Cambridge Branch Seminar

  • 18th October 2022
  • Faculty of Education, Room 2S4 Donald McIntyre Building, Cambridge
  • Seminar

Rethinking the Philosophy of Education in the light of
Sri Aurobindo
Gitanjali J Angmo, Himalayan Institute of Alternatives, Ladakh India

17:00-18:30
 
The question of a perfect philosophy of education has endured for centuries and has seen some long and hard fought disagreements. While the profundity of the queries into the abstractions of education has seldom suffered, the practicalities of enabling a sublime education for our children has remained elusive in most part. Perhaps the pressures of earning a livelihood are too pressing a concern for us that we turn a blind eye to other important purposes of education like inculcating social awareness, developing intelligence and character, and most importantly embarking on an endless journey of self-finding and self-expression to access higher vistas of the mind and deeper recesses of the heart which are in line with the true purpose of human evolution. Can a philosophy of education be constructed such that its proof is visible not in the dry cadence from premise to premise but rather in the wondrous eyes of a child looking onto the world? And, maybe, this kind of an education, while making us skilled and productive, would unlock those hidden doors of self-discovery that alone fill life with its essence – turning us, at first, from our present half-beast state to realising our full humanity and finally awakening the hidden faculties that are lying dormant in us waiting to be kindled, catapulting us beyond manhood! Such a philosophy would bring us the future.
 
Gitanjali J Angmo is the Co-Founder, Director & Dean of Himalayan Institute of Alternatives, Ladakh (HIAL), India. HIAL is an alternative University for mountain development based on the principles of contextual and experiential learning that is transforming higher education in India. Gitanjali has advised Governments of Maharashtra and Ladakh in designing their educational policies. She is authoring a book on the “5 pillars of the Education of the Future” slated to be released by the end of this year. She is a TED speaker, Chevening scholar at Oxford University and Women Transforming India national awardee from the Government of India.

PESGB Branch Secretary: Dr Daniel Moulin (contact: dpm50@cam.ac.uk)