News from Rishi Valley Education Centre (RVEC)

In January 2008 the State Government of Andhra Pradesh took the singular step of declaring Rishi Valley and its environs a specially protected zone. A Special Development Authority (RV-SDA) has been set up (Order No. Ms 97 dated 24 January 2008) which, apart from the Chittoor District Collector, and the Panchayat Heads will include representatives from the Krishnamurti Foundation.  The objectives of this pioneering initiative are to (a) protect and conserve Rishi Valley's rich and diverse environment from being degraded, through unrestrained growth; (b) bring about sustainable development; (c) promote inclusive growth to all its stakeholders; and, (d) preserve Rishi Valley's sanctity as a heritage site.

The generosity of Rishi Valley alumnae during and after the 75th anniversary celebrations, in 2006, will see a new science laboratory, a larger guesthouse, a new dining hall and refurbished kitchen on campus. The well-known architect Shankar from Kerala has designed all these buildings.

With financial support from former student, a hydrological survey of the Valley was conducted to map the underground streams, wells, check dams and recharge points on campus. The internationally known hydrologist Dr. Vishveshwaran headed the team.  Dr David Stacey from England assisted by Sunil Thomas and Kartik Kalyanram, teachers of Rishi Valley, and with local farmers, mapped the terrain. The major recommendations of the report include changing cropping patterns and clearing out existing water channels.

News from the Rishi Valley Study Centre

The annual KFI Gathering held at Rishi Valley towards the end of November drew an audience of about three hundred persons from different parts of the country.  The theme for the Gathering ‘The Path and the Pathless’ was intended to be a study of the relationship between J. Krishnamurti’s two major statements, ‘You are the world’ and ‘I want to set man unconditionally free.’  Implications flowing from the theme were explored in multiple ways: through texts and texts attributed to Krishnamurti prior to his dissolution of the Order of the Star; through Krishnamurti’s interpretation of karma, which is probably the only concept from ancient thought he adapted; and through the idea of ‘total responsibility’, which is one of the hidden meanings he distilled from the statements. Videos of Krishnamurti in discussion with Pupul Jayakar and a talk given by him in Washington D.C. were shown to spotlight various facets of the theme.  The talks were followed by animated, even vociferous discussions.

Teachers from the school meet regularly on Tuesday evenings around readings from “Letters to the Schools,” which has recently been published in a re-edited edition.
Sunday evening discussions continue. Students, teachers and visitors participate in these free ranging discussions.

Three issues of the KFI Bulletin were edited for publication.

The psychiatrist and filmmaker Pierre Anglade who is making a film on Krishnamurti spent several days with his team of cinematographers in the Study Centre.    Cecilia and Miguel, Spanish-speaking filmmakers visited the center along with several guests from around the world.

News from Rishi Valley School
Gieve Patel the eminent painter, poet and playwright has been conducting poetry workshops for students at Rishi Valley, ever since he first visited Rishi Valley, in 1997.  An anthology of the students’ work during this period was published in December 2007 by the Sahitya Akademi, whose Director Shri Keki Daruwala is himself a poet of standing.   Poetry with Young People is an elegant book with illustrations by some of the county’s most prominent artists, Atul Dodiya, Anju Dodiya, Nilima Sheikh and Sudhir Patwardhan.  Their artfully understated illustrations create a wonderful affinity with the students’ youthful writing without overwhelming it.   In his introduction to the collection, Mr. Patel’s looks beyond the parents and teachers of Rishi Valley to address areas in present day education that are disappearing from view.  He spurns poetry induced by 'high emotions' ('a false adult notion of what goes on in young minds.'), such as heroism and patriotism, in favour of poetry that reflects genuinely felt emotions, even anger but also empathy. Above all, he does not condescend to his audience. He ‘read to them from the masters’:  ‘Sangam poetry from the first and second centuries in south India, Wang Wei, Francois Villon, Shakespeare, Robert Frost, A. K. Ramanujan . . .’ The following poem by Bilawal Singh Suri is an example of what students learned from Mr. Patel:

I used to be a man well off
Going about my business,
But now I have a job no more
And I'm looking out for a business.

I go walking looking for a job
But I've been walking so long, looks at last, dear reader,
That walking is my job.

