Welcome everyone! We deeply appreciate your taking time out to attend and participate in our 2nd General Meeting! We are so happy that the Soka Educators International Network (SEIN) is growing and you are with us today to plan our future. SEIN was created to encourage all of you Soka educators and now you are really encouraging us!! As it should be with the Mystic Law.
Like the tree that is our model, we have been growing steadily but surely. We first started in 2003 with a quarterly newsletter which we sent out to less than fifty people. Since then, five years later, we have grown to over 200 in our our network and our countries include, Brazil, U.S., U.K., France, Nigeria, Netherlands, Austria, India, Japan, Canada, Portugal, Israel, Cyprus, Peru, and others. The newsletter is archived at Soka University in Japan, is on the SGI-USA Culture Department Website, has been translated occasionally into Portuguese in Brazil, and is posted on our own blogsite: www.sein2008.blogspot.com More importantly, many of you report its great value in your lives.
In November 2005 we started our Online Forums and we were asked to have them more often so we have them twice a year. We have grown from ten people to over thirty participants and from the work of one person to a team of planners and committee heads. This year we started having co-facilitators and co-hosts. We are a much more international a community and had our first multi-lingual Forum (English/Portuguese) this year for the Spring 2008 Forum.
Out of the forums grew the desire to create change together. We are now completing the first stage of four projects: internationality, disarmament, dialogue skills handbook and our own website on time!!
SEIN Website headed by Constance Haig and Martin Rees. The new SEIN website will be launched at the end of December 2008 and so we will be able to move our Online Forums to our website in early 2009. Soon Soka Educators can share lesson plans, read our newsletters, read and work on our Dialogue Primer, work on and download our Disarmament Exhibition. Next year's General Meeting will also be on this site! To view the work in progress go to - http://strangelyperfect.com The bulletin board, which you asked for last year, will be there as well.
Internationality. The last Spring 2008 SEIN Forum was hosted by Brazilian members. Participants found it difficult to understand some of the more advanced discussions in English, and felt the need to express themselves in their own language. We decided to introduce an automatic translation facility into the SEIN Forum, with non-primary-language-speakers having access to support from a instant translator. The person making the post was responsible for simultaneously posting the online translation in the second language, so the Portuguese contributor would post in English as well. This way, the individual takes responsibility for being understood by the other, which is a Buddhist tradition and develops our compassion. The next step will be bilingual translators so that Buddhist and educational terms can be better understood around the world.
Disarmament Exhibition headed by Terry Ellis with Michel Nader and Dave Koranda. We have something to celebrate!! No new nukes!! Americans urged Congress not to fund the Reliable Replacment Warhead (RRW). They heard us! On July 10, the Senate Appropriations Committee passed an annual spending bill rejecting all funding for the new weapon. This is a significant victory. Thank you all for your prayers.
There are many great resources out there; the problem is getting them to the teachers and students who will benefit. From the SEIN perspective, our goal is to continue to look for other teachers who want to take on the challenge of creating original lessons infused with the Soka/Makiguchi spirit. It will take time to develop our own touch, so that the lessons, applications, etc. we create stand out among the many other resources available. Please let Terry Ellis (calellis@worldnet.att.net) know if you are interested in contributing to this project.
The Disarmament's Exhibition's first document will be an interview by Terry Ellis with Richard Rhodes about the history of the development of nuclear weapons, and lesson plans regarding the people and physics behind this. This will be ready for the website in December. Rhodes portrays this history as a tumultuous human drama; the key is to engage students of all ages in this learning process. Many of the challenges and debates surrounding nuclear weapons have been with us from the start. We want to provide ongoing "news" about nuclear disarmament activities, research and information from around the world, educational tools for use in classrooms, libraries, and communities and an exhibition which could be downloaded and used in small spaces with PowerPoint capability as well. See attached proposal and powerpoint document created by Terry's son.
Dialogue Primer headed by Dennis Merimsky with Po Halikalani and Stephanie Tansey. The Dialogue Skills primer is going on the website in December. In 2009, we can expand it to include Buddhism and dialogue as well as Dialogue experiences. Attached you can see possible chapter headings for an expanded dialogue booklet. At this stage it is a kind of a roadmap or vision, which can be changed as we go along. Dennis' resolution is to contribute a paper about Buddhism and dialogue in 2009. Please see attached proposal.
