The School of Tomorrow (SOT) International Education and Cultural Festival 2015 began at the Beach Luxury Hotel at 9:00 am on Saturday, November 28. The welcome address by Beaconhouse Chairperson Mrs Nasreen Mahmud Kasuri was followed by a keynote speech by Dr David Cole. A panel discussion featuring Dr Pervez Hoodbhoy, Dr David Cole, Dr Lawrence Burke and Rashid Rana, moderated by Beaconhouse Chief Executive Kasim Kasuri elaborated on the six themes that are the focus of the SOT. These were Geopolitics and Global Security, Media and Digital Technologies, Art, Culture and Learning, Schools and Society, Environment and finally, Public-Private Education Partnerships.
The Heritage Awareness Programme activity led by Ms Marvi Mazhar was extremely popular, in which the hall was filled to capacity. Its emphasis was on teaching young children the importance of valuing our roots and understanding how one’s home is one’s city. Concurrent sessions ran throughout the day. The session on educating for peace raised the issue that “there was a time when weapons were made for war, now wars are made for weapons”. It emphasised how security is a state of mind that needs to be changed gradually. Our forgotten national language looked at ways to promote Urdu once more. A workshop on Robotics and Society was also well-attended.
The final set of pre-lunch sessions included ‘Brave new digital world: dream or nightmare?’, which looked at the pros and cons of digital technology on education and its impact on society. Another session discussed whether children under the age of 13 should be on Facebook. It raised questions of its benefits, such as collaborative learning and its ability to bridge the social gap, and its drawbacks including time wastage and addictive nature. Panellists discussed how it is the parents’ responsibility to keep a check and balance.
Sessions that were both significant and extremely well-attended in the afternoon were ‘Politicising Art and Popular Culture Across Borders’ that explored the question of whether politics should have a relationship with art. The panellists included Khalid Ahmad, Khurshid Mahmud Kasuri, Rashid Rana and Sanjay Rajoura, and the session was moderated by H M Naqvi. ‘Are Private Schools Enablers or Dividers?’ had another exciting line-up of panellists including Farzana Feroz, Pervez Hoodbhoy, Nisar Khuhro and and Baela Jamil, moderated by Mehmal Sarfaraz. After a heated discussion, they concluded that the vision for education must emerge from the society. Another related discussion questioned whether public and private education partnerships can work and felt that such partnerships are the way forward if the State pools resources.
The session on Nationalism and Identity was extremely engaging, with personal experiences that supported the view that over the years our sense of national identity has been confused by curricular complications that have linked religious identity and security issues to a sense of self and nationhood.
Parents keenly attended sessions on developmental milestones, story as a vehicle or object of learning and the influence of media on young people. Several other sessions took place through till the evening, all of which ran to packed halls and high audience engagement.
The evening’s entertainment included a theatre production ‘So NOT a DREAM’, a bilingual adaptation of Shakespeare’s ‘A Midsummer Night’s Dream’. This was exquisitely performed by students of Beaconhouse College Campus Karachi and directed by Sunil Shankar and Joshinder Chaggar. There was also an enthralling Dastangoi session, a revival of the Urdu oral storytelling tradition by Fawad Khan, Nazar-ul-Hassan and Syed Meesum Naqvi.
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