A social justice based approach to life skills: Insights from the Prerna School

• In Event: Life skills education for youth: Critical perspectives

Proposal

This presentation will argue for a structural, human rights and social justice based approach to life skills, contextualized in an urban setting in the state of Uttar Pradesh, in north India. It will provide a descriptive analysis of a school program for girls and boys from marginalized backgrounds, aiming at educating them for gender justice. The school, Prerna has been established and is run by the Studyhall Educational Foundation (Founded by the author in 1994). The Prerna school focuses on life outcomes and learning outcomes both and its educational goal is to educate its students, both boys and girls to develop egalitarian and gender just habits of the mind and the intellectual, emotional and behavioural skills that will enable them to live as equal persons, which includes respecting others ( girls) right to equality. This presentation will focus particularly on the school’s program for boys, where they are helped to see that though patriarchy is not their fault, it is very cruel to girls and women and does give them an unfair share of power and privilege.

Author

• Urvashi Sahni, Study Hall Educational Foundation (SHEF)