As we noted earlier, in discerning participants for Tutu programs, we look for a manifestation of desire and a willingness to make a commitment to the process prior to entry into the course. They do this by achieving targets set for and with them by our visiting staff in the home situation, in the year (or more) prior to commencement.
… we look for a manifestation of desire and a willingness to make a commitment to the process prior to entry into the course.
This process is holistic and includes the affective (emotional) aspect of life whereby a person is helped to take responsibility for his/her own feelings. This involves the whole person, including the intellectual aspect whereby participants are helped to take responsibility for their own thoughts, beliefs, and assumptions. Insights are confirmed by the ability and freedom of each person to name both the old and new way of seeing things. It includes the moral aspect whereby the person is helped to take responsibility for his/her own behavior, and his/her own choices. We explain the type of responsibility involved here as responsibility for autonomy, i.e., physical, emotional, and spiritual autonomy.
The person is central in this process, not things. While the individual focus is important, the process itself takes place in a group environment in Tutu. Values, ideals, dreams and visions are caught, not taught. They are picked up and passed on informally as well as presented formally in course sessions, from the formators, farm staff, even other participants, hence the importance of the group relationship.
Values, ideals, dreams and visions are caught, not taught.
Because this learning or human development process takes place in an institution, it is ideal that there are periods of oscillation between the home community and the institutional community. Our own limit is five weeks at most in the Centre, followed by the corresponding time at home. It is helpful for participants to have the opportunity to exercise their commitment to the values and ideals they profess individually, both in the context of the community which professes the same commitment, and in a world which may not profess the same values and commitment.
The immediate environment surrounding the person(s) during the process is important. The freedom for participants to grow and change demands a respectful, loving, and accepting atmosphere, so that they are free to challenge and be challenged in their attitudes, beliefs, and behavior. It includes what we call ‘loving confrontation’ which is stimulated by the principle of fairness and is an essential part of the process.
It is an experiential process. People learn through experience. The truths we live by are the ones we discover for ourselves; not what others tell us. The learner is in charge of the process. The learner sets the agenda. The learner initially begins with felt needs and must be led to discover for himself/herself the real personal needs. It is a process of empowerment.
This process is at the heart of what we mean by Rural Adult Education for Self – employment. We call it “Adult Learning.”
Because we are involved in a human process, our expertise needs to be in the field of human development in the broadest sense. As part of the learning or development process, Tutu programs include specific sessions in human development. These take priority and are held early each day in all courses including the longer program for Young Farmers as judged appropriate. These sessions need the atmosphere and quality of our staff ‘presence’, together with the structures which all lead to support growth towards autonomy. This is an important aspect of the overall Tutu programs, and of the quality of staff presence and personal dedication which determines the outcome.
Empowerment of the human person means new enlightenment and new ways of looking at oneself and the surrounding world. It the awakening in participants, of a new awareness of the resources, the opportunities, the dignity, the unperceived possibilities that exist for them in the land and sea which they own. Then in turn, participants gain the energy to take hold of their lives and to take up the skills of farm management. This entails management of one’s own person, one’s time, the soil, the crops, and the fruits of one’s labor, which can be counted in financial terms. So, we define the process of human development as:
a process whereby a person in and through community, assumes responsibility for his/her growth as a person, in the service of the world in which he/she lives. It is a process of liberation by which, under skilled guides, a person grows in freeing himself/herself from constraints of a personal order and a social or cultural order.
Empowerment of the human person; new light + new path ways
Young Farmers 2020
A process in and through community
Farming Couples
His/her growth as a person in the services of the world
Pacific Team
A process of liberation
Single women
Under skill guide a person learns to free herself
A single woman participants with her display accompanied by her father
Recent Comments