S3.C26. From First Greetings to a Shared Horizon
What began as introductions unfolded into discovery, a shared vision, and a north star — guiding PSBK and Fundamental Decisions toward transformative collaboration
1. Discovery of Each Other’s Worlds
The call opened with the gentle hesitations of new acquaintances. Cloudy, LIN91 from Vietnam, Silvia, Anita, Nadia, Ayaz, Septi of Yogyakarta’s PSBK, and DAV79 from Singapore each brought the voice of their organizations — and the quiet spark of curiosity.
DAV79 broke the ice with a description of Fundamental Decisions — a group rooted in behavioral research, mindset evaluation, and innovative ways of engaging children through peer-to-peer learning. Their work crossed borders: Singapore, Hanoi, Malaysia — and now, they hoped, Indonesia. For them, art was not a decorative layer but a diagnostic and transformative tool, a way of measuring and shaping how people think, feel, and grow.
Septi, in turn, unfolded the story of PSBK: an art center born in 1978 under the vision of maestro Bagong Kussudiardja. For decades, PSBK had nurtured artists, children, and communities by weaving art into education and human development. Their strength lay in performing arts as an experiential process — workshops where employees, students, and children discovered responsibility, empathy, and creativity through performance, not just performance as product.
In this discovery, each side recognized a mirror: both saw art as a pathway to human growth and responsibility.
2. The Shared Vision Emerging
As Silvia introduced the upcoming Sustainability Bootcamp in Yogyakarta and Bali, the two worlds began to overlap. The bootcamp would not only teach sustainability as a concept but immerse children in it — through business case studies, interviews with local entrepreneurs, problem-solving, and the dramatization of real challenges on stage.
DAV79 emphasized that sustainability was not simply about “going green.” It was about values:
Equity between people.
Understanding the worth of one’s neighbor.
Seeing business, community, and environment as a living ecosystem.
Septi listened and recognized echoes of PSBK’s own mission. PSBK had long believed that art touches humanity in ways that policy and lectures cannot. They too had built programs where children and adults alike learned resilience, collaboration, and creativity through theater, dance, and reflection.
Here was the shared vision: to use art as a vessel for sustainability and human capacity building. Both sides valued process over product, journey over performance, transformation over transaction.
As Ms. Septi explained, reporting at PSBK is not confined to written records or numerical scores. Instead, assessment is seamlessly woven into the artistic process itself, with trained experts translating observations into meaningful outcomes. Their approach is built on three interconnected pillars:
1. Performance as Reflection
At PSBK, performances are treated as living reports, not just artistic showcases.
Through dance, theater, and movement, participants demonstrate growth that transcends paper-based evaluation.
These performances reveal shifts in empathy, teamwork, creativity, and responsibility — qualities made visible through the act of creation.
2. Workshops for Competency Development
Structured performing arts modules are designed to cultivate and uncover specific competencies.
The way participants behave, collaborate, and express themselves during these workshops effectively becomes the report of their progress.
Facilitators and expert observers document how learning translates into practice, ensuring growth is both witnessed and articulated.
3. Measurable Personal Growth
Septi emphasized that PSBK’s methods allow for tangible growth in personal and social skills, even without reliance on digital tools.
Observable outcomes include:
Confidence expressed on stage.
Collaboration within groups.
Creative problem-solving through artistic expression.
PSBK already integrates , Ms Seti explained, dance and theatrical performance as spaces for expression, mindset reflection, and growth. Their practice is well-rooted in the arts, with deep sensitivity to human development. Rather than questioning its accuracy, the opportunity lies in augmenting what they already do: introducing digital tools, behavioral frameworks, or sensor-based insights that can complement their artistry. This way, performances remain authentic while also generating new layers of reflection — whether through data visualization, mindset mapping, or enhanced performance reports that support both students and organizations.
3. Mapping the North Star Together
If these two organizations were to work together, their “north star” would shine on a common horizon:
For Students:
To transform from passive learners into creators of meaning, able to see sustainability not as an abstract idea but as lived responsibility.
To discover empathy by stepping into the roles of business owners, workers, and community members through theater.
To become ambassadors who train peers, carrying the lessons forward in ripples of impact.
For Communities:
To build bridges between schools, local businesses, and cultural institutions, so that sustainability is rooted in everyday life.
To showcase at the expo not just solutions, but the spirit of collaboration that children embody.
For PSBK and Fundamental Decisions:
To unite behavioral research with artistic practice, measuring not just output but growth in mindset, values, and responsibility.
To design modules where PSBK’s depth in performing arts meets Fundamental Decisions’ expertise in peer-to-peer learning and mindset evaluation.
To position Yogyakarta and Bali as laboratories of art-driven sustainability education that can be scaled to other regions.
The story ends not with a final conclusion, but with a direction: a constellation of values, methods, and aspirations forming a north star. A star that asks both organizations to co-create — where PSBK’s decades of artistry and Fundamental Decisions’ innovative frameworks become complementary forces.
In that moment of recognition, what began as an exchange of introductions turned into the beginnings of a shared journey.
4. The first steps to allign the North star
Collaborate on the Bootcamp
DAV79 invited PSBK to co-create within the upcoming Sustainability Bootcamp.
The focus: testing the potential of theatrical performance as a medium to explore sustainability challenges, student creativity, and peer-to-peer learning.
Scale to Companies and Organizations
Based on the results of the bootcamp, DAV79 suggested taking the model forward into the realm of companies and organizations.
The idea: adapting the arts-driven, mindset-shifting approach for workplaces and communities, showing how applied theater can help tackle real-world sustainability and organizational challenges.
Ms. Septi invited Silvia to join one of PSBK’s workshops, offering a firsthand experience of how dance and theatrical performance function as both expression and reporting. This step allows Silvia to directly observe PSBK’s methods and engage with their facilitators and experts, setting the stage for a reflective exchange on where Fundamental Decisions’ peer-to-peer learning and mindset review frameworks could complement PSBK’s artistry. From there, both sides can review the pilot module for the Sustainability Bootcamp, testing applied theater as a medium for mindset formation and reporting, with the longer-term goal of adapting the model for companies and organizations if applicable.
For Reference: A preview of how we help enrich performances and empower participants—all through the unique lens of our Mindset Evaluation specialty.
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Once these steps were completed, a proposal would be drafted and presented for the Bootcamp trial. The initial idea was to engage PSBK in training 10 student ambassadors, overseeing their delivery throughout the program, and then concluding on the final day by acting as expert evaluators. During this closing session, PSBK would provide feedback, comments, and ideas, while the audience would also participate by selecting the ambassadors they felt made the strongest impact.