What is Regenerative Education?
"The current education paradigm holds the idea that the sole purpose of education is to educate individuals within their particular society, to prepare and train them for work in an economy that integrates people into the national cultural reality and passes on to them the values and morals of that society.
In Carol Sanford’s critical analysis: “The Role of education is the means of socializing individuals and to keep society running smoothly and remain stable.” In other words, to form people who conform to the ruling class of their respective societies.
This theory has dominated modern culture and defined the social rules of nations for the last 200 years or more.
There is an emerging new theory of education that we at Gaia Education espouse and are dedicated to developing further. An education that serves people and the planet as we move into a new environmental reality, with its accompanying social shifts, economic transformation and understanding of who we are as a species and an individual.
Daniel Wahl describes this new education paradigm this way: “Education for regenerative cultures is about the life-long process of enabling and building the capacity of everyone to express their unique potential to serve their community and the planet and in the process serve themselves.”
-from https://www.gaiaeducation.org/news/a-regenerative-education-for-our-times/
More from Gaia Education:
Why Regenerative Education?
Regenerative — committed to realizing the evolutionary potential of life. Carol SanfordBased on this new thinking, we can say that Regenerative Education aims to:
- Progressively improve the whole individual (body, mind, and spirit)
- Express the essence of the individual and the learner’s innate potential embedded in the larger reality they inhabit
- Continually cultivate just and reciprocal relationships with other individuals, communities and nature
- Honour the interconnected and mutually influential relationship between people and the ecosystem where they live
- Promote justice, equity, compassion and cooperation
- Honor the uniqueness and expression of each person
- Look to the past and the future, our elders and our youth, for wisdom in order to bridge the inter-generational gap
- Look to uplift every person in order to create conditions for “peace and prosperity” for everyone.
- Reward diversity, inclusivity, generosity, creativity, innovation and the fruits of our collective intelligence
- Understand that life is iterative and ever-changing, that change is the only constant, that evolution has gotten us where we are today
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