New Development for SEIN
Buddy System for the Online Forums
The first new development is to introduce a Buddy System for anyone who wants it or for those who want to help others learn the ropes to SEIN forums so that more and more people can enjoy the riches we all get out of it. We want to offer this buddy system for new community members, for those in need of support in your language; and for those who need technical help. The current buddies are: Constance Haig, Jill Rees, Terry Ellis, Dave Koranda, Dennis Merimsky and Stephanie Tansey. If you'd like to be a buddy please contact Stephanie. If you feel like you'd like to have a buddy to help you enjoy the Online Forums, please contact Stephanie.
So now we'd like to ask your opinion on how to do this so it really works. We think that these buddy relationships should be multinational relationships as much as possible, for example, a French-American buddy team or an Austrian-Brazilian team. We also think we should limit these buddy systems to the month before and after the forums. Also that one buddy should only have five such relationships. SEIN is not a full time activity and we are all busy educating our students so we don't want to add to your work. We want the buddy system to enrich everyone's teaching.
Translations Committee headed by Jill Rees with Michel Nader. This is to support the Forums. We are developing a four-tier buddy system according to our capacity. Non-native English speakers will have the support of same language partners of different language levels or SEIN Planning members.
Now we are ready for advice and questions from you, our wonderful SEIN Community: Simply reply to this email OR go to our blog: http://sein2008.blogspot.com and if you need help logging in contact Constance Haig at (Haig.Constance@orbital.com).
Like the tree that is our model, we have been growing steadily but surely. We first started in 2003 with a quarterly newsletter which we sent out to less than fifty people. Since then, five years later, we have grown to over 200 in our our network and our countries include, Brazil, U.S., U.K., France, Nigeria, Netherlands, Austria, India, Japan, Canada, Portugal, Israel, Cyprus, Peru, and others. The newsletter is archived at Soka University in Japan, is on the SGI-USA Culture Department Website, has been translated occasionally into Portuguese in Brazil, and is posted on our own blogsite: www.sein2008.blogspot.com More importantly, many of you report its great value in your lives.
In November 2005 we started our Online Forums and we were asked to have them more often so we have them twice a year. We have grown from ten people to over thirty participants and from the work of one person to a team of planners and committee heads. This year we started having co-facilitators and co-hosts. We are a much more international a community and had our first multi-lingual Forum (English/Portuguese) this year for the Spring 2008 Forum.
Out of the forums grew the desire to create change together. We are now completing the first stage of four projects: internationality, disarmament, dialogue skills handbook and our own website on time!!
SEIN Website headed by Constance Haig and Martin Rees. The new SEIN website will be launched at the end of December 2008 and so we will be able to move our Online Forums to our website in early 2009. Soon Soka Educators can share lesson plans, read our newsletters, read and work on our Dialogue Primer, work on and download our Disarmament Exhibition. Next year's General Meeting will also be on this site! To view the work in progress go to - http://strangelyperfect.com The bulletin board, which you asked for last year, will be there as well.
Internationality. The last Spring 2008 SEIN Forum was hosted by Brazilian members. Participants found it difficult to understand some of the more advanced discussions in English, and felt the need to express themselves in their own language. We decided to introduce an automatic translation facility into the SEIN Forum, with non-primary-language-speakers having access to support from a instant translator. The person making the post was responsible for simultaneously posting the online translation in the second language, so the Portuguese contributor would post in English as well. This way, the individual takes responsibility for being understood by the other, which is a Buddhist tradition and develops our compassion. The next step will be bilingual translators so that Buddhist and educational terms can be better understood around the world.
Disarmament Exhibition headed by Terry Ellis with Michel Nader and Dave Koranda. We have something to celebrate!! No new nukes!! Americans urged Congress not to fund the Reliable Replacment Warhead (RRW). They heard us! On July 10, the Senate Appropriations Committee passed an annual spending bill rejecting all funding for the new weapon. This is a significant victory. Thank you all for your prayers.
There are many great resources out there; the problem is getting them to the teachers and students who will benefit. From the SEIN perspective, our goal is to continue to look for other teachers who want to take on the challenge of creating original lessons infused with the Soka/Makiguchi spirit. It will take time to develop our own touch, so that the lessons, applications, etc. we create stand out among the many other resources available. Please let Terry Ellis (calellis@worldnet.att.net) know if you are interested in contributing to this project.