Arun Swaminathan, a practicing architect from Bangalore joining the school as teacher, has created a new course in Design and Technology.  The course bridges the gap between Art, Mathematics and the Humanities. The medium of work is generally paper, cardboard, newspaper and junk. ‘Students are encouraged to reflect on their work and discuss amongst themselves as well as see what they could do in the future with their line of thinking,’ says Arun.  Mrs Vijaya Santhana Gopala Krishnan, who has several decades of teaching history, has joined the school; besides teaching she will hold the additional responsibility of looking after the senior school library.  A young couple – Roopika and Rishi with masters degree in management – joined the school this academic year. While Roopika teaches English and Social Studies in the Junior School, Rishi teaches Computer Science and Geography.  Mr. Santhanagopalakrishnan, formerly of the Government of India Revenue Services, has joined the school as teacher of Indian history at the senior level and as a senior administrator.  Mr. Santhanam will lend support and assistance to the RV-SDA programme.

The results of the ISC and ICSC examinations were on the whole very satisfactory.  Everyone passed with high averages. One notable achievement is the following: with 25 students sitting for the ISC examination, the average grade obtained added up to 89%.  Outgoing students from class 12 have found seats at St. Stephens, Miranda House, Lady Sri Ram College, and Sri Ram College for Commerce in Delhi; St. Xavier’s in Mumbai, at the newly established center for the humanities at IIT, Chennai and at the National Law School in Bangalore.  A few students have gone abroad, to Amherst, Mt. Holyoke, and University of Michigan in the United States, to the University of Waterloo in Canada and to Warwick in the United Kingdom.

News from the Community Mathematics Centre (RVCMC)
Our former principal Dr. Shailesh Shirali returned to Rishi Valley in 2007 to set up a Community Mathematics Centre.  Its purpose will be to serve as a resource centre for teachers, to produce enrichment materials that can be used across the country, and to create teacher networks that will enhance peer learning through the culture of problem solving, problem posing, and sharing of materials.

To date he has taken part in the following:

Conference held in IIT-Mumbai for Mathematics Teachers to highlight the use of technology in Mathematics education

AMTI Mathematics Teachers Conference, conducted in Warangal (28-30 December, 2008)
Workshop for Mathematics Teachers conducted in Mumbai under the auspices of CERE (28-29 March, 2008)

Workshop held in Pune by the Maharashtra State Government, for Mathematics and Science teachers (9-10 May, 2008)

Coaching camp for math Olympiad students held in HBCSE (4-25 May, 2008)
Workshop for Mathematics teachers conducted by IIT-Mumbai (26-30 May, 2008).

Visit to Sahyadri School, KFI (11-18 July, 2008), featuring interactions with mathematics teachers and extended meetings with members of the Sahyadri Math Club “AfterMath”.

A website is under preparation, and should appear soon. It will feature articles, problems, solutions, questions from readers, answers, responses from other readers, and so on.

Apart from working in the RVCMC, Padmapriya Shirali, who had earlier been associated with the development of mathematics materials for the 'School in a Box’ created by the RIVER programme will be working on the Middle School Curriculum in Mathematics and Telugu language studies.

News from the Rishi Valley Institute of Teacher Education (RVITE)

Some of the activities undertaken by Rishi Valley Institute for Teacher Education (RVITE) during the year 2007-2008 are described below:

Conducting ‘Teacher Development’ sessions as a series of interactive workshops with the teachers of the Rishi Valley School.  Two themes were explored: 'planning for teaching' and 'correction and feedback'. 

Organising two subject based workshops as outreach programmes.  Participants included teachers from a range of different schools in Bangalore, Chennai, Hyderabad and Coimbatore.  The first workshop, for English teachers, was on 'Strategies for Language building, and Teaching of Comprehension and Writing in English'. Rohini Oomman, an experienced teacher and teacher educator from Bombay and Ishwari Chandramauli, from our school were the resource persons for this workshop.  

The second workshop, for Hindi teachers, was on 'Strategies for Language Building and Teaching of Hindi to non-Hindi speaking Children'. Chandrika Mathur was the resource person.

