– The Somm Inn system of Learning & Education 2010
Welcome to your own Somm School of learning.
Project Title: Somm Innpi Mission
Project Location: Guwahati
Project Designed by: Ei mTECHKnowlogiZ
Project Objective: To revive Somm system of education, provide conducive place of stay for graduates and students, Guest House for volunteers on Vacation, Service apartment for families of the sick and cultural Tourists, Research & Training Centre for traditional system of learning.
Is your Life on TRACK?
When your life goes off the track, you need a nurturing centre, a place where you can rejuvenate, rethink, be counselled on your career, be guided on how to solve the problem you faced currently and align your long term goals with that of your current goals, be guided on Life, be surrounded by friends and concerned people to enable you to recharge spiritually, emotionally and physically. Somm Innpi is designed for capacity building among Job seekers, Students and Entrepreneurs to equip them with the right skills and attitude to face life & career challenges so that they succeed in their endeavour as they regained their “Self Believe” and become capacitated to make their dreams come true.
For a student, life is at its toughest phase after graduation, if you are struggling to get a job and it gets rougher if the hunt goes longer. The average time Eimi Students’ get a job after graduation has been estimated to be three years (figures are based on DU students) and for IAS Aspirants the average is around 5 years. During this phase, the mood swings from hopeful to hopelessness yet you are left to cope on your own with every UG/PG Hostels admitting only students still pursuing a regular courses. There are times a struggling graduate & actors questions the very Existence of God Himself! This is my metaphor for saying “It’s a tough, tough time”. If the time lag between getting a job and your year of graduation goes up, alienation and a feeling of misfit also creeps into their minds, some plough on and make it while the majority and the less fortunate from poorer income families have to return back or end up in a low paying jobs with battered self esteem thus rendering them unproductive for their societies. These segments of the populace normally limit their level of interaction within and without the community. They also give up on their ideals as a student and are very much vulnerable to social ills – they could join unwarranted organisations or end up running bogus charitable Orgn. If, at this time in their hour of need, something like Somm Inn was there to help them, today the societies they come from would have gained rather than be tormented by them! Spiritual Leaders and community Leaders will be there at the Somm Inn for the needy and the ones who call on them for such spiritual nourishment.
Take a different scenario, you are employed but you see your dreams slowly dying before your own eyes and your very own reality somehow drive your thoughts towards accepting that dreams are luxuries you can’t afford anymore. You can rebuild your life by rebuilding the life and career of the less fortunate; it will give you a new leash of life. Be an Angel to the less fortunate at Somm Inn, and grow your wings again as a Volunteer on Weekends or if you are an entrepreneur looking for advice or like minded people, you have a friend in Ei Grups who manages the Project.
Somm Inn is for you if you are off the track! Or planning to take the road not taken or want to be an entrepreneur. So, what then is this Somm Innpi which has the potential to Change the way we learn & better our chances of success. Somm Inn learning techniques are activity based, keen observation and application of thinking of the world around the learner and role model based community learning system where a young man learns his customs, survival kits, traditions of his people and necessary skills to succeed as a responsible and productive member of his society. However, with over 6-7 decades of exposure for eastern tribes to Classroom/ directed syllabus based learning adopted from the Prussian Education system where people were taught to follow orders and to fit into the mass Industrial culture, a conflict between the community based existence in their traditional system vis-a-vis Individualism encouraged by the new system has left many a misfit in both worlds. The methods of learning they are exposed to is alien from their conditioning in their society leading many of the students to ill adapt and most never achieving their potential. This is amply proved by the cases of high drop outs in village schools etc. Reviving the way they learn, introduction of activity based learning techniques and technology aids in the formal education could solve the problem cited. To initiate the revolution, the present Somm Inn Project is designed by Ei grups to serve the following purpose (limited scope in the present context).
The Somm Inn is envisioned to become an ideal place/environment (a minimum of 2 star facilities):
- For youths/ graduates seeking employment, preparing for Competitive Exams based on the traditional village dormitory learning system practiced by various tribes esp. The Kukis in the North East.
