“Yellow train is a love story. A fairytale of spirited children and passionate teachers and a railroad carriage”

The truth is that I am enslaved... in one vast love affair with 70 children. -  Sylvia Ashton Warner.

Dear Friends,

I read this book when I was 12. It is a moving tale of one man’s endearing love for children. In his school in Japan, ’Tomoe Gakuen’, children study in an abandoned railroad carriage in a magical setting unaware of the imminent war outside. In their later years, these children could shine through the darkness, they were thrown into, strengthened by the love the headmaster had for them and the fond memories of their school. I grew up wanting to build a school like that. I dreamt of a place for children where they will be loved, nourished and celebrated for who they are. Yellow Train is a manifestation of that dream.

 What was once my dream is today a shared dream. A dream that we the community of teachers hold as an impulse in our endeavour to serve the children. As passionate teachers we find the cause of children least represented, least championed, least fought or crusaded for. Our educational system is desperately in need of transformation. We are renegades where we are.

While we stand apart from the mainstream consciousness, what gives us strength and the holding is the philosophy on which our work rests – The work of Rudolf Steiner. On August 21, 1919, Steiner uttered these words on the finding of the first ever Waldorf School.

“It is our duty to see the importance of our work. We will do this if we know that this school is charged with a particular task. We need to form our thoughts so that we can be conscious that this school fulfils something special. We can do this only when we do not view the founding of this school as an everyday occurrence, but instead regard it as a ceremony held within the cosmic order.”

This is a  constant reminder, to all of us, of the enormity of the task.

While we can grasp the sacredness and the magnitude of this task, we deeply recognise that the task of the parent is no less. We are a school that believes in the power of a community. We enrol families into our fold, not alone the children, for we believe what really works on the child is the collective energy of the partnership between the parents and the school.

I imagine the child in front of us, looking at us with the words of Mary Oliver.

 “Tell me, what is it you plan to do with my one wild and precious life?”

Yellow Train is our offering.

In the name of children

Santhya Vikram

Santhya Vikram is a recipient of the EOTY award - Entrepreneur of the Year -  Nov  2018

The Coimbatore Chapter of the Entrepreneur’s Organization (A global Organization of 13,000 plus entrepreneurs in 57 countries) conferred the Woman Entrepreneur of the year Award to Santhya Vikram. This award comes as a recognition for championing social change and for Yellow Train being a forerunner as a social enterprise.