A workshop for KFI School teachers on 'Curriculum and Teaching in the Social Sciences’ drew teachers from Sahyadri, Rajghat, the Valley School in Bangalore and The School in Chennai.

Initiating a project for curriculum and material development for teaching Science at the middle school level, for the Rural Education Centre.

Continuing a project for curriculum and material development for teaching Hindi to non-Hindi speaking children at an intermediate level.  Work at the middle school level was also initiated in collaboration with Anjali Noronha from Eklavya, Bhopal.

Organizing and supporting a study-cum-planning visit by a group of teachers and administrators from the Anubhuti School, a newly established residential school in Jalgaon, Maharashtra.

Participating in a series of four workshops (and hosting one of these) for the reformulation of the 2-year B.Ed programme of the Regional Institutes of Education, NCERT

News from Rishi Valley Rural Education Centre (REC)

Rishi Valley Institute for Educational Research has trained around 1000 persons belonging to various agencies in India, and Nepal. Trainees from Sarva Siksha Abhyan from Goa, Samavesh of Madhya Pradesh and Srujanavani in Vishakapatanam participated in the programme along with teams from Azim Premji, Natco and Satyam Foundations, Somaiya Trust, Mumbai, SCERT, Raipur and America India Foundation, New Delhi.

Professor Ralf Girg from Regensburg, Germany, and Rishi Valley Education Centre organized a joint seminar on ‘A Sane Society through Inner and Outer Education’. Professors Meenakshi Thapan from the Department of Sociology of Delhi University participated in the seminar. Mr. Padmanabha Rao, Mrs. Rama Rao, Dr. Chandrika Mathur, Mr. Alok Mathur, Ms Kavita Krishna and Dr Radhika Herzberger represented various units of the Rishi Valley Education Centre.

Padmanabha Rao, Rama Rao, accompanied by T. Venu, E. Ramu, Y. Krishnappa and G. Anil, spent 20 days in Ethiopia.  The team for several years has been working with a group from Dembi Dolo on a multi-grade programme in the local Oromoo language.  In the course of the visit they set up Model Schools and conducted Teachers’ Training courses.

A team from REC went to Puducherry in July 2008 and conducted a 4-day workshop for the SSA, Puducherry. This was a first initiative of its kind wherein the Multi-grade Methodology was going to be used at the primary level for English Medium Schools affiliated to CBSE board.

The KHEMKA FOUNDATION awarded Padmanabha Rao and Rama Rao, joint Heads of Rishi Valley Institute of Educational Research (RIVER) fellowships for innovation in primary education and in scaling-up their methodologies in February 2007.  The Khemka Foundations Schwab Foundation also felicitated them on the occasion for their Outstanding Social Entrepreneurship.

Ms Mei Lan Frame, a Fulbright scholar spent nine-month at REC. Her research project was titled “RIVER: Community and Culture in Education”.

Ever since RIVER won the Global Development Award a fairly ambitious building programme is underway.

A new Dining Hall and a Multi Purpose Hall were inaugurated by in August 2007.
An International Guest House jointly funded by the Professor Ralf Girg’s group from Germany and the RVEC has been completed.  Professor Girg and his students will be the first to avail of the facilities in August 2008.

Plans to refurbish the existing classrooms, build a new library and a few dormitories are proceeding.  Sishukunj International an educational foundation from the United Kingdom has very kindly come forward to sponsor some of these structures.

A new documentary ‘A Freedom to Learn’ was released.  The film was made at the Rural Education Centre, with camerawork by Cecilia and Miguel and script by Raju Ashirvadam.
A new computer laboratory which host 14 machines, donated by Mr Harish Raghavan and Mrs Rama Raghavan (ISC 81) of New York was inaugurated in August.  The realization that the new laboratory would open up new vistas for their children has generated a great deal of excitement among the local people.

The Annual Sports Day was conducted on 27 & 28 Jan 2008. Children participated with a lot of enthusiasm.

News from the Rural Health Care Centre (RHC)
Over 16,000 patients accessed the health centre for health care services. With this the total number of patients who have accessed the health centre since its inception has crossed 63,000. Patients come in from as far as 100 km, for the quality and cost of the health care provided.

