A journey to find the soul of development
It takes a while for an outsider to fully grasp the work scope of the Participatory Development Training Centre (PADETC). Why? Because there are so many "tentacles" (a word used by its director) that it has spread out over its ten years of development work in Laos. The centre, which is entirely staffed by Lao people, has its fingers in many pies: from the production of fuel-efficient stoves, to fish farming, recycling, media, young volunteers in schools, and even to teacher training.
"We had to try out different things over the years, to find an entry point into what we really want to achieve," said Sombath Somphone, director of PADETC.* "So everything we did were like little pieces of a jigsaw puzzle, which we have developed and pieced together. Now after ten years, a picture is slowly taking shape."
The 'heart' of development
PADETC's quest can be summed up in four words: Education for Sustainable Development.
Imagine a house with four pillars, built on sturdy foundation. This is PADETC's model of sustainable development, which is built on a sturdy base of good governance and education, while upheld by four pillars of economic development, environmental harmony, promotion and preservation of culture, and lastly the spiritual well-being or heart of the people. All these work together to form the roof (or ultimate goal) which is Genuine National Happiness, a concept of joyful living inspired by the Bhutanese' idea of Gross National Happiness.
It seems zen or even old-fashioned to speak of spirituality in the 21st century, but PADETC believes that modern-day education and development models have ignored this crucial element. Societies are highly skilled but sorely lacking in qualities like compassion, and social responsibility.
In the model, good governance sits at the bottom of the house and will determine how shaky or firm the building is. For PADETC, a government is only as good as the people who run it, which is why education is stacked together with good governance.
"So education is at the centre of the sustainable development model. Unless we have a good education system, we will not have good governance," said Somphone. "And for us, education of the heart, should be the heart of education."
Early days
In 1981, Somphone (standing up in picture on right) began working in sustainable agriculture techniques, using a participatory bottom-up planning approach. But he was constantly stonewalled by adults who were not open-minded enough to accept new ideas, and skills.
"After 15 years of hard work, I came to realise that the root of the problem lies in the human component. Human attitude can be changed more effectively only when they are still young and the window of learning opportunities are still open," Somphone said. "So I changed my approach and started training university graduates to promote sustainable development techniques in our rural development programme."
This was in 1997, a year after PADETC had registered as a non-profit Lao institution to build human resource for sustainable development. But Somphone soon realised that training university graduates was too late as well as they were "already too old to learn certain new skills."
So it went further down the education chain to reach primary and secondary school children. In 1998, the centre introduced recycling and organic farming at some schools in Vientiane; teaching a range of skills while ensuring joyful learning.
"For example, through raising earthworms with kitchen waste, the children learnt about biology, the environment, and also the discipline of taking care of another life form. They also learnt to organise and work in teams," explained Somphone.
The children recruited to take part in its activities in turn imparted their knowledge to others during monthly community service in villages. Year after year, the network of young volunteers grew and the activities diversified to include storytelling, drama, and drug prevention awareness campaigns.
At the same time, PADETC made forays into small businesses, encouraging villagers to try out environmentally-friendly and sustainable appropriate techniques. There were some hits and misses but those that worked has helped villagers to have better income and employment. Today, villagers are earning more money producing fuel-efficient stoves, weaving better quality silk, and selling green tea from mulberry leaves.
PADETC hopes such successes might persuade more Lao youth to stay home to develop local industries instead of migrating to the capital or to other countries in search of employment. Already, there has been increasing numbers of Lao youth lured abroad as cheap labourers in human trafficking scams.
"In whatever we do, we have to foster self-reliance and reduce dependence on outside assistance. So PADETC tries to transfer the knowledge to enable Lao communities, that are ready and able, to care for their own, now and into the future." said Somphone.
In recent years, the organisation has begun to streamline its work, to focus much more on youth development and economic enterprises. These two initiatives have the potential to build a new generation of citizens who are socially responsible, and yet possess the entrepreneurial spirit to make good use of the rich resources and indigenous knowledge Lao offers.
