Australia's Maharishi Primary School

Transcendental Meditation reduces stress in Australia's Maharishi Primary School
by Global Good News staff writer
July 2006

On June 15, 2006, Kelly Ryan of the Melbourne Herald Sun in Australia reported that students at the Reservoir Primary School are giving new meaning to the expression ‘higher learning’. They are practising Maharishi’s Transcendental Meditation Programme twice a day as part of their curriculum.
 
Teachers say the pupils are more focused, make more intelligent decisions, and express a greater sense of themselves than before they began the practice.Teachers and parents at the Reservoir school believe the age-old meditation technique could help cut soaring student stress levels.
 
Already principal Frances Clarke said proof of the benefits is apparent in her fifty pupils. ‘There has been a noticeable change in their growth and enthusiasm for schoolwork,’ she said.
 
The school has enlisted the help of Dr Ashley Deans to introduce other schools to the same approach. Quantum physicist, Dr Deans, is principal of the Maharishi School of the Age of Enlightenment in Fairfield, Iowa, USA, which has enjoyed twenty years of success as a result of this programme. 

According to Dr Deans, hundreds of published studies have reported that the practice of the Transcendental Meditation Technique produces a wide range of benefits when applied in schools, leading to unprecedented educational outcomes—academically, artistically, in creative problem solving, in sports, and in the development of good citizenship.

At Maharishi School in Iowa, Upper School grades consistently score in the top one percent on standardized tests both nationally and in Iowa, and the school has won over a hundred state, national, and international championships in the past decade.

According to Dr Pat Bassett, President of the National Association of Independent Schools, USA, ‘Maharishi School is a world-renowned independent school of the highest calibre.'

Similar successes have been reported at hundreds of schools, colleges, and universities around the world, with students representing a broad spectrum of economic, cultural, and religious backgrounds. These include institutions as diverse as inner city middle schools in Detroit and Washington, DC, a university in Beijing, a vocational college in South Africa, and over one hundred and fifty schools in India.

© Copyright 2006, Global Good News(sm) Service