Health Programmes

1. Eye Care: Dr TN Krishna Reddy and SILOAM eye hospital, at Madanapalle, operate on our patients for Cataract surgeries at a minimal cost of Rs 1100/- per cataract. 73 cataract surgeries were done bringing the cumulative figure to 821 surgeries since the programme started in 2001.
2. Tuberculosis: The RNTCP, regional coordinator and the District TB Officer visited the RHC in Feb 2008. They were impressed with the quality of diagnostics, record keeping and follow up of patients. Subsequently they have instructed all Primary Health Centres in the area to refer patients to the RHC for sputum examination. The RNTCP provides the laboratory materials for the Sputum Tests. The TB programme diagnosed 69 new patients in 2007 – 08. 40 of these patients have been referred to the RNTCP for continuation of treatment. The total number of patients diagnosed at the RHC since the programme inception in 2002 is 283, with a cure rate of > 90%. (WHO requirement is 85%.)
3. Antenatal Programme: 44 new patients were registered in the year 2007 – 08. Most of them opted for hospital deliveries thanks to incentives introduced by the State Government (108 Ambulance and a Monetary incentive). The average birth weight continues to rise and it is now about 2.7 kg (up from 2.5 kg).
4. Diagnostic Centre: The laboratory continues to be very busy with an average daily workload of about 40 patients. More than 10000 investigations of different kinds including X Ray, Microbiology as well as Pulmonary Function Testing was done in 2007 – 08.

News from the Rishi Valley Estate:
The Estate has been experimenting systematically with organic farming techniques. A new technique for growing sugar cane with inter-cropping has been tried out successfully. Our agricultural fields have been certified as organic farms by recognised agencies.
With poor rainfall year after year we have been unable to experiment more extensively. The yield from orchards has been significantly less than the average due to unseasonal rain in the month of March.

New from the Rishi Valley Institute of Bird Studies and Natural History
Among the distinguished naturalists to visit the school and speak to students were:
Dr P. Jeganathan of the Bombay Natural History Society, who talked to students about the endangered and endemic species Jerdon's Courser, which was thought to be extinct, until its rediscovery in 1984. Its habitat is confined to just one known site in Kadapa district of AP.

Dr Kartik Shanker of Centre for Ecological Studies, Indian Institute of Science, Bangalore spoke on Sea Turtles: their biology and conservation.

Dr Raman Sukumar, Chairman, Centre for Ecological Studies, Indian Institute of Science,  Bangalore was the chief guest on the occasion of the Rishi Valley Bird Preserve Anniversary on 27th July.  He presented a slide show on Asian Elephants, their role in Indian culture and ongoing efforts to conserve their habitat.

Under the direction of Dr. Suhel Qader, the National Centre for Biological Studies in Bangalore has established a ‘field station’ for environmental monitoring at Rishi Valley. R. Somnath, a resident of the Valley has been collecting data on the fruiting and flowering times of trees and shrubs with a view to evaluating effects of climate change.  He is in addition compiling records of  livestock villages and on the use of natural resources by residents, which  will help create a more complete tool for monitoring environmental change in the Valley.

The Home Study Course on Ornithology has an enrollment of over 1070 students from all over the country as of 31 July 2008.

Mr Murali Reddy a research scientist working in america is maintaining a website that highlights Rishi Valley Education Centre’s work  in the areas on conservation, rural education and rural health. The website url is: www.forv.org (Friends of Rishi Valley).

Somnath has been collecting some very interesting information about the ecology of the valley and about the use of natural resources by its inhabitants. Somnath has been collecting data on fruiting and flowering times of various trees and shrubs (important for evaluating effects of climatic changes); on grass extraction from the hills above the school, and on livestock ownership in the villages within the watershed of the valley. Also, with the experience gained from this "environmental monitoring" at Rishi Valley, "field station".

Rishi Valley School ’s Seventy Fifth Anniversary Celebrations

Rishi Valley Education Centre turned seventy-five in 2006. The Rishi Valley Alumni Initiative, an organisation of the school’s Chennai-based former students, marked the occasion with a cultural programme followed by a day-long symposium in Chennai, on the 28th and 29th of July.

The artistes Leela Samson and Bombay Jayashree Ramnath, accompanied by their students Aditi Rao and Namrata Kartik, former students of Rishi Valley School, inaugurated the celebrations with a ballet, Asthacal. The Deccan Chronicle, reviewing the performance under the banner ‘Perfect Blend of Body, Mind and Soul’, described the event, which it said was inspired by J. Krishnamurti, as ‘coming not a day late, when tranquillity and contemplation are the only ways to deal with a life filled with stress and strife.’

Gowri Ramanarayan’s much acclaimed Rural Phantasy played to a full house at Kalakshetra, on July 30th. The play studded with songs by Kalki evokes the independence struggle.

The celebrations ended with a symposium on education titled “Quality Education for all in the 21’st century”. The meeting was intended to draw individuals from across the country that have contributed significantly and in different ways to the field of education. Among the aims of the symposium was to bring to focus innovative work in the field, to uncover the ideals that inform these efforts and so enlarge the public discourse in the country on education, in the hope that a comprehensive definition of ‘quality’ might emerge.

Professor Anandakrishnan, currently chairman Madras Institute of Development Studies and Dr. Krishna Kumar, director NCERT delivered the keynote addressed. In a comprehensive perspective, Professor Anandakrishnan portrayed the educational needs of the country, the failures of both private and public institutions to fulfil needs these and suggested ways of addressing the problem. His important suggestions included: decentralized curricular development and the creation of social monitoring and accountability norms.

Dr. Krishnakumar built his talk ‘Quality in Education’ around the legend of Eklavya, which he viewed as re-instating the existing social order; quality education was confined to the powerful in traditional societies. Modernity, he maintained, challenges this assumption and raises the question of quality in the context of mass education. Professor Krishnakumar warned against equating quality with reading and numeracy outcomes, which are held out as the key orientating feature for education by managers of the global marketplace. The paper ended with Dr. Krishnakumar suggesting two directions for the future of education. ‘In one direction, we should be looking for ways to build teacher confidence by ensuring communication between them and policy makers, curriculum designers and non-government organizations. In the other direction, we should look for greater historic awareness at all levels regarding the role of education in promoting a culture based on reason and peace, which might replace the culture of competitive aggressiveness which has been gaining legitimacy.’

Mr. M.V.Subbiah, Director, Murugappa Group gave the inaugural address, in which he spoke of the need for religion to become rooted in spiritual concerns.

Sri Bunker Roy, founder director of the ‘Barefoot College’, Tilonia in Rajasthan, who is inspired by Mahatma Gandhi’s faith in the wisdom and resourcefulness of village India, gave a power-point presentation of his work with poor rural school dropouts. Smt. Anjali Naronha, representing one of the oldest and most vibrant experiments in education, described Ekalavya’s work in government schools of Madhya Pradesh, including Ekalavya’s publications in the areas of science and language. Sri Padmanabha Rao Director of Rishi Valley Institutes of Educational Research (RIVER) showcased the multi-grade, multi-level programme that is presently being adapted for use in many thousand schools in India. Professor Kirti Trivedi of IIT, Mumbai introduced a beautifully designed multi-media display called ‘Recent Breakthroughs in Educational Technology :India's Response to A Global Challenge in Migrating to a Knowledge Economy’ on behalf of SchoolNet, India (IL&FS). Professor Mina Swaminathan, Dr. S. Anandalakshmy, Smt. Amukta Mahapatra, Professor Meenakshi Thapan, and Dr. Vithal Rajan joined with the large audience to discuss a wide range of issues in education. Dr. Sultan Ismail’s as chairman of the various sessions stalwartly helped balance out issues and moderated the discussion throughout the day.

The Campus

The abundant rain this year has filled all the water bodies on campus: wells, dry for more four years, have water, the large percolation tanks is overflowing; channels that had fallen into disuse now carry water downstream; and the five new percolation tanks are full – one can see Sliding Rock reflected in the pond across from Mulberry House.

