Participatory Action Research

The three days of training programme in Participatory Action Research (PAR) at Ramanthapur were enriching days.  I am happy I chose to be part of the same.  (More about it, read here).

Personally, I learnt most...

• That participation, includes the “last” in the group too! 
• I also got to know the names and some thing about the lives and works of people working with the YaR centres, some for decades of years! 
• Perhaps this method is more needed in a formation setting than a YaR setting. The rationale is that if Brothers see this in action and are involved in this exercise, they would automatically live it out in their own places of apostolate, wherever they are. Then we would not need to train the YaR sector, every sector would slowly but surely adopt this strategy.  (However, this entails that PAR be understood as a strategy, rather than another course to be completed!)
• Better we start to learn and enjoy working with lay people before it is too late and say, “We should have better prepared them, earlier.”