Dear Rainmatter Community members,
Greetings from rainy Wayanad!
The Gurukula Botanical Sanctuary, alongside The Forest Way Trust, Upstream Ecology, and Adavi Trust, are collaborating on a new/old educational initiative inspired by GBS’s established adult programs—immersive, skills-focused, and community-driven. Beginning in 1998, we’ve run multiple programs: Exploring the Essentials of Life (with Centre for Learning, Bangalore), The Landscapes and Lifeskills Course (with Pradip Krishen and Himal Prakriti), and the Apprenticeship in Ecological Nurturance (with The Forest Way and Upstream Ecology). We’ve always strived to engage small groups of youth and adults meaningfully in exploring nature and themselves. Initially three months long, these immersive programs, emphasizing fieldwork, practical skills, and close-knit living while studying plants and animals, grew to ten months with the 2020 AEN. The pandemic derailed our programme; however, we’ve revived it with an altered approach. With Rainmatter Foundation’s 2024 support, we launched a diverse range of programmes: Rewilding Retreats, biodiversity-focused short courses and surveys, various internships, and longer apprenticeships.
And now we’re notching things up, as things seem to get back on track for our intercommunity project; we’ll now offer a wider range of skills, deeper landscapes and ecosystems understanding, and, most notably, a stronger ethical foundation with an emphasis on supporting community, alongside the other organizations.
We’re dedicating the next few weeks to collaborative reflection and volunteer work at the Gurukula Botanical Sanctuary, inviting friends and others to help draw out the foundational principles of this prospective school. A month-long (or longer) fluid conversation, welcoming varied and changing participants, is our vision. We offer two short workshops during this time: one on the Place of Science in Intercultural Wisdom, and the other on Krishnamurti, nature, and education.
Please check out the poster below; already shared on social media, for details.
Hoping this finds you in the best of monsoon spirits!
GBS Team
