a city in south central India called Salem. I’m headed back to the town where I’ve been staying, about four and a half hours away, called Auroville. Aurovilles population started growing after it’s founding in 1968; hippies interested in new conscious ways of living, men and women interested in rebuilding connections to the earth and spiritualists seeking adventures in consciousness came from all parts of the globe during the following decades. They came, interested in the teachings of a guy called Sri Aurobindo and a woman endearingly (and spiritually) known as “the Mother”. Today many ex-pats populate the town, both as permanent residents and also as visitors throughout the year, of which there are thousands and of which I am one. The population of Auroville represents nations throughout the world with nearly half of Aurovillians coming from all over India. The early settlers I mentioned, who came from across oceans and continents to help shape the vision and reality of Auroville: some remain and some have moved on. Auroville doesn’t have the atmosphere of a hippie-commune as some might imagine; instead, there is a true sense of cultural diversity, a mix that brings together traditional Indian lifestyles with cultures that have grown out of the west.
This place is a planned community and it was founded on very few principles, which are listed in the short charter, drafted by the Mother. Auroville, it is written, told, believed, “belongs to nobody in particular.” All the land is owned by Auroville, and while Aurovillians can build, with permission from the Housing Service (a group comprised of community members) they never actually own the house or residence. As long as they remain in Auroville and as long as they’re officially Aurovillians, they act as stewards who promise to upkeep the home. Through stewardship of the place and other work, they contribute to and sustain a community of nearly 2400 (as of now, with newcomers). Should they decide to leave Auroville, their home becomes the responsibility of the community to fill or maintain as the community and Housing Service see fit.
You might be wondering how people make money in Auroville. Well the vision of some Aurovillians is to one day have a cashless economy. Right now, throughout the town different merchants provide goods and services to guests and Aurovillians alike; while guests use a debit card which they can fill and top up with funds at the financial services office, the Aurovillians simply write their name and account number (which is a low number since there are only a couple thousand Aurovillians) in a ledger. Even though the dream of Auroville is to one day be cashless, today cash does cycle through the community. However, a great many of transactions have become cashless through use of the card or account ledger, and there is something to be said for having less of a consumerist atmosphere because goods are exchanged for currency that is stored in an account. There is a sense of trust that develops when the community is in charge on the funds instead of big commercial banks that issue debit and credit cards. Because the economy is not mediated directly through commercial institutions, people develop a greater sense of ownership for the place and their relations, even those that are dependent upon the exchange of goods.
Aurovillians do get paid. Well some of them do. For regular work done as contribution to support the basic functioning of the town. Many who don’t get paid through Auroville often have a source of income from elsewhere, such as a pension from their native country or if they are part of a commercial unit, they provide their own salaries. However these salaries, if provided through Auroville or through the commercial unit, are called “maintenance”. Every month each Aurovillian has to pay dues, and he/she can choose to use the maintenance funds or monies otherwise obtained to pay those dues. There is, as you can imagine, wide diversity in the financial standing of the people who live in Auroville, but because of the simplicity of the place and its workings, those differences are rarely evident and hardly visible. There is a sense of equality that is present here and I think it comes from the fact that everyone who lives here could have chosen to live an easier, or at least a life in which society has made livelihood easier, either through the government or through the free market. But these people have willingly chosen to come and live here, to engage In a unique undertaking, even if the current realization is imperfect. The important thing that drives Auroville is not the hardships of the present but the aspiration for human unity in the form of community. It’s their undertaking; they’ve chosen to give up many of the comforts to work in community and build something new, something unlike anything else out there.
When i think about this place and when I think about lawrenceville, what comes to mind are the qualities of the connections people have with each other. I notice a difference, and it’s hard to explain but it’s pronounced, and while I’m not going to try an qualify the difference I will say that I think it comes from, at least partly, the fact that these people choose to be there and their work is solely about contributing to the evolution of the place and the communities relation to it. At lawrenceville and in other types of communities which emerge from scholastic institutions, the community members are similarly focused on the success, the well being, the comfort in modern society of themselves and their loved ones. At lawrenceville employees are contracted to the place. Their livelihood depends upon upholding that contract in hours and commitments. In auroville while some receive maintenance, value in the form of monies earned are usually in some way or another cycled back into the community. Somehow, in some way I can’t yet articulate, it creates a qualitative difference in the working of the community.
And so, in a way this has been what has brought me to auroville. I’ve been after a deeper understanding of the mechanics and physics underlying communities. I’ve had many rich conversations with people whose stories are as diverse as the cultures they represent.
(me and my guide, Jogindar, who took me around to many temples throughout Namakkal. I learned a great deal about the rituals and traditions of devotion in temple worship.)
People have asked why I’ve embarked on this journey. To be honest, it was a feeling that compelled me, not something logical that I can easily describe. Slowly, experience after experience, I’m beginning to catch glimpses of why I’ve come, and Auroville is a big part of the reason thus far, but I’m only 2.5 months in, with 9 more to go.