- For travellers/tourists looking for safe, secure and affordable accommodation where they can also serve as volunteer to help out/ teach the youths living at Somm Inn while they are on vacation. This could evolve a transcultural exchange centre with foreign and domestic tourist making it their “Home Away from Home” or Guest House.
- For Family/ Tourists groups visiting cities (Ghy for now), where Somm Inn is operational, for long term treatment or on cultural vacation to find a conducive Home environ in the special service apartments to convalesce and have family time while going through testing times.
- For Group of students appearing for same competitive exam to stay together for a short duration where group learning techniques would be applied by Ei Faculty and Volunteers to help them succeed.
# For students to avail counselling at the Career counselling clinic – 3Cs and take battery of PI/psychometric test embedded within the Inn to help them decide their career choice based on Aptitude, Personality & Interest. Somm Resource Persons will use teaching methodology based on oriental/tribal people ways of learning, observation based or learning by doing & less of theory & conduct Research on community learning concept.
# For students and Sommaritans or inmates to Share resources – Library, internet and reading materials. Concerned Citizens will be given the opportunity to contribute to the Library without their relinquishing ownership of books shared with the Library.
# For youths to learn about their culture, customs, tradition and traditional administration system such as the Kuki Innpi and also conduct research on such areas. Also, Sommaritans will be provided Leadership, personality, grooming and Team skills development opportunities and be moulded to become thought leaders for their society. Also somm Inn would be meeting point for thought leaders and academicians to meet up and conduct discourses on societal relevant issues.
# For youths to rejuvenate and be nurtured spiritually by Spiritual Leaders & committed persons in the community. For the needy and weary at heart to seek prayer and spiritual guidance from spiritual Leaders and community Leaders who are the guiding force behind somm inn.
# For anyone who wants to offer their services as volunteers
# For new entrepreneurs to meet, connect & network with other established entrepreneurs and Great minds in the industry as it would have an incubator centre as well. In the movie “The Last Samurai”, in one the most poignant scenes of the movie, The Emperor of Japan said “We can’t forget (pause) Who we are ....”. We, NE people, have forgotten our age old best practices in learning, culture and administrative systems, e.g KHANKHO/TOMNGHAIHNA among Kukis & Mizos etc thus making our younger generation rootless and without anchor to hold on to when faced with challenges. Desperate words “we have nothing, we are in the remotest corner and our forefather were this that” sprung from their mouth so easily, I don’t blame them. The present Gen X with no knowledge that some of the best learning and administrative systems we see today in the world were already practiced by our forefathers or by the so called People or Tribal’s of the East of India. WE HAVE LOST IT! And with it our sense of dignity, we look up to the West for everything from democracy to Jockey. Let me remind you, the United State’s Democracy founding fathers had taken the concept of their democracy & governance from a small Red Indian Tribal system of governancei, INNPI perhaps is the most democratic form of Governance, if guided by KHANKHO. From here, like the phoenix, from ashes we shall rise and regain our glory rooted in our tradition yet modern, accepting & assimilating the best practices around the Globe and maintaining our tested ways of learning. Welcome to the future of East India’s own Somm School of Innovative Learning or the future Universitaz Somm Innpi (uSi)
Why be at Somm Inn?
When you are job hunting, the process of looking for a job is long and painful for most. The success rate is higher when group learning techniques are applied for competitive exams. This technique will be shared by Somm Inn Resources persons mostly Engineers who have perfected the art in their college days. Here, you get maximum career support & guidance without foregoing your personal liberties, we expect each of the inmates to be self regulated.
