Finland has been one of the most successful countries in the world in education, – and perhaps because – the universities and educational institutions are open to different educational concepts. Among other high-quality educational programs, Finland is exporting the concepts of creative education to different countries – to India, too. Tattvavada Das has been part of the Finnish Council for Creative Education  (CEE) team since 2014 tour in Pune and Mumbai, traveling and lecturing. Their group was very warmly welcomed everywhere. 

Tattvavada is a pioneer of interpreting Krishna-conscious concepts of culture and education in Finnish schools, universities and teacher training in colleges where he has been visiting for more than two decades, at the beginning with Suhotra Swami and later on with Bhakti Vidya Purna Swami.

“This autumn I realized that many Finnish universities showed their increased interest towards the concepts and strengths of the traditional Indian education”, Tattvavada says. He has just recently returned from the University of Eastern Finland where he lectured about the concepts of the Indian traditional educational system. His lecture was part of the course called “a teacher as a profession.” The response in the educational faculty has been enthusiastic.

“I’ve never thought how practical and deep this old science of education is “, says Heidi who is completing her further studies to become a headmaster of a medical college. Before she was heading one department in a big hospital in Helsinki. She and a number of other students and their teachers were very interested and asked good questions. At the end of the lecture, the university teacher of history gave Tattvavada a nice present, a book he had written together with his colleagues.

The Archbishop of Finnish Protestant (Lutheran) Church Kari Mäkinen, Bhakti Vidya Purna Swami and Tattvavada Das 

”Nowadays we can only afford to invite two special visitors yearly. Timo (Tattvavada) is surely one other of them”, says Vesa Hirvonen, Phd, who always introduces Tattvavada as the “number one pundit” of the Veda culture and philosophy in Finland.

In the university of Tampere, teacher Mrs Tuovi Pääkkönen has developed a course called Eastern Philosophies. It has been going on there in their teacher-training college already over 15 years. Tattvavada has been a permanent visiting lecturer in that course from the beginning. This autumn the interest among the students has been wide and the course has been nicely participated and gathered a full classroom of students.

 ”Similar types of courses are starting in other parts of Finland, too – for instance around Turku region,” Tattvavada continues.

It is worth noting that the course material is partly based on Srila Prabhupada’s and Swami’s books.

”Mrs Pääkkönen has created a nice course and the students seem to be very inspired to study this vast topic,” Tattvavada says.

In the university of Oulu there is a course called Global Education in the educational faculty. It is a part of the international MA program. Early December Tattvavada lectured there about the principles of Vedic education. These lectures and discussions took one full study day because of the enthusiasm of the students and their teachers.

”Timo’s (Tattvavada’s) mind-expanding lectures are strengthening the quality of our teachers education. No doubt that these lectures assured us that universal pedagogy and ethics surely  exist”, Johanna and Markku said respectfully. They are working as teachers of this program. 

Tattvavada’s next Oulu University lectures will take place in February 2016. He is also invited to lecture in the university of Tampere soon after. Besides of the main universities he is also lecturing in the main colleges.

Like in Oulu he lectured in four other colleges. Those were successful as well. It was full house in everywhere. “Our lectures fit well to different courses. Like in IB college we lectured in the courses called foundations of the civilizations ( history) and in the theory of knowledge course (philosophy). Last autumn, I got more invitations and opportunities to lecture than there are the days in my calendar, “ Tattvavada says.