I came to know about this course mid last month and immediately decided that I should join this. What caught my eyes was the clarity of thought using which the article was written and the location of the course, which is my hometown, Jabalpur. To submit the application we have to through following content :-
- India’s Knowledge Crisis: The Struggle Between Formal Education and Traditional Skills
- Crafts Show the Way for Indian Industrialization: A Path to Sustainable Development
- Is India following an alien model of “Development” and “Education” ?
And fill the form sharing our insights from the content. Following is what I shared.
While growing up I always had questions like why we have so many rituals which our elders are performing. I did ask questions but according to my understanding then, I did not get the satisfactory answers. I also did not put my honest efforts to understand as I did not give enough importance to it, at that time. I was busy pursuing what was expected from a formally educated child. From the Guruji video, I could now connect all the missing dots; on how in the village we had interdependence and was complete on its own.
As I write this, I recalled how I tried to teach my grandmother to read and write in her 60’s after watching the commercial on DD “Padna Likhna Seekho … O Mehnat Karne Walon”. Till recent times (till 5-8 years), I used to consider formal education the only way of being called literate. How wrong was I?
As mentioned in the “The skilled & the schooled” article, we don’t get skilled graduates from the colleges. The colleges are just trying to fill the seats, specially the ones on which they get subsidies/scholarships from the government. The government gives scholarships to students from special castes and students from villages. That is doing double damage, first relocating the students from villages to cities and second as most of the colleges are not giving them the right skillset. After graduating students move to even bigger cities to get the right skillset and then get caught in the never ending cycle of desire and EMIs.
I think with the advancement in Artificial Intelligence (AI), the artificial wall which education institutes have created over the years is going to break down. This would make formally educated graduates like me realize how much real skill we have and I believe make us understand the value of skills which our farmers, artisans, and craftspeople. This kind of understanding would open up doors for more collective dialogues between the formally educated and skilled workers, which would create jobs which are sustainable. Something similar is also mentioned in the Uzramma article.
With more awareness about climate change and environmental damage done by humans; I can see that people are making conscious choices to purchase any items. The percentage for such people and purchases are low as compared to the other side. One of the reasons is that hand crafted products are sold at a premium in the regular market. By removing the exploitative market intermediaries and with better government policies, we can help our craftsmen to get better compensation for their craft, while not selling the product at premium.
As per my understanding, doing the above would reduce the price and may be some more adoption. But it would be difficult to surpass the consumption/production of items made in the big factories unless most people make better choices.
So how can we direct people to make better choices at scale? I would be coming with this question, during our workshop.
Today I got my acceptance and very happy about it. I have never explored villages near to Jabalpur while growing up and post education left the city. So this would be my chance the explore, which I am really looking forward to. During the course we’ll be exploring following topics in detail :-
- Global Economic History
- Indian Economic History
- Industrial Production and Artisanship
- Design and Aesthetics
and work with local artisans. Will post another blog post the course to share the experience and learning.
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