Vivienne Rutgers
is South Africa’s foremost specialist teacher in Humane Education
Now retired, Vivienne took a leadership role, in cooperation with The Humane Education Trust and Forest Heights Primary School, Eerste River, in a two-year pilot project to assess the impact of humane education on learner behavior.
The outcome of this ground-breaking project was presented to an international audience at the Oxford Centre for Animal Ethics in 2019 and is now included in the up-coming Palgrave Companion to Humane Education due for release in 2026/7.
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Special permission was given by parents to show the children's faces so that the project could be featured on SABCTV2's Issues of Faith.
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​​​​Says Vivienne:
I am totally convinced that the inculcation of ethics and values in society has fallen on the shoulders of educators like myself, and it is something we dare not shrug off.
If we are to fight violence effectively and uplift our communities for a
sustainable future, we will have to reach into the hearts of learners and develop that vital quality called empathy.
That is why the traditional 3 Rs must become the 4 Rs – Reading, ‘Riting, ‘Rithmetic, and Respect for all life.
HET is indebted to Vivienne for her dedication and support of our efforts to build a better world.
