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True Education Starts Here....

I was delighted to be introduced recently, through a book on Awareness, to a school operating in the UK on a completely different basis to the vast majority of educational establishments in the world.

The school is called Summerhill School, and was established by A.S Neill in 1921 to provide 'progessive, democratic education' to its children. In essence, the children have an equal say to the 'teachers' in the life of the school, and they are able to choose which lessons to attend, if any. There may not be a great deal of surprise to hear that the school has frequently come under very close scrutiny, to say the least, from Ofsted, the UK government schools inspection agency!

Neill's sense was that children only behave as they mostly do in our society because they grow up in an atmosphere of fear and violence in all its forms, with regard to the adults or other children around them. Violence can mean something as simple as saying no to a child on the basis of what another person (adult or child) thinks is 'right', 'wrong', good', 'bad', etc. This instils fear from a very early age, which blights a child's full development and frequently leads either to various problems in childhood, or to maintaining this status quo in adult life, rather than seeing the lack of true freedom in it.

On the surface, this may seem radical. In fact, the children raised and educated at Summerhill leave with a sense of the completeness and totality of Life and each individual within and as part of it. It may be that they leave with little or no 'education' in the commonly understood sense of it, but all acknowledge the need for gaining the basic skills, such as reading and writing, through an understanding of the place for them in functioning in the world as it is, rather than having them force-fed to them. This also allows for natural 'abilities' to be nurtured and shared with others in an open and giving way.

Is this not the way to truly educate children, so that they grow up and mature in Awareness, with the clarity of knowing that everybody and everything has its place in Life?

posted by adamgilliland on 12/ 2/2007 6:51 pm | COMMENTS (5)
Comments (5)

Sorry everyone, I forgot to post the link to the school's website for more detailed information - it's www.summerhillschool.co.uk. Thanks!

posted by adamgilliland on 12/ 3/2007 4:11 am

I am born in Europe - have lived in the UK as a teenager - am familiar with "Summerhill. I was under the impression that they have some schools here in the US too (Summerhill). Am I incorrect?

Li Adler

posted by li.adler on 12/ 6/2007 9:20 pm

There are various 'democratic education' schools around the world, although I believe there is only one named Summerhill, the one in the UK. For a list of schools in the US and globally, please go to www.idenetwork.org.

posted by adamgilliland on 12/ 7/2007 3:56 am

I was glad to see your post about Summerhill, the Granddaddy of democratic schools. In 1969, I joined three fellow teachers in starting a free school, having been highly influenced by Summerhill. I write about it in my free download book CRISIS IN SCHOOL MANAGEMENT (see my blog here on ODE). And thanks for the link to idenetwork. On their site, one can find a link to Sudbury Valley School, the longest continuing free school in the USA. Good thoughts, Jim Evers

posted by jimevers on 12/ 9/2007 4:32 pm

It's an interesting concept. How do the kids fit in with the larger society after having this kind of education? I think our current school systems tend to produce workers rather than thinkers, but I do think there's value in members of a society having a common pool of knowledge and some minimum standards to be met before one is unleashed on the rest of society.

I'd prefer a system that teaches kids how to learn, then lets them focus their studies according to their interests. I also think kids would be better in environs that don't reinforce their natural preference for conformity and herd or pack behavior.

I agree that society is far too focused on issues of violence and dominance. I'm just wondering if society makes room for kids who haven't been taught to conform to it, or if the kids are able to adapt or cope with a society so unlike their training. How great is the culture shock if a kid moves to a University system or goes into the work force?

Maybe I'm thinking to taditionally?

posted by MorgaineSwann on 6/19/2008 4:04 pm

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