Ethical education and well-being in Italian schools
Since 1999, when the Ministry of Foreign Affairs recognized it as an eligible nongovernmental organization carrying out development and public awareness projects, ASIA has been involved in carrying out projects abroad and information and education activities in Italy.
Initially, the idea was to inform Italian and European citizens about the activities being carried out in Tibet and other countries and the different cultures and traditions that we came into contact with while carrying out our projects. During those years, our activities aimed to make people aware of Tibet’s rich cultural heritage and the serious risks it faces after the Chinese occupation in 1959.
We organized seminars, lectures and exhibitions so that civil society could learn about traditional Tibetan medicine; the world of nomadic herders; contemporary artistic expressions; the delicate ecosystem of the Himalayas and other aspects of this immense culture.
This constant presence in Tibet, Nepal and India with the holders of Tibetan spirituality and in particular the Teachings of Chögyal Namkhai Norbu – who often urged us to make known the values of Tibetan culture and to interact more and more openly with the people we came into contact with – gradually led us to carry out projects aimed at Italian schools in order to spread the values of Buddhist culture and spirituality among students and teachers, aware of how much this knowledge could help to counter the phenomena of hatred, intolerance and discrimination that were spreading extremely quickly.
Empathy, interdependence, and nonviolence could become the pillars of a task to raise awareness and educate the youngest and affect and make a difference in what is one of the most important institutions in society, the school.
We were convinced that only an increased awareness of the individual could generate change and evolution in society, so we decided to accompany the youngest in their inner growth, proposing methods, to primary and secondary schools, that would complement the classical school approach totally focused on instruction rather than education.
In this way our first ethical education and wellness project in schools was created in 2019, “Distinct but not Distant – The values enshrined in Buddhist culture as a means of breaking down inner boundaries and making diversity a great wealth”. It was funded by the Italian Ministry of Foreign Affairs and opened the doors of schools and allowed us to verify the strong need for emotional literacy, awareness of one’s inner world and listening among children and adolescents.
The fact that the Italian government had supported a project based on Buddhist values to address the strong individual and collective distress was a great encouragement to take the vision and activities related to the Teaching of Chögyal Namkhai Norbu to the outside world. In particular, with Distinct but Not Distant, the teaching of Kumar Kumari entered public schools for the benefit of primary students for the first time.
The arrival of COVID-19 did the rest. The pandemic experience was a kind of detonator for so many issues that were present but often latent and which exploded in a strong way with the sudden upheaval in the rhythms of life, uncertainty and fear that we all found ourselves experiencing. For children and young people anxiety increased exponentially. As the National Council of the Order of Psychologists (Cnop) noted, it is precisely young people who have developed the long effect of psychological problems.
According to a periodic survey conducted by the Piepoli Research Institute just for the Cnop in January 2021, almost 8 out of 10 people were feeling stress at a medium to high level, and among the most affected were young people and children, who saw their life habits, socio-affective ties within school, contacts with their friends suddenly come to an end, and who often absorbed their parents’ worries and sufferings.
Tension, irritability, sleep disturbances, difficulty in attention and concentration, and aggressive behavior are increasingly found in childhood. The alarm has also been sounded by the WHO: today, worldwide, suicide is considered one of the three leading causes of death among individuals aged 15-44, and is estimated to be the leading cause in the future.
Becoming aware of this problem, our intention to make available to young people and schools knowledge, practices and values rooted in Himalayan contemplative traditions and in particular in the teachings of Chögyal Namkhai Norbu was strengthened.
Thus, in 2020, our partnership with Merigar was established, with whom over the past four years we have implemented five projects co-funded by the UBI, Italian Buddhist Union. The cultural mission of the projects aimed to promote in educational institutions knowledge that embraces themes consistent with the Buddhist view such as mindfulness, compassion, peace, respect for the environment and all living beings, and the interdependence of all phenomena.
