[COLUMN] ‘Examine-in-rural-village’ training challenge creates ‘hometown’ for future generations

[Courtesy of the Seoul Metropolitan Office of Education]

[This special column was contributed by Cho Hee-yeon, superintendent of the Seoul Metropolitan Office of Education]

 

SEOUL –​ “It couldn’t be extra good.”

 

It was a remark from Yun Si-hu, a fifth-grade pupil who transferred from a faculty in Seoul to a Woldeung Elementary college in Suncheon some 294 kilometers (182 miles) south of the capital metropolis. His phrases had been probably the most comforting to folks like me who’re in a scenario the place we’ve to ponder the efficacy of instructional insurance policies.

 

College students appeared completely free after they laughed and giggled as they caught marsh snails, ready meals after taking eggs out of the henhouse, and as they performed with a ball in a large nature setting that was rolled out in entrance of their properties. What would “learning in a rural a part of the nation” means to Si-hu who thinks that his life in Suncheon is among the three happiest moments of his life?

 

It was additionally spectacular to listen to the story of a instructor at Woldeung Elementary College that the contents of the category turned considerable as youngsters got here from Seoul and group actions turned doable in school rooms. I feel these scenes absolutely reveal the necessity for college students to review in rural areas.

 

The Seoul Metropolitan Workplace of Training’s “Finding out Overseas in Rural Areas” challenge is designed to ascertain an ecological transformation training plan carried out in response to the period of the local weather disaster.

 

It’s our pressing instructional activity that we let our future generations have a severe thoughts of reflection on trendy industrial civilization within the period of the local weather disaster and develop into eco-friendly-minded, naturally delicate folks. Finding out within the countryside will probably be an experiment in South Korea. Finding out overseas in rural areas is for college students from Seoul, the capital of South Korea surrounded by high-rise cement buildings, to really feel the adjustments in nature in farming and fishing villages, to step on the soil, and create ecological sensitivity.

 

The challenge additionally intends to create a second hometown for metropolis college students who’re troublesome to have the sentiment of a “hometown” surrounded by nature. It was additionally vital to reply to the phenomenon of native extinction, a significant issue in our society. The learning overseas in rural areas challenge was anticipated to revitalize rural school rooms the place any exercise was troublesome as a result of absolute lack of scholars.

 

Regardless of the challenge being rolled out with quite a lot of good intentions, we weren’t certain whether or not any pupil will apply for this system. Nevertheless, my worries turned out to be unfounded fears. As a result of college students had been engaged in distant school rooms in 2021 when the agricultural learning challenge started as a result of COVID-19 pandemic, college students and oldsters who had been uninterested in extended social distancing confirmed excessive curiosity. 81 college students participated within the first packages and now, two years because the challenge was kicked off, we’ve had 714 contributors thus far.

 

The full variety of contributors is definitely a lot greater as relations of collaborating college students additionally moved to rural villages. This system expanded from South Jeolla Province to North Jeolla Province to cowl extra villages with themes corresponding to a therapeutic program for the physique and thoughts and a Taekwondo program within the city of Muju. Beginning this yr, the realm of protection will broaden to the jap province of Gangwon.

 

Now could be an period of challenges, dangers, and continual conflicts. In occasions like this, it is very important have the aptitude to create an setting the place folks, nature, and applied sciences can co-exist. It’s also the rationale why I recommend co-existence as an vital precept that penetrates the concept of future training. Conflicts can by no means be resolved by dichotomous concepts. We will creatively clear up such issues by way of a means of realizing the interconnectivity and interdependence between Earth and people, people and people, and people and non-humans past the dichotomous battle, and creating a brand new common story of co-existence.

 

I imagine that the study-abroad-in-rural-village challenge will change into part of our instructional sector’s many vital common tales of co-existence. The challenge is an lively instructional coverage that seeks co-existence and co-prosperity between cities, rural areas, and people. Greater than 2,800 rural colleges have closed since 1982 due to decreased variety of college students. The variety of colleges prone to closing down continues to extend. In a rustic like South Korea the place about 50 % of the entire inhabitants is targeted on the capital metropolis and its satellite tv for pc cities, the closing down of rural colleges is straight related to native extinction.

 

Some say that our challenge is a “downgrade” of the present instructional system and a few say that it’s an “exile” however such feedback overshadow the phrases of a neighborhood help company’s scholarship supervisor that “many individuals are struggling on this area to make rural life an exquisite option to dwell correctly, not a lifetime of the defeated.” In a way, it could possibly be degrading statements concerning the residents of rural areas.

 

In truth, within the village the place our college students examine overseas, there are numerous packages custom-made for worldwide college students corresponding to horseback using and golf lessons which might be troublesome to entry in cities. Quite a few persons are attempting to share the charms of rural areas. In South Korea, a rustic of fierce personal training, folks residing in rural areas can get distant personal training in the event that they need to.

 

“Residing collectively” and co-existence usually are not troublesome phrases. It’s a query of methods to clear up the issues of life we dwell. The sustainable way forward for people and nature is feasible when we’ve created a society that doesn’t lose solidarity as world residents and members of the South Korean group. I attempt to understand this by way of training on co-existence.

 

If you wish to escape from the stark lifetime of the town, I like to recommend you to comply with the kid’s phrases, “It couldn’t be extra good,” and examine overseas in rural areas.