SPONSORS

 

Alianza Arkana is helping to develop locally based public schools in native Shipibo communities. Arkana is supporting Soi Sani pilot school and has helped raise over $10,000 thus far. 

Arkana is a project of Social and Environmental Entrepreneurs (SEE) a non-profit charity exempt from federal income under Section 501 (c)(3) of the Internal Revenue Code. SEE is the physical sponsor and makes donations tax deductible for U.S. citizens.

Arkana Alliance is a Non-Profit organization in Peru working to create and strengthen strategic networks at regional and community levels to call for change that protects and preserves the Amazon forest, its people and their traditions.

They are working with indigenous federations and communities to help promote their own model of development—one that is based on environmental sustainability and indigenous rights.

The organization focuses on four major areas: Environmental Justice and Human Rights, Community-based Solutions, Intercultural Education and Preserving Indigenous Traditions

Dr. Paul Roberts
 

Director of Education for Alianza Arkana, Dr. Paul Roberts has worked in different forms of education all his working life, beginning as a social worker with single homeless women, families and adolescents. He then practiced as a humanistically trained psychotherapist before working in leadership, team and organizational development for over 25 years. His clients have included large transnational organizations, small family businesses, and the public and non-profit sector.

Paul has a degree in Social and Political Sciences from Cambridge University, a Masters in Human Resource Development from South Bank University, London, and a Doctorate from the Center for Action Research at Bath University.

He lived for seven years in Mexico, working as a Professor at the University of Guadalajara, and a Head of Department at the Mexican Institute of Public Health, one of the leading research institutes in the Americas - combining this with his independent organizational consultancy practice.

He first visited the Peruvian Amazon in January 2010 where he was amazed at both the richness and diversity of the natural environment and the extraordinary culture and cosmovision of the Shipibo people. In the summer of 2011, he moved to Pucallpa, Peru to be Director of Education for Alianza Arkana.

Luis Marquez

Luis is the Shipibo director and visionary behind the intercultural school in the Shipibo community of Puerto Firmeza. Since graduating from the teacher training program in 1992, he has had 20 years of experience working in the Peruvian educational system in a variety of roles: as a teacher, a trainer of teachers, Director of the Instituto Superior Pedagógico (the principal teacher training organization in the region) and working as a specialist in the Ministry of Education and other local and regional educational bodies.

However, in these experiences, he found that a genuine intercultural education, although mandated by Peruvian law, does not in fact exist. Instead, a western education is given in the Shipibo language, teaching nothing of indigenous culture or cosmovision.

Luis was born in a time when bilingual, intercultural education did not exist, and he grew up ashamed of his traditions and his language. He had all but denounced his culture when he had the opportunity to be a part of a five-year ground-breaking education program to learn to be an intercultural educator. During this program, Luis rediscovered his indigenous identity, and was determined to give Shipibo youth the opportunity he did not have.

Marcos Urquia

Marcos is a Shipibo permaculture specialist trained at the Instituto de Permacultura de la Amazonia in Manaus, Brazil. Marcos has been working with permaculture design for more than fifteen years in the Peruvian Amazon. He is working closely with Luis to create a complete permaculture system incorporating medicinal plants, food forests and fish farms.

Igor Rakuz and Ella Alpina

Funding and Project Outreach