FLAME University at the 21st Century Academic Forum at Harvard University

The theme of the Fifth 21st Century Academic Forum Conference at Harvard was "Challenge 2030: Envisioning the Future of Education. FLAME University’s Dr. Suniti Vadalkar was invited to participate in the same. The conference was held from 27-29 September 2016, at the Martin Conference Centre, Harvard University, Boston, MA, USA.

The key note speakers were Dr. Hideyuki Horii, Executive Director of i-school,Tokyo; Dr. Myles D. Miller, CEO & Founder, LeadUP; and  Bill Hughes, President and Founder, Open4 Learning, an ed tech solutions company.
In different ways, all spoke about the importance of Innovation.

FLAME University's paper, ‘Abhyudaya: Agro-centric primary education in rural India, written by Dr. Suniti S.Vadalkar and co-authored by Dr.Swati Nalawade was presented at the conference. This ongoing qualitative research discusses an innovative idea being nurtured in the field of agro-centric primary education by ‘Abhyudaya Global Village School’ (AGVS). Situated in the city of Nagpur, Maharashtra, AGVS is a space for learning for the children of farmers and farm labourers. AGVS integrates a study of effective agricultural practices in a scientific manner to build an optimistic attitude towards agriculture and envisages a generation of financially sustainable ‘agri-preneurs’ in future.

There were presentations by 73 academicians from across the globe. Topics ranged from Mathematics, Psychology, Design, Entrepreneurship, Digital Learning, Critical Thinking, Spiritual and Youth Development etc. The conference served as an excellent platform for networking, sharing ideas and also meeting scholars from across the globe.