02. A new humanism
WHO LEARNS We all learn The most profound transformation in this era of change is the central role played by people, since it promotes the development of all aspects of our own nature. The democratisation of the access to learning and its ubiquitous nature, the new hierarchy in the creation of knowledge and the limitless possibilities to share and enrich it with others, afford learners faculties that were unthinkable in the past. And this represents an enormous challenge for formal education.
Our vision of man • Mankind is the result of inheritance, the environment and personal development. • Mankind is in constant evolution, open to personal perfection and bettering the world. • Our capacity for reason constitutes our ultimate dignity, and freedom, another of our essential traits, flows from this.
This new humanism is: • P ersonal: since it is based on creating personal experiences in which the subject/user is placed at the centre and promotes a kind of cognitive revolution. • S ocial and connected: fruit of the networked society, with much more fluid, bottom-up movements and new forms of communication which favour enriched collective intelligence exercises. In order for the educational model to be coherent, it is essential for it to be based on a clear anthropological concept of mankind.
• We are individual beings, in terms of our capacity for self-realisation, and social beings, in terms of our interactions with others. • We are cultural beings, receiving and creating culture. • We are open to transcendence. • And, of course, each stage of our development merits the utmost respect and the right to be treated with dignity.
In times of change, learners inherit the earth, while the learned find themselves beautifully equipped to deal with a world that no longer exists. Hoffer, 1942
SEK Education Group, established 1892 | 33