Together they would form the four firm pillars of economic development, environmental harmony, culture, and spiritual well-being, referred to in PADETC's model of sustainable development.
Winning formula
PADETC knew early on that it had found a winning formula working with young children. It believed that it was building a future generation of leaders that had character, self-esteem, responsibility and civic-mindedness - leaders with 'heart.' It was keen to introduce its activities nationwide, but the time was not right. The government viewed it suspiciously, and was doubtful of the young volunteers' abilities.
At the same time, it advocated schools to include life skills and cultural traditions so that Lao children would be better prepared for life outside the classroom. (on the right, a Youth Leader teaches basic english with an entertaining software programme)
"When the schools teach the children, they don't teach about 'the heart' which is the source of decision making. They only teach the facts," said Phoxay Chantavongsa, who heads the Youth Development Unit. He recounted the early years of advocacy as "painful and difficult."
Finally in 2003, the tide began to turn as the work of young volunteers gathered momentum. The centre's 300 young volunteers were officially recognised by the Ministry of Education and the network grew dramatically. By the end of 2006, 56 groups had been formed in 13 provinces, totalling 1800 volunteers.
Getting to the heart of education
It was at this 'ripe' time that PADETC began to move forward in a few ways. In 2005, it was able to launch its pilot Quality School project at 10 primary schools in Vientiane capital. It helped teachers to prepare lesson plans based on the national curriculum, trained them in child-friendly teaching methods, and placed older volunteers called Youth Leaders to assist in extracurricular classes. It even roped in monks to teach meditation and dharma (Buddhism) to the primary school students twice a week.
Communities and authorities saw that the children at the 10 schools enjoyed coming to school which now included Lao dance, Buddhism, aerobics, English, storytelling, drama, gardening and indigenous skills. This was the 'heart' of education that PADETC was talking about, and it was finally being accepted.
The teachers were motivated, having learnt how to use discovery-based learning to engage their students - a skill they picked up from the Youth Leaders.(pictured on the left at a PADETC festival) Most importantly, the Quality Schools reported higher school attendances and better examination results, at a time when truancy was escalating elsewhere.
In 2006, the centre was allowed to expand the Quality Schools project to another 100 schools. It scored another coup in 2007, when officials nationwide gathered to discuss how they could follow in PADETC's footsteps to engage young volunteers to carry out extracurricular activities with positive impact on communities.
The next lap
"We started from zero 10 years ago, with no tools, no network, no human resources, to now becoming accepted into the mainstream," said Chanthavongsa, almost with an air of vindication. "We have begun to understand the government better in the last two, three years and the reverse too. So there is much more synergy now. I'm really happily surprised that we have won them over and now are close partners.
"I'm also glad that the Ministry of Education now appreciates and recognises the strength of the youth networks and what the young people can do."
PADETC's network of young people with 'heart' can be a powerful and positive social force to encourage other young people to use their time meaningfully, and steer clear from temptations such as drugs, alcohol and prostitution. In fact, one of its latest project relies on 500 students to spread the word on drug prevention through forum theatre. In just 14 months, this group reached out to 98,000 students and villagers.
The home grown organisation is not resting on its laurels: it already plans to develop packages of multimedia teaching and learning tools to support teachers and volunteers; and to train more volunteers to prevent a drop in quality as the project widens its coverage.
"So the picture emerging from the jigsaw puzzle is the 'house' of sustainable development, and with it, education of the 'heart.' With it, we can help communities practise good governance, and find genuine happiness. We want to popularise this model not just in Lao but also in the region," said Somphone.
An ambitious plan but as the last ten years have shown, hard work and passion can reap some surprising rewards.
***ENDS****
Copyright PADETC
Written by Bridgette See (Freelance writer in eco-travel & community development)
Website: www.padetc.org
*Sombath Somphone won the Ramon Magsaysay Award for Community Leadership in 2005
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