With the first of these projects – “Seeds of Awareness: starting from self-knowledge to rediscover the deep connections that exist between human beings and cultivate relationships of empathy” – carried out in Rome, Naples and the Amiata municipalities we followed up on the Kumar Kumari experience in elementary school that had already begun with the previous project. Given its great success and positive feedback from teachers and parents, we have continued to present it in all subsequent projects. The young students were able to develop a greater awareness of the breath and the body, and the link between it and the mind. In particular, the welcoming and listening atmosphere created by the teachers and the invitation to share brief reflections on their own feelings helped the children cultivate calmness, attentiveness and a cooperative attitude, very valuable in this early age when they are encouraged to be competitive.
As part of the same project, workshops on fairy tales from around the world and drawing, as well as experiences of mindfulness and empathy, enabled children to creatively get in touch with their own emotional world and stimulated them to put themselves in the shoes of others. The concluding activity – the photographic exhibition “Portraits of India and Tibet” by Enrico Dell’Angelo – introduced civil society to a distant world that is unfortunately disappearing.
This was followed by four other projects, all carried out in the area of Rome and its province and the Amiata municipalities, each project with its own characteristics.
With “Breathing the Earth. Resilient children consciously live with themselves and the environment”, we presented the children with ways to become aware of and care simultaneously for their inner world and the plants and fruits of the Earth. In fact, the overall goal of the project was to spread the values of mindfulness, respect for the environment and the interdependence of all living beings inherent in the Buddhist view to first grade educational institutions and increase the resolve and environmental awareness of students and teachers. More specifically, it aimed to foster the socio-emotional development of elementary school children through increased awareness of their inner space (with “Yantra Yoga – Kumar Kumari” activities and “Mindfulness Experiences”) and the outer environment (with “School Gardens” environmental education activities and the “Earth Viewed from Space” workshop).
The project “Educating to Defend Animal Rights and Protect the Environment for a Sustainable Future of Planet Earth”, in which LAV (the Anti-Vivisection League) also participated, focused on respect for all living things and the environment.
In particular, primary and secondary school students, teachers, and civil society were made aware of animal rights, forms of protection and care – both on the level of the individual and society – and the risks associated with climate change and links to intensive meat consumption.
To promote empathy and respect for all living things, we organized a visit to the LAV Rescued Animals Recovery Center in Semproniano. This meeting was conducted via Google Meet call, with the online presence of the ASIA educator, and led by the LAV educator present in Semproniano who, together with the animal keepers, told students and teachers stories and characteristics of some of the animals at the Center.
Out of this experience came the picture book “ANIMALS AND ENVIRONMENT – Respect for animals through the eyes of children,” made from the children’s drawings and inclusive of the ASIA and LAV educational kits used in the classroom.
Finally, civil society was offered an in-depth look at these issues from an interdisciplinary perspective through the “Animal Landscapes” webinar series.
DO WE MAKE PEACE? Taking Care of Inner Enemies to Make Peace with the Outside World, conceived and initiated during the period when the Russian-Ukrainian war re-entered our daily lives, aimed to contribute to a nonviolent and peaceful society by experientially reviving a series of human values such as empathy, kindness, compassion, and altruism. Activities directed at elementary school students (Kumar Kumari and the Emotions in Color workshops) were complemented by those aimed at teachers with theoretical-experiential courses structured in 3 modules: yantra yoga, emotion management and empathic communication. The goal of these courses was to create a space and time in which teachers could stop and take care of themselves and their inner world, and at the same time acquire knowledge and tools to be able to manage emotions and communication in a healthy and empathic way. This seemed to us to be the fundamental starting point to be able to help teachers be effective and play their educational roles successfully. Schools are becoming increasingly bureaucratic and the only kind of training they receive is technological or procedural. The human aspect is completely neglected and teachers find it difficult to relate to students’ psychological and emotional problems and their own burden of stress and tension.
In fact, all the groups we worked with expressed great appreciation for the work done and the need to deepen it, and when it was possible we lengthened the course with additional meetings.
Another novelty included in this project was the guided tours of the MACO Museum in Arcidosso for primary students aged 8 – 11 and their accompanying adults, with a focus on the theme of compassion and how this can be the basis for a non-violent, peaceful approach to life.
