Kalvi

Kalvi is an Auroville unit researching the practice of Integral Education. Building the foundation for Integral Yoga, Integral Education strives to bring together the mind, body and spirit to guide the student to find a place of greater unity and peace, through an active work to evolve the human consciousness. Kalvi sees Auroville as its learning environment, using different existing spaces in the community for its activities. With a diverse international team of professional educators, our work follows the latest research on transformative education internationally, is dynamic, and innovative.

• It has been in operation for over 8 years, offering:
• Research on Integral Education
• Teacher Education and Programs for Adults
• Programs and Activities for Children
• Educational Materials
• Consulting and Mentoring

TLC had been operating for nearly 16 years building a community where children and adults could grow more conscious of themselves, each other and the environment, by learning and working together. They had been implementing ways to practice the concept of Integral Education where each part of the being is helped to grow into its full potential and the psychic being becomes the leader of one’s life and growth through an unending education. Communication skills, collaboration, critical thinking, problem-solving, leadership, ethical decision-making, action-oriented practices, accountability, responsibility, as well as creativity and imagination were the foundation of practices and methods used.

Current situation

TLC was officially closed by SAIIER on the first of July 2024. TLC lost the space, infrastructure and support for maintenances. This was due to budget cuts and the current development/destruction situation in Auroville.

Kalvi was approved to officially add “Programs and Activities for Children” by the FAMC (GB) as part of its scope of work and from first of July, it offered former TLC facilitators employment to create and run these new programs and activities. Most of the children previously in TLC (~20) were also enrolled.

Kalvi’s team thus expanded overnight with 12 Aurovilians, 2 newcomers, 5 SAVI volunteers, and 3 paid workers. A model for financial sustainability has been created to be able to generate the funds to support this team within the coming 2 years but, until then, donations are required to run the children’s programs and activities.

Evergreen community offered existing community spaces to host these programs and activities. Many spaces needed and still need improvements to make them usable. For a more comprehensive overview of the move and the programs and activities offered, please have a look at the Kalvi October Report.

Current budget situation

Presently, we receive about 1.5 lakhs a month from program fees, but we need around 2.5 lakhs a month to cover rental of space, maintenances, stipends, and salaries for facilitators and team.

Then we need funds to cover expenses like food (we get part of this through BCC/parents/facilitators), transport, educational materials etc. and then to develop the campus, to have enough learning environments for our programs, and do basic things like mosquito proofing learning spaces, fixing the leaking community kitchen roof, etc.

Although we have some reserves in place, we are currently running a deficit of around 1 lakh a month, not counting expenses for basic space maintenance and improvement. 3 of 10In the new year, our programs and other fundraising events will be able to provide the necessary finances to keep us going until the more sustainable revenue stream is obtained, but we currently need support until the end of the year of at least 1 lakh/month.

Project Team

Below is a non-exhaustive list of the Kalvi project team. For the full team and more details, please follow this link.

Maya: Management of Kalvi, research, and coordination. Developing methods and practices to bring systemic change in education. Maya facilitates teacher education programs for different age groups, Integral Education programs, activities with children, and works with innovative educational material design.

Ishay: Management of Kalvi, the creative director and developing the educational materials for AuroGames / teachers program. As a Worldschooler parent, Ishay has travelled extensively, bringing education into the everyday of his children and life.

Ashwini: Administrative face of Kalvi, welcoming new participants, volunteers and supporting the overall organization in a multitude of ways.

Tamar: Tamar is the main coordinator of the children’s programs and facilitates the Independent Learning program for children ages 6-12.

Sara: Sara facilitates the Independent Learning a program for children ages 6-12, and mentors individual and collective processes, supporting children to know themselves, direct their learning, take responsibility and self-assess, building the foundation of character needed for the child to begin to enter into a Free Progress methodology at age 12-14.

Aims & objectives

Overall Objective: To provide integral education to about 50–70 children, 20 (2-6 year olds), 35 (7-12 year olds), 15 (13-14 year olds).

Specific Objective for this application of funding: Receive support now to be able to, have the capacity to receive new parents and kids (10-15) in the new term, which will in, turn enable the sustainable functioning of Kalvi to offer these services.

Existing Staff/facilitators will be financially supported.

These facilitators are responsible for:

• Actively researching the practice of integral education
• Scheduling work with the children
• Ensuring the work gets done
• Providing the necessary elements for a child’s development
• Ensuring communication between all parties (parents, kids, facilitators)