Please be informed we are not running a hostel, it’s a place where you rediscover your true potential. So, with a little help in the right direction, Somm Inn is expected to help you get a job with some coaching and arranging group learning sessions. If you are financially challenged, students who passed our 1-2-3 API Test would be given free stay, counselling, coaching by volunteers and resources from various professional domains. Once you get a job, you can contribute back to the Inn. Most important reason for staying at the Somm Inn would be your chance to correct your learning disabilities in Maths and science through Somm Innpi traditional observational & applied thinking Methodology and NCERT Delhi Faculties guidance on “How to study Maths & Science?”. NCERT’s NCF guidelines emphasised on relevant examples which a community can connect to e.g. To explain Fermentation Process, Standard text books gives Curd as an example but for us it makes little sense as we do not make curds at home, if the example was “Bethu/ akhuni” or Ngari, (a fermented bean & fermented fish) our children will never forget Fermentation process in their lifetime! How we learn is different from how we are taught. And today, our syllabus fails to even teach us what we really need to learn. It’s simple and logical to learn how to use mobiles for talking, sms, mms, pics and payment services etc and Google for search, we don’t even bother with the history of mobiles, we are concerned about what it can help me with and how to use it. What bothers me is what we don’t question. When we are given a complete syllabus on the “History of Computers, Fundamentals and etc etc” we initiate the learning process without thinking. “3 idiots!” has three but out here we have many idiots! My father could never learn to use a computer since the Institute with a syllabus based learning system got it all wrong for him. My dad needed to know how to use a computer for browsing and MS office; they end up making him scared with their history and ICs etc. Give a learner’s what he needs and a functional education; let him decide what he wants to learn. Learning centres should only guide.
The point I am making here is if you are in Somm Inn you will be a part of a Revolution in Education. Oriental Tribes/ our people have never learnt from a BLACKBOARD! So I don’t blame you if your low score reflects mismatch between your roots and the Prussian education system. The Conflict between the Present western Education system meant for mass production of order following, qualified non-thinking “individuals” fit for factories and offices vs. Somm Inn Learning system where each person was trained for their survival, to think free, to innovate, observe, be fearless and learn to be a productive member of the society (think community before self interest .i.e. non-individualistic) have many communities in East India and tribes across the world confused leading to degeneration of societal values at alarming rates. They are caught between the two streams, theirs giving way to the mindless more powerful western education, though it may not be better. Time to incorporate our good practices into the University system we now have! Our forefathers never learn our Nursery Rhymes “ Early to bed & Early to Rise , makes a man healthy, wealthy & wise “ but lived their life right. They get up early, work hard and retire early – it was a resource based economy and poverty was unheard of and money was not a common thing, no value to him as to a Kilimanjaro Bushman as we saw in the movie “Gods must be crazy”. It’s not the God’s who are crazy but Us with the monetary based economy invading our lives ill prepared and really losing our way through the blackboard maze. Students, if you want to succeed, let’s start with getting the Basics “Early to Bed .....” right! First thing first. At somm Inn, thats the first thing we expect you to work on. It would be a place where you will make lifelong friends, spread your wings and through your interaction with travelling tourist staying at Somm Inn who also doubled up as volunteers, you will get to broaden your horizon. If you are the Entrepreneur type, you could get a chance to work as an intern and learn the ropes on entrepreneurship at our Ei Offices located near the Somm Inns.
Ei Grups is a corporate house, an entrepreneurship start up by members of TECHChapaz, which believes in creating business value while designing and implementing Social Entrepreneurship rojects, working on Green local technology platform and mobile Governance. We want to be the best designers of Social projects and work with societies to “make lives better” while the projects are co-owned by the communities we worked with.
About TECHChapaz & Educational Initiatives
TECH ChapaZ (TC), a network of professionals with the mission of "Empowering through inspirational learning & education - 'Enabling better lives'" has been facilitating guidance/counselling on professional careers for students in India since 2002. We, in collaboration with partners organize conventions, workshops and other events to build capabilities through inspirational learning’s and refocusing on value added education and career awareness. Through such events, Presentations and live-talks from experts, TC endeavours to give insights into various Career options such as Management, Journalism, Media and Mass Communication, Fashion Designing, CA/CS/ICWA, IT and related fields, Law, Medical Sciences, Engineering and other emerging careers. The workshop on Civil Services includes in-depth analysis of popular Optional and General Studies by SYNERGY and other experts , and an Experience sharing session from successful candidates called the 'Right Approach to Civil Services Exam'. Personality Development and Effective Communication is also emphasised at such career counselling with the view to raise our youths Employability Index The III TECH Chapaz Convention cum Seminar on Career options was held at JNU, New Delhi on 13.11.2004. while similar events were organised at Imphal, Mumbai and Shillong. Eminent speakers from various disciplines spoke on their profession/ careers. Starting from the very first event in 2002 at Convention Hall KCC, the Event was attended by about 300+ students and was widely covered in the local media and cable network ICTV. In addition to the seminars; Classroom visits, guidance through the Quarterly Newsletter on Careers called “DmatriX” and workshops were carried out at schools from time to time.