The Disarmament's Exhibition's first document will be an interview by Terry Ellis with Richard Rhodes about the history of the development of nuclear weapons, and lesson plans regarding the people and physics behind this. This will be ready for the website in December. Rhodes portrays this history as a tumultuous human drama; the key is to engage students of all ages in this learning process. Many of the challenges and debates surrounding nuclear weapons have been with us from the start. We want to provide ongoing "news" about nuclear disarmament activities, research and information from around the world, educational tools for use in classrooms, libraries, and communities and an exhibition which could be downloaded and used in small spaces with PowerPoint capability as well. See attached proposal and powerpoint document created by Terry's son.
Dialogue Primer headed by Dennis Merimsky with Po Halikalani and Stephanie Tansey. The Dialogue Skills primer is going on the website in December. In 2009, we can expand it to include Buddhism and dialogue as well as Dialogue experiences. Attached you can see possible chapter headings for an expanded dialogue booklet. At this stage it is a kind of a roadmap or vision, which can be changed as we go along. Dennis' resolution is to contribute a paper about Buddhism and dialogue in 2009. Please see attached proposal.
New Development for SEIN
Buddy System for the Online Forums
The first new development is to introduce a Buddy System for anyone who wants it or for those who want to help others learn the ropes to SEIN forums so that more and more people can enjoy the riches we all get out of it. We want to offer this buddy system for new community members, for those in need of support in your language; and for those who need technical help. The current buddies are: Constance Haig, Jill Rees, Terry Ellis, Dave Koranda, Dennis Merimsky and Stephanie Tansey. If you'd like to be a buddy please contact Stephanie. If you feel like you'd like to have a buddy to help you enjoy the Online Forums, please contact Stephanie.
So now we'd like to ask your opinion on how to do this so it really works. We think that these buddy relationships should be multinational relationships as much as possible, for example, a French-American buddy team or an Austrian-Brazilian team. We also think we should limit these buddy systems to the month before and after the forums. Also that one buddy should only have five such relationships. SEIN is not a full time activity and we are all busy educating our students so we don't want to add to your work. We want the buddy system to enrich everyone's teaching.
Translations Committee headed by Jill Rees with Michel Nader. This is to support the Forums. We are developing a four-tier buddy system according to our capacity. Non-native English speakers will have the support of same language partners of different language levels or SEIN Planning members.
Now we are ready for advice and questions from you, our wonderful SEIN Community: Simply reply to this email OR go to our blog: http://sein2008.blogspot.com and if you need help logging in contact Constance Haig at (Haig.Constance@orbital.com).
Agenda for the Online General Meeting
Welcome
Appreciation
General Report on SEIN
Report on the Progress of the Forums – Jill Rees
Report on the Progress of the Website – Constance Haig
Report on the Disarmament Exhibition – Terry Ellis
Report on the Dialogue Primer – Dennis
Welcome
Appreciation
General Report on SEIN
Report on the Progress of the Forums – Jill Rees
Report on the Progress of the Website – Constance Haig
Report on the Disarmament Exhibition – Terry Ellis
Report on the Dialogue Primer – Dennis
Questions and advice from SEIN community:
How do you see SEIN supporting the development between Nichiren
Buddhism and the global society?
Thoughts and recommendations on our projects-
How do you see the new international buddy system working and growing??
How can we be of more help to you?
You will be getting a summary of our meeting. It will act like Final Encouragement from all of us!
Don't forget! Our next Online Forum will be from Sunday, November 16 through Sunday, December 13. The Online Forum is located at: www. earthchartercommunities.org/soka The theme is: The 2008 Peace Proposal: Humanizing Religion, Creating Peace, Soka Educators and the principle of Obutsu Myoho – Understanding the relationship between religion and government. We want to take this opportunity to work on ways the SEIN community can help our friends in the SGI use the ideas of the Peace Proposals in their daily lives and activities. Another deep and wonderful dialogue! See you online!
Thanks to everyone who have volunteered to be on the committees and to all of you for your support!
Stephanie Tansey (US living in Nigeria) and rest of the SEIN Team: Michel Nader (Brazil), Jill Rees (UK), Constance Haig (US), Dennis Merimsky (Israel), Terry Ellis (US) and Dave Koranda (US)
