Sudbury school
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The Sudbury model of democratic education is named after the school that pioneered it — Sudbury Valley School. Since it was founded in 1968, the Framingham, Massachusetts school has been a source of inspiration for dozens of schools and institutions, and there are currently over 40 Sudbury schools around the world.
Certain facets of the model separate it from other democratic schools and free schools, although there are evident similarities. One central defining aspect is the non-compulsory nature of the model and the equal, nonjudgmental treatment of all activities (within the bounds of school rules regarding behavior and conduct) which results in a great de-emphasis of classes and other activities normally emphasized for their educational value. This attitude stems from the basic belief of the educational model, that every individual learns what they need to know through life and that there is no need to try and design a curriculum that will prepare a young person for adult life. Another facet that often separates Sudbury model schools from other democratic schools is the limitation — or total absence — of parental involvement in the administration of Sudbury schools. Sudbury schools are run by a democratic School Meeting where the students and staff participate exclusively and equally. Lastly, Sudbury schools do not arbitrarily separate the students into age-groups, emphasizing free age-mixing as a powerful tool for learning and development in all ages.
Although there is currently no official doctrine or association governing a Sudbury school, many schools have independently and voluntarily adopted the title of Sudbury school. The schools maintain good communication with each other, and recognize a loose camaraderie.
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[edit] School Meeting
Every Sudbury School is run by a weekly School Meeting sometimes in conjunction with an annual assembly. These meetings are modeled after the traditional New England Town Meeting. Most of the schools run this meeting using Robert's Rules of Order, with an elected Chairperson presiding over the meeting and a Secretary recording the minutes.
All aspects of governing a Sudbury School are