Starter Kit. Idea 195 of 500. Cluster 9
Teacher training and certification for meditation instructors, so the standard is Sri Lankan rather than borrowed
The mechanism, from the book
What cannot be copied. Every competitor can build a beach hotel. No competitor can offer a Buddhist tradition more than 2,000 years old, still practised at the places where it first took root on the island.
The first step
Ask 5 meditation teachers abroad, found through yoga studios and retreat listings, whether a certificate examined by the teachers of a Sri Lankan monastery would be worth a fortnight's travel, and what they would pay. Take their answers to the chief incumbent of a monastery that teaches meditation and ask whether his teachers would set the standard, with you running applications and administration. The proof is one willing examiner and 3 applicants.
- Who pays first
- A working meditation or yoga teacher abroad who needs a credible credential for clients and wants it from the source rather than a weekend course.
- What leaves today
- The standard for teaching meditation is set and certified elsewhere, so the fees, the credential and the authority all sit outside the tradition that holds the practice.
Ask first
- Tertiary and Vocational Education Commission. Ask whether a meditation teacher certificate can be registered as a recognised qualification.
- Department of Cultural Affairs. Ask which monasteries they know already train lay meditation teachers.
Check before you spend
Whether the teachers of the monastery agree to examine and sign each certificate, and whether the monastery's name may appear on it.
Find out these three numbers
- How many teachers abroad would pay for a certificate examined here?
- What do teacher-training courses abroad charge, and for how many hours?
- How many trainees could the monastery's teachers examine each year?
A comparison from the book
Switzerland and India. Chapter Sixteen
"a Swiss scheme backed by Swiss industry trained Indian apprenticeship instructors and examiners to the Swiss standard"
Train the examiners to your own standard first, and the certificate stays yours.
The test
Does it keep value that now leaves the island, or build the proof that lets somebody else do so?
From the appendix of Why Not Sri Lanka? by Dr Maheshika Halbeisen. The idea and the mechanism are the book's; this kit was written for the site.