GIRLS ARE OUR FUTURE: Thoughts of a Practical Radical Nun

Girls Are Our Future is a vivid compilation of Sister Cyril’s thoughts on a wide variety of topics— education, life, sexuality, social issues, religion—that she has tackled throughout her tenure as Head of the Loreto Girls’ School, Sealdah in the city of Kolkata. Her powerful voice shines through in a series of interviews charting a long and illustrious career in the realm of education. Arriving as a young Irish nun, she completely immersed herself in Kolkata and the problem of how to help the slum children of the city. Victims of abject poverty and abuse, they found a safe haven under her affectionate care. Over the years, she has spearheaded innovative programmes like ‘Rainbow Homes’, the ‘Brickfields Project’ and ‘Barefoot’ teaching, which helped tremendously in educating children belonging to the poorest section of the community. The mission ‘each one, teach one’—whereby the older students themselves help educate those with little or no schooling—covered both the urban and rural areas of West Bengal and neighbouring states.