We believe sharing of life experiences and conducting such events can empower, inspire the youths and equipped them with the capability to pursue their dreams, create awareness among students on careers and find their calling/ purpose in life. Such awakening and defining moments empower them to choose the right Careers and inspire them to attempt great things. These little efforts and guidance could translate students into rich pool of human resource for the future. Showing the Way and igniting young minds to channelize their energy in the right direction could build up a large pool of professionals, even among underprivileged societies within a few years. This could also act as a boost to bringing about an overall development of the country in a big way!
We earnestly believe, people do share a great concern for the students and education. We believe you would spare no effort to enable students to be achievers; this is possible only when they have access to the right guidance, at the right time and the right place. And such opportunities can be created only through our collaborative efforts. Therefore, we look forward to your cooperation and we are inviting you to be a part of 'the fellowship of the Vision'. we also seek partnership with esteem organisation which has been in the forefront of enlightening the youths and spearheading a revolution in the field of education and social awareness. You can be the lead in this initiative or you may seek our help in taking such humanitarian work further Ei Educational Initiatives is an educational research practice within Ei group started by a group of NITs/ IIT/NERIST/CIT/NIFT/FMS/IIMs alumni working with leading schools/organisations and communities in NE India. Our vision is a world where learners learn by activities, learning with understanding and application of mind over what’s being taught. We work extensively with schools; both private and government, to help parents and teachers identify common learning gaps and disabilities and work towards remedying them. We provide career counselling & develop and offer products and services based on research in assessment that will
(1) accurately and meaningfully measure how well students are learning;
(2) provide insights into the learning process and incorporate traditional and locally relevant teaching methodology and
(3) actually help improve the quality of learning by reengineering the learning process.’ Visit www.techchapaz.com for more Information Funding & Your role in Somm Innpi Project:
The somm Inn Board of Trustees will comprise spiritual and community leaders to ensure the social objectives are always adhered to and they will guide the Sommaritans spiritually to become good Samaritans. Management of Ei Somm Inn will rest with the Management Team from Ei Grups which will comprise of Hotel Mgmt. Graduates and General management professionals. Your sincere prayer will be the pillar for Somm which is proposed to be first set up in Guwahati and we also have a greater vision to expand to other metros of India. You can contribute your ideas or invest Rs. 100/- per share in the project. However, minimum share from individuals would be 10 share i.e. Rs. 1000/-. Families may have the option of contributing more. Ei grups promotes communitisation of socially relevant projects and therefore would want participation from more people in the community. The ceiling of shares allotted would be capped at
the number of family members or two dependents i.e. if a family has 5 members and have two parents who are dependent then they can own only 7 shares i.e. 7000/- only. Special exemptions will be available for organisations and in specific cases only at the sole discretion of the Management Board after taking approval for such cases from the Trustee board. ORGANISATIONS, students and social, can help us spread the gospel of Somm Inn or take stakes in the project. For student leaders, they could help us identify inmates for Somm Inn.
With all things in place, Ei grup plans to launch the first Somm Inn at Guwahati by 13 Sept., 10. We seek cooperation from responsible/qualified persons among the Kuki, Chin , Mizo, Zomi/ U-nao Community to set up Ei SOMM INNPI. The project is meant for Students’ Community in NE India who are going to various cities for Studies and other related works. These students face problems in finding ideal place for studies or for exams prep. Finding the right place to stay becomes an important issue for our students. For this purpose, we would like to seek your valuable support. Interested individual/ group/ institutions may contact us for any further queries at the address mentioned below.
• Luv Kush Apt. E-5, Senduri Ali Path, Zoo Rd., Jonali, Guwahati -24
• Email : techchapaz@gmail.com
• Students may contact Emkay Khongsai : 09873674738 &
• Others may contact: Paul H - 9159813878
• Ei mTECHKnowlogiZ office Contact no: +91 – 9678458582 , 9854083757 , for local NE 9612166077 (Lenn C)
