The Rebalance Institute (TRI)

The Rebalance Institute, a subsidiary of Y-East Sustainability Forum, founded by Pauline Laravoire in 2019, is known to its partners and learners as TRI. The name captures, more precisely than any mission statement could, what the institute is trying to enable: nudge a world that has tilted out of alignment, between humanity and the earth, self and system, power and agency, inner life and outer action, back toward something meaningful, steadier, and sustainable.

In her formative years and through her personal and professional experiences, Pauline deeply realised how much education and pedagogy had drifted from real learning, and pledged to build something learner-centric, joyful, and meaningful, which was the seed of what would later become the Rebalance Institute. She founded the institute as her answer to a broken system–a space where sustainability comes alive through experiential, learner-led workshops, and where the next generation learns not to inherit imbalance quietly, but to question and reimagine it. 

Today, ask anyone associated with TRI to describe its philosophy and you'll hear the same phrase surface again and again: learners as the protagonists of their own learning journey. It's a small shift in language that implies a large shift in design. A protagonist doesn't sit and absorb, they act, decide, stumble, and course-correct. TRI's workshops are built around this exact principle—weaving experiential learning, peer interaction, and critical thinking into experiences that ask participants to do something with what they're learning, not just receive it.

The institute's portfolio reflects this range. There's the Climate Fresk, a globally recognised collaborative science-based card game that walks participants through the causal chain of climate change. There's Bin There, Done That, a hands-on confrontation with the realities of waste. There's the SDG Career Compass, helping young people map their ambitions onto the UN's Sustainable Development G  oals, and the ESG Decision Lab, which drops learners into the messy trade-offs corporate leaders actually face. Storytelling — Harvesting Attention for Impact takes on the very skill TRI itself depends on: the ability to make an idea land. And for organisations with more specific needs, TRI builds custom learning experiences from scratch, co-designed around a client's audience, goals, and timeline.

All of it designed to make the learning experiences unforgettable, something you'll remember for decades! 

If the learning experiences are the tools, the rebalancers are the drivers. TRI doesn't call its facilitators trainers or instructors, everyone who stands in front of a room on the institute's behalf becomes, by title and by ethos, a rebalancer. It's a deliberate choice. A trainer delivers content. A rebalancer, in TRI's framing, guides a room through a genuine shift in perspective. They ask questions, step back, and let the room do the work and find the answer. This is not a typical workshop. It is, in essence, an act of rebalancing.

The community of rebalancers forms the backbone of the institute. And becoming a rebalancer is not simply a matter of showing up with subject expertise. The institute thoughtfully selects and trains its facilitators, ensuring each one can hold a room, read a group's energy, and translate a workshop's design into a memorable experience. The institute treats facilitation skill as a craft worth investing in, not an assumption to take for granted.

The Rebalance Institute is based in Kolkata and is expanding its footprint across cities in India through its community of rebalancers, and also steadily building its portfolio of experiences. TRI has now reached more than 2,200 learners through 60+ workshops delivered at IIFT Kolkata, IMI Kolkata, TISS-Guwahati, Techno India University, Modern High School International, Christ University, LIT School, French International School of Delhi, ASMi Business School, Nuvoco Vistas Corp. Ltd., minimalisTee, among others — a spread that runs from higher education institutes, to corporates, to NGOs, each workshop customised for its audience.

TRI also partners with organisations and professionals to build co-designed learning experiences and collaborates with communities and cultural institutions to host public workshops, events, and expand its reach and impact.

TRI's ambitions extend past the workshop itself. Recognising that a single experience can definitely spark curiosity in a room but it needs continued support to drive informed action. To provide professional support and offer end-to-end sustainability solutions to its clients, the institute has built a network of partners. Through a partnership with Green Mentor, TRI connects clients to LongSight, an AI-powered platform for ESG data analysis and reporting, backed by bespoke consultancy and TRI learners get a 30% discount on Green Mentor Academy's online courses, turning a single workshop into an ongoing learning pathway. For organisations pursuing formal green credentials, a partnership with Ekologiks Infinite offers support toward IGBC, LEED, and Net Zero readiness certifications, alongside energy, water, waste, and carbon audits. And through Sulitest, a global leader in sustainability education, TRI offers TASK™ (The Assessment of Sustainability Knowledge) — a psychometric tool that lets students and institutions benchmark their own sustainability literacy and get an internationally recognised certificate.

Learn more about TRI's learning experiences, meet the rebalancers, and book a workshop for your institute, office, or community at rebalanceinstitute.com.