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Sister S.M. Cyril will speak at
DeSales on Tuesday, May 1, at
8:00 p.m. (Photo courtesy of Biswarup
Ganguly)
by Andrew Ritter' 12 | Apr 26, 2012
DeSales University will be hosting Sister S.M. Cyril
on Tuesday, May 1, where she will deliver an
address on “Education, Equality, and Justice.”
Sister Cyril will speak on her remarkable tenure
as principal of Loreto Day School - Sealdah, and
how her humanitarian efforts have brought
dynamic social change and hope throughout
Calcutta. The event will be held at the DeSales
University Center in the Commonwealth Room,
beginning at 8 p.m.
Sister Cyril is internationally recognized as an
educational innovator. In 2007, she received the
Padma Shri Award, the Government of India’s
fourth-highest civilian honor, and has been
presented with the Kolkata Telegraph Award for
Social Service seven times. In 2010, she was
presented with an Honorary Doctorate in
Education from Trinity College in Dublin,
Ireland. Monmouth University awarded Sister Cyril
with 2011 Global Visionary Award.
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with 2011 Global Visionary Award.
Sister Cyril joined the Loreto Order, the same
order as Mother Teresa, in her home country of
Ireland. She relocated to India in 1956 where she earned a Ph.D in zoology and began
teaching upper-income children at the elite English-speaking Loreto Sealdah. However,
Sister Cyril was dismayed at the established order and unyielding caste system.
“I was appalled by the poverty almost outside our gates...You have a peasant class that
never went to school, they were there to serve, and you had the well-off people who
they served,” she explained.
Sister Cyril assumed principalship of the school in 1979 and immediately opened
enrollment to needy children; today 50% of students attend Loreto Sealdah free of
charge, the majority coming from Calcutta slums. In 1983 she pushed her humanitarian
outreach further by opening the school gates to street children, inviting them inside for
a meal or bath. Children off the street were never forced to stay at the school, yet the
option was left open to the children.
Another groundbreaking community program is “The Rainbow Program,” an effort to curb
risks of street children trafficking into the sex trade. The Rainbow Program currently
provides housing, food, and education for 250 girls who previously lived hard lives on the
street. Every day-attendance student from a wealthy background is required to spend
two hours per week tutoring the Rainbow Children, in an effort to integrate the under-
educated into the classroom and allow them the opportunity for a better life. The
program has also led to the establishment of Rainbow Homes across the region, where
children are welcomed into larger schools which traditionally lie empty from 2 p.m.-8 a.m.
Such arrangements are already providing overnight shelter to 600 additional children.
Loreto Sealdah is also responsible for outreach programs such as the Barefoot Teachers
Program (which provides preliminary education training to young adults who lack the
means to attend formal institutions), Hidden Domestic Child Labor Outreach (combating
abusive child labor, particularly at the expense of their education), and the Rural Child-
to-Child Education project (which provides more highly educated students the
opportunity to tutor classmates confined to very large class sizes, promoting a more
intimate learning experience.) Sister Cyril remains an extraordinary example of education
beyond the realm of mathematics and phonics: allowing students perspective of their
world, and the heart to meet it fully.
For more information, contact Jaime Gerhart 610.282.1100 ext. 1889
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For more info:
Tom McNamara
Executive Director of Communications
DeSales University
2255 Station Avenue
Center Valley, PA 18034
610.282.1100 x1219
Tom.McNamara@desales.edu
