I love bumper stickers. My car windows suffer the consequences. When it was time to trade in my car earlier this year it broke my heart to bid goodbye to my old friend, and the stickers. The car had served me well but it needed substantial work. It came at as good a time as possible. I could afford a new car, but it felt like saying goodbye to an old friend who held many sweet memories within the bumper stickers it wore.
One of my oldest stickers was from the little school in Hallowell where all three of my sons attended at one time or another. “Self directed learning in a democratic setting” was their motto - a beautiful place that every child should experience at least for a while. The kids ran the school through Business School Meeting, dealing with issues of budgets, hiring staff, purchasing supplies; and Judicial School Meeting, dealing with disciplinary issues. They chose what to study and when to study it within availability of the staff, their mentors.
“Who are you?” the school asks, and the kids answer, with books . . . often choosing to start off looking for their intellectual side in their search for themselves. And art - working with clay Jared created elaborate scenes of a forest with cowboys sitting around a campfire , their horses, nearby. The landscape and inhabitants changed daily for weeks.
And then comes the music, heard incessantly with the thump of the bass reverberating through the walls until the other kids convene a Judicial School Meeting to air their grievance and consensus is reached that bass free zones would be honored - democracy in its truest form. Later however, the musicians prevail in their motion before the Business School Meeting to purchase a school guitar that could actually be tuned and some of them are never to be seen again, though heard softly practicing with sweet and not so sweet melodies emanating gently from the music room. Well at least not until the winter comes with a bountiful snow and they're free to bring their sleds and snowboards to school and enjoy a full day of, hmmmm, let's call it phys ed, the conditioning of public school still tugging at them. Snow always leads to forts and elaborate tunnels which inevitably lead to snow ball fights - and the teachers (ooops, mentors) are right out there with them.
Winter wears on and long conversation abound about the philosophy behind the movie Fight Club, (the book is better cry out the avid readers) or moral and ethical issues surrounding the new video game one of them wants to bring to school, Grand Theft Auto.
As spring nears my oldest, who's never been good at fractions, understands them intimately within hours as he decides he's going to learn how to sew in order to design his own clothes; he's always had his own style but he takes unique to a new level, and my husband cringes when he appears for church decked out in his new outfit and hairstyle. Yes he says, I realize people will see me as a freak but when they meet me one on one they'll see I'm not scary or weird and maybe it will help them overcome preconceived judgments about people.
hmmm, how can I argue with that logic. Damn school.
So goodbye Evergreen Sudbury School, self directed learning in a democratic setting. You'll always be in my heart, if not on my car.
