8 March, 2024

Dear Parents,

Happy Women’s day to all!

LC for the past few weeks has been a topsy turvy emotional ride. To start with we had some really good discussions and then there were unsettling moments too. This has been happening during the month end transitions. It is the time when the ministers swap their profiles. Nothing seems to be working during those days. Sometimes constant reminders doesn't seem to be working. Lots of patience and a never ending supply of blocks of ice is what we need!

Seva Discussion

During the parliamentary meeting, some of the kids expressed disinterest in seva. Lots of emotions were being expressed, someone said that facilitators are forcing everyone to do seva. So we thought it as prudent to have a separate longer discussion so all of us could understand each other. When the meeting was called, we thought every member will join, but only those who completely opposed and who strongly believed in the idea came to the meeting, rest were fine either ways. There were 2 in complete opposition and two kids who were only half in opposition (yes, only half!) So overall a total of 3 or 4 kids out of 23 opposed the seva. We listed down the issues which were,

1. Its boring
2. If we have hired Sanjeevani Mausi then why bother?
3. Even if we do seva Mausi ends up doing it again
4. Its time consuming
5. I never get good seva partners

Lots of arguments were made on both the sides. Is this sociocratic if some of us are dissenting? Pro team spoke about what it means to be a community and what kind of ownership do we have with this space? If I don’t clean up after I have left, then who will? Is there an expectation that someone else will do? If yes, then are we all cleaning up the mess that others are making. If the answer to all of this is no, then it means that we all will have to do seva. Ones in opposition actually agreed to everything we said, atleast theoretically. One of the child also said that sociocracy doesn’t mean that minorities have to agree and that we can’t stop functioning and keep waiting for them to agree. It means that the minorities are heard and respected for their opinion. We raised this issue again during this week’s meeting in case there were other left over unheard emotions. Finally we all had to take a decision and have mutually agreed that seva is one of the core community values and we should all be doing it. People can of course dissent and raise questions and when that happens we will talk about it.

Seva or no seva, I think what we need to feel good about is that we have a system where people with dissent voices have a method to voice their opinions.

Wall Painting

LC has donned a new look. The outside compound wall just got painted. It is an effort of the past few weeks. Kids cleaned and scrubbed the walls and put two coats of primer. Then they ideated with Shri for what LC meant for all of them and what it stands for. After that two weeks ago they painted the background and today was the final stroke. You must have seen the pictures on WA. Kids stood and made pose in front of the wall and others traced them. This was a really fun project.

Prep work for Dhamaka day

First meeting for the planning of dhamaka day took place this week. Facilitators have taken a back seat and have left the reign to the kids. At least that’s the plan for now, we will see how much the facilitators can restrain themselves. Needless to say children are going to be children and will want to play all day. to get them to focus and plan is going to be a task, but we will try and see if they can self manage this time’s program. So the plan is that the whole event will be managed by kids. There are committees being formed.

Project Day

We had the last project day of this semester. Many of the kids did group presentations. There was also a folk dance performance. Except for three kids everyone presented. Some of them were last minute presentations though. But overall I think the quality of presentations is getting better.

Tests

This week was the week for wrapping up the session. For the first time we asked kids if they wanted to give a test for Science, Math and language. All of them have given atleast 2 out of 3 tests, except for one or two kids. Some of them demanded a retest for science, since they didn’t get good marks.

Review Meetings

We will have review meetings starting from 18th March. Please read the reviews and discuss with your child what his/her goals are for the next semester.

That's all for this week,

More later,