Choyakot Secondary School in Bajura Teaches Students Traditional Weaving Skills Alongside Studies

June 2, 2024: Kathmandu

Along with studying in the formal way, students at Choyakot Secondary School in Bajura are also being taught traditional weaving skills. Now in Bajura, Choyakot secondary School is one of the school that is able to provide students’ craft along with the curriculum. In this level of classes 6 to 10 make Choyako Doko, Babiyako Kucho, etc.- the Raithane items using Nigala choya which is local material. This is a program offered by Cyberschools, and the school’s principal, Gorakh Thapa, recommended it. The initial part of the site name “Choyakot” itself holds the association with huge availability of Choya reeds in the past used for making several items. It is even to this date that people hold that the school building stood on a ground that housed the Choya products during the Baise/Chaubise kingdom.

As far as the impact on the society is concerned, the acting principal of Hroling Thapa insists on retaining this form of handcraft which is fast disappearing from the village. Currently, the school’s program will ensure that the students have the theoretical background in Raithane crafts as well as be in a position to practice the same. The program offers an excellent example via Niraj Vik, a 15-year-old child. Earlier he was least bothered of conventional weaving techniques but today he is quite proficient at making doko and babiya kucho. The Nigala choya are already prepared and given to the school by the administrators, and the students are expected to work on the weaving part of the cloth. As the impact of the program will be evident across the overall curriculum, it is not just limited to the classroom. With assistance from their teachers, students have knitted fifty hats, some of which the dokos have been adopted to replace plastic dust bins within school environment. The principal has even taken it upon himself to give gifts of dokos to representatives from local municipalities.

Dokos are a form of traditional Nepali headwear and the school has been requested to deliver 200 of them to the Badimalika Municipal Office; the making of these dokos has commenced. This shall be achieved by introducing different products to be sold in order to establish a fund for this school. The material costs will also be funded as will wages for the students who make the items such as baskets and blankets, and the vegetable garden of the school where students are given snacks. This new program at Choyakot Secondary School has an effective way of solving the problem -and this is by Preserving culture and transferring practical skills while at the same time raising environmental awareness among the students.