For 3.5 more months I’ll be in India, a world like none I’ve ever known. I learn so much everyday about the people, the place, the cultures and the history. And while I though I knew so much from the books and articles and videos, that was only knowing facts and opinions. Being here is knowing realities. If only my ninth graders could experience the adventure of travel like this. They would surely have a deeper passion for the learning they do in the classroom, although it may be too powerful a tool, as they would probably also see so many of the limitations that come with classroom learning. Experience is by far a more powerful teacher than a man or woman talking at then front of the room (something I know happens a great deal in Indian classrooms). It’s why the philosophies at Lawrenceville and our peer schools are so popular. With depth and frequency of professional development, we teachers are learning through experience how to make the right innovations in our classrooms for the benefit of our students. There is a pervasive idea that is gifted us because we’re allowed so much freedom in our classrooms: we think of ourselves not just as teachers, but also as designers of experiences for learning. We try to provide students the space in and outside the classroom to learn in a very natural way: a way that promotes curiosity, engagement, motivation, and reflection. Even though they could probably get into most of the best colleges and universities in the world just on the basis Of having Lawrenceville on their resume, they are definitely better off for the kind of learning they do at Lawrenceville. It makes them stronger and more independent critical thinkers. But there are some downsides to our system (which come from a mix of class and modern culture) like our students (I believe) are far too concerned with self image, they are highly critical of others, and less humble than they could (and perhaps should) be. But most importantly, I think our students never truly learn how to be compassionate and vulnerable with others. And maybe these qualities are not virtues in modern 21st century society, but I kind of feel they should be.
While on this trip I’ve been regularly posting to my blog (which up until my trip has focused primarily on the subject of education), and a guy called Sudio, a professor of business in SF and NY sent me a message. He wanted me to come visit his friend Gopu’s school in Tamil Nadu. Auroville happens to be in the Indian state of Tamil Nadu and I thought it could be interesting so I agreed and just two days ago found myself on the way to this city called Namakkal, a small city by Indian standards, of around 200,000. What I’ve learned about the majority of schools, both public and private in India, is that they all are preparing students to take state or nationally mandated exams, which will essentially determine the course of their lives. Students in India do not have the same sense that they can be anything and do anything like students in the USA have. The avenues for choosing a career are limited and determined by their ability (or lack thereof) to perform well on exams.
It is, therefore, that india suffers from an amplified version of a problem that we have also in America, that public schools often create environments in which teachers feel pressure to teach to the test. In India, however, with perhaps little discussion of progressive education methods, philosophies, and practices, children in many schools learn mainly one skill: memorization, and many teachers often revert to teaching through rote.
So yesterday a truly rewarding morning and afternoon at the Surabi k-11 school and the Surabi Polytechnic College in Namakkal. Sudio had asked me to come and share with both teachers and students about whatever I wished. The only challenge was the language barrier. While in many states people are familiar with English (thank you Britain), here in Tamil Nadu English is less understood and seldom spoken. Tamil is the local tongue. For the younger students I therefore chose to write and tell a story about leadership and focused on the importance of being compassionate as a leader. In a future post I will publish this story – still working on it. With the help of my new friend and translator Wen the students were all able to understand the story and afterward, we discussed the meaning in the story.
For the older students in the polytechnic college (after grade ten students can choose a trade route in a polytechnic school for a variety of reasons - academic performance, interest, etc) I created an experience for them: the type of which they’ve never had in a school setting. I used some of the experiential education games that i had learned from my North Carolina Outward Bound Educator’s Initiative as a real-life metaphor for problem solving. We talked about the challenges of 21st problems and how their skills as engineers may train them to solve problems with machines, but the big problems, like poverty, hunger, disease; these problems demand that we engage our imaginations and learn to work together and collaborate effectively. Both games they played could be discussed as metaphors for these topics. The students loved it (you see them participating in one of the games below) and I loved how excited they were to be there and have this new experience.
Lastly I spoke to the teachers: all women and mostly hesitant english speakers and maybe not-so-confident english listeners. I shared with them some methods behind discussion-based teaching and learning in a Harkness classroom and presented ideas about formative feedback, growth mindset, letting students fail to succeed, as well as independent learning. I encouraged them to think about the teacher’s role in the classroom and gave them some insight about our values and educational philosophy at Lawrenceville - that we’re helping our students to learn how to inquire and pursue those inquiries on their own. We’re giving them practice for lifelong learning and just-in-time learning. To use the catchphrase: they’re learning how to learn well.
Here the teachers are in a tough spot. Even if they wanted to change their teaching; even if the head of school wants them to employ more progressive methods (which he does) they don’t know how to think outside of the system they’re in - outside of the constraints of big classes, little funding, antiquated resources, and a mandated curriculum. And I feel for them because when you see these students and talk to them you see the way this education system limits their creativity, limits their ability to go deep, to be critical and skeptical, to inquire authentically.
(Sudio speaking with the teachers on how he engages the students in his lecture course on marketing. He’s a firm believer that learning and engagement happen when students are “doing”)
And there’s no answer. Last night at dinner I could hear the desperation in Gopu’s voice as he talked about the state of Indian education. He founded the school ten years ago with dreams of bringing a new quality of education to Indian children in Namakkal, but with the challenges he faces to make real change, he’s like a fish trying to swim upstream. The pressure to conform comes from so many sides, but he still hopes and tries by bringing people like me and Sudio to the school to expose them to new ideas and maybe inspire them to see that maybe things can be different.
Anyway, it’s 11pm and the train has stopped. I’m not sure if it’s because of the rain or because we’re at a scheduled stop. Two more hours ‘till I’m suppose to arrive at my station, and then I have a car picking me up to take me the remaining 50 km to Auroville. It’s 11pm here (9.5 hours ahead of you) and I suppose I’m a little tired. Usually I sleep around 930 or 10pm. Goodnight.
