Pushpinder Kaur

Whenever some role models for the community are to be found, teachers provide the most suitable area for searching appropriate role models. Pushpinder Kaur associated with teaching profession right from India where she was born and brought up and had earned her M.Sc in biology and B.ed degrees before her migration to USA, is one such role model. Since her shifting to USA, she has been mainly living in San Jose, California. Here she received her teaching credentials and M.A. in Elementary Education from San Jose State University while raising her two wonderful children. She got involved in teaching Punjabi to Sikh children in San Jose in 1988. She was one of the founding members of the Khalsa School, San Jose which is a very successful Sunday school model. Due to the need of appropriate teaching materials set up in the western context, she designed curricular materials to teach Punjabi and Gurmukhi.She also designs the curriculum, the teaching materials, and volunteer recruitment. She has helped start a number of Khalsa Sunday Schools that teach Punjabi, Gurmukhi and Sikh history to young children throughout the United States.

She has prepared a very comprehensive, step-by-step curriculum that helps in smooth running of these Sunday schools. Schools in USA, CANADA and Australia use her Punjabi teaching books. She has also been involved in diversity training for public school teachers by giving presentations of Punjabi culture specifically focused on the Sikhs, their religion, values and customs. She is a role model in the real sense as she has inspired a large number of Sikh youngsters by her leutures, articles and storybooks and Punjabi teaching books. The Sikh Foundation published two of her books. ‘The Boy With Long Hair’ tells in very simple and straightforward words that Sikh boys are like any other child, with feelings, which should not be hurt, with dignity that should be respected and with identity that should be preserved. The book has been widely distributed to several school districts in California and Canada, and Khalsa Schools in USA. All these have proved for her as great tools for conveying to peers and classmates as to who Sikhs are. She is not only associated with Sikh Foundation but also Sri Hemkunt Foundation, and through these organization she is doing a lot of service to the community particularly in the field of promoting teaching and learning of Punjabi and Gurbani. She lives in the foothills of San Jose with her scientist husband, Dr. Gurinder Pal Singh and other family members.