The four-year drought has taken its toll on the large banyan tree (BBT), which lost several branches, its symmetrical canopy becoming lop-sided; the old mango orchard near Malli Bavi now has many bare spots; wetland birds lost their habitat. Our resident ornithologist Dr. Santaram notes their plight in a recent article:

“There have been hardly any waterbirds on the campus for several years now. The ubiquitous White-breasted Waterhens Amaurornis phoenicurus that used to advertise their presence with loud calls were now conspicuously absent. So were the Little Grebe, Common Moorhens Gallinula chloropus, egrets Egretta spp., waders, and Small Blue Alcedo atthis and Lesser Pied Kingfishers Ceryle rudis. The Indian Pond-Herons Ardeola grayii that had put up with the water shortage all these three years became scarce this season (December 2004 onwards). All these days they had eked out a living foraging on the dry ground close to the paths frequented by people, feeding on insects. Now even these became scarce and it was time to leave. Yet one or two individuals still frequent and occasionally flush out from quieter corners.”

With the filling up of ponds and lakes water birds are slowly returning. The Banyan Tree has revived after water was diverted to it eight hours a day for several days.

The new hospital designed by Sri Sankar from Kerala is a distinguished red brick building, a central courtyard of the building lets in light and air. Students like the new facility which has its own common room and kitchen.

The foundation for the new office building has been laid. Mr. Srinivas Reddy assures us that the office staff will move in by June 2006.

Agricultrure

Our Estate Manager Santosh has just harvested a crop of organically grown by the less water intensive Madagascar Method.

A 100 kg of Majjige Ragi, a white millet close to being lost, grown on our farm, has been made available to the Green Foundation for propagation among the organic farmers network in Karnataka.

Dairy

There is high demand for the bull calves from the Rishi Valley Dairy. They are being used in Dairy Farms in the disctricts of Anantapur, Nandyal, Tirupathy and Guntur,

The recently published Puffin Book of Children’s Verse edited by Eunice D’Souza and Melanie Selgado contains four poems written by Rishi Valley students for Gieve Patel’s Poetry Workshops. The poems are by Ishan Agarwal(2000), Alisha Raghavan (2003), Kriti Sharma (2003) and Raeesa Vakil, who is still at school in her final year. Alisha’s poem is given below:

Not Long Ago

Clothes you say
Must not be our only preoccupation
Friends you say
Must not be our only preoccupation

Forgetting to do our homework
You say is sinful
Keeping away from games field
You say is harmful

Junk food you say
Is abominable
Television you say
Is baneful

But not long ago
You too were a child like me.

Suruchi Aulakh, a former student, and Jaimini Pathak inaugurated the term with two engaging plays, the work of a Ramu Ramanathan, a Mumbai-based playwright. ‘Teen Sakina Manzil’ is a story of lost love set in war-time Bombay of 1944. ‘Mahadevbhai’ follows Mahatma Gandhi through the diaries of Mahadev Desai. Both plays were studded with period music and performed with great verve by Suruchi and Jaimimi.

News from Rishi Valley School

The following new teachers have joined the school.

Ms Srirangavalli Kona (mathematics), Ms Damayanti Rao (English);
Mr. S.G.Krishnan (history); Ms Srikumari (general science); Ms Susan Deborah(English); Ms Rima Sinha (dramatics), Mr. Siddhalingiah (computer science), Mangala Reddy (English), Veena Saldahna (economics and mathematics).

The orientation programme for the teachers focused on the necessity of relating to students as individuals in every respect including academic and non-academic areas. The place of silent observation in uncovering teachers’ preconceptions and individual students’ nature was also explored. Videos of talks and discussions with Krishnamurti were viewed.

Class 12 students arrived on June 1, fifteen days earlier than the rest of the students. They participated in group discussions with teachers, watched Krishnamurti talking with students and teachers on video, went on hikes and got a head start on their academic programme.

News from the Institute of Bird Studies and Natural History

Dr. V. Santharam and Mr. S. Rangaswamy of the Rishi Valley Institute of Natural History and Ornithology have been invited to serve as Advisors on Ornithology to the Jamshedji Tata Virtual Academy for Rural Prosperity. Their brief is to ‘help create among rural youth a love of nature’

News from the Herbal Garden

Dr. Nalini Geete was invited to Srinagar in Kashmir and is helping to identify herbs for sacred gardens in different locations in the city. She has brought back several indigenous varieties of millet that will be grown on campus.