To conclude the project, the conference “Inner Disarmament. Contemplative Ways in Dialogue on Peace,” offered civil society an opportunity to reflect on Peace, understood as a living, dynamic process that stems from self-knowledge and inner peacefulness, a path to be cultivated with care and perseverance rather than a goal to be reached. Distinguished representatives of different religions and contemplative paths had the opportunity to dialogue and discuss different approaches to inner disarmament: Diana Petech, a teacher of Zen Buddhism from the School of Thich Nhat Hanh; Luigino Bruni, economist and exponent of the Focolare Movement; Geshe Jampa Gelek, resident Tibetan master of the Lama Tzong Khapa Buddhist Institute; Imam Mikail AbdAllah Mocci, a member of the Council of Religious Guides of CO. RE.IS (Islamic Religious Community) Italy; Khenpo Gelek Jinpa, from the Bön Shenten Dargye Ling spiritual center in France; Adalberto Mainardi, a monk from Cellole and representative of the Hesychast tradition in Slavic Orthodoxy; Svamini Shuddhananda Giri, a Hindu nun from the Matha Gitananda Ashram in Altare (Savona); Miriam Camerini, a theater recorder and scholar of Judaism; and Giorgio Bonaccorso, a Benedictine monk.
The latest project carried out in partnership with Merigar and with funding from the UBI was “WE ARE ONE: from the illusion of a separate self to the awareness of an interconnected self”, concluded at the end of August. We wanted to work with young people on their sense of identity, stimulating different and inclusive ways of perceiving others and mitigating the sense of separation and isolation. In addition to Kumar Kumari, Mindfulness, Kindness and Empathy Workshops and others on recycling and environmental sustainability, with this project for the first time Khaita Dances classes were activated in Italian schools and it was a real success. The boys and girls immediately understood the message that the dances bring: no one is first and no one is last, as one seven-year-old noted, “in the circle everyone is equal.” The manner in which the dances are performed and the fact that they are performed to Tibetan folk songs proved to be very effective in increasing the spirit of cooperation, allowing the children to relax and relieve tension, and to get in touch with a different culture.
Given the experience with the previous project and the need encountered, we again implemented Yantra Yoga and Mindfulness trainings for teachers.
The culmination of all the activities was the concert “We Are One,” featuring Rashmi Batt and Fakhraddin Gafarov, which was open to both the classes and families who participated in the project and to civil society, and was intended to be a celebration of interconnectedness through the coming together of different and little-known musical traditions.
In addition to these projects, since 2022 ASIA has been a partner, together with Città Metropolitana Roma Capitale, in the “GREEN SCHOOL Italia Program: a network of schools and territories for sustainable development,” funded by AICS, which supports member schools that commit to adopting good practices to reduce their carbon footprint and stimulate the adoption of active and virtuous behaviors toward sustainability among students, families and communities. To date there are 35 schools in which we are present and, as of this fall, the Metropolitan City of Rome has fully entrusted us with the management of the project.
In these years of working inside schools we have learned to understand their complex dynamics, encountering numerous difficulties that from time to time we have addressed by adapting our proposals to emerging needs. We have understood how important it is to work more and more on prevention and the health of children and adolescents, and for this reason we are developing, together with other agencies and associations, a program to promote the development of safe, nonviolent, inclusive and effective educational environments for all in educational institutions at all levels. The intention is to start with teacher training and then involve classrooms in the development of key competencies: personal competencies (awareness and emotions) social competencies (relationships and community) and the ability to learn how to learn (critical and reflective thinking). The program will run for five years so as to have a measurable impact on students’ social-emotional development and the well-being of the school system. The goal is to implement a method – like the Green School – to be disseminated nationwide and to earn schools that apply it the certification of Re-School, the Resilient School.
We hope that circumstances will allow us to find the funds and continue to develop these activities.
To date we have reached more than 7,400 students in Italian public schools. These are small seeds that if watered can generate change in their own area and create a contagious wave of awareness, empathy and kindness in society.