News from the REC and RIVER

As part of RIVER’s endeavour to understand the implications of multi-grade education systems in more diverse communities, and to benefit from the contemporary pedagogical theories and practices, it is building connections outside the country. Rama and Padmanabha Rao, accompanied by Maitreyi spent six weeks during March and April in Europe in April and May lecturing at the University of Metz in France and the University of Regensburg in Germany.

In addition, the team interacted with a cross-section of people, including teachers of primary and secondary schools, headmasters of schools, school administrative officers, University professors in school pedagogy, and young teacher trainees. The team was able to observe and understand various classroom structures and processes and also look at a host of teaching-learning material in language, mathematics and environment study.

An ongoing programme with the University of Metz has brought students from the computer science department in France to RIVER. Our first visitor was Remy Bertot.

The Rishi Valley methodology, earlier adopted by the Chennai Corporation for some of its schools, broadened to include ten schools in each block. According to the Hindu, ‘the decision to extend the project to all districts was taken at an executive committee meeting of the Sarva Shiksha Abhiyan, after a joint assessment by the State and Central representatives of the SSA and the World Bank found the method "most scientific" and recommended that it be considered for replication. "The study materials were prepared by the Corporation staff after a brief training at Rishi Valley school in Andhra Pradesh. They will now be used in schools all over the State," he said. ‘

News from the Rural Health Centre

A Microbiology facility, the first of its kind in a 100 km radius, was established earlier this year. The doctors in Madanpalle as well as the people from surrounding villages, to whom it has meant much needed savings, have welcomed this much-needed facility. We also now have an Ultrasonologist visiting us on the first Sunday of every month. The Laboratory and Microbiology centres were funded by Mr. Ramkumar, an alumnus of RVS. The X-Ray machine donated by the SIDVIM trust was commissioned and is proving equally useful.

A new computer which will store data storage, inventory control Mr. Mahadevan, has been helping us with developing a software for patient record keeping. 

In the 3 years since its inception we have seen the average birth weight creep up from 1.8 kg to a healthier 2.3 kg, just short of the desired 2.5 kg.

The TB programme has been recognised by the District TB Society as a treatment centre under the DOTS programme of the Revised National TB control Programme. We will be sourcing drugs and laboratory materials from the Government.

We would like to share the following especially good news from the RHS with our readers and donors to the programme.

Lakshmidevamma is all of 23, pregnant for the third time; she came to us in her 5th month, complaining of loss of vision in the left eye.

She had a massive hypopyon and the cornea was so soft that one could easily have perforated it while examining.

The cause – severe malnutrition. Name the deficiency and she had it: Haemoglobin of 3 gm%, bleeding gums, smooth tongue, skin changes etc. She was literally on her last legs, could not take a step without gasping. Thank god for “modern medicine”, MMKCMT and friends like you all. She was admitted at a private hospital in Madanapalle and given nutritional supplements, Sub-Conjunctival injections etc. She made a remarkable recovery and delivered a healthy, but underweight baby girl. Both are doing well.

Madhuri, a 12-year-old girl presented with a dry cough and severe dyspnoea of 2 days onset. Surprisingly the chest was clear. Thanks to the new X-Ray machine, donated by the SIDVIM Trust, we were able to pick up massive bilateral pneumonia, probably Atypical. The child was transferred to the Paediatric ICU at St Johns Hospital in Bangalore. She was diagnosed as having mycoplasma pneumonia, was on the ventilator for 5 days, and has recovered well. It is a pleasure to see her running around and back to school. We were able to afford her treatment costs thanks to friends and well-wishers who have donated generously for patient welfare.

Global Development Award for Rishi Valley Rural Edcation Centre

Rishi Valley Education Centre (RVEC) of the Krishnamurti Foundation has been awarded the first prize for the “The Most Innovative Development Project 2004” at the Sixth Annual Global Development Conference held at Dakar, Senegal on January 26, 2005.

Sponsored by the Government of Japan, this Global Development Network (GDN) award is open to all development projects in Africa, Asia, the Middle East, Latin America and the Caribbean, and the transitional economies of Europe and Central Asia.

Adjudged by a multidisciplinary panel of experts, the award was given to the Rishi Valley Centre over several contestants, in recognition of its path-breaking multi-grade multi-level methodology and teacher training programmes developed for meeting the needs of children belonging to the underprivileged sections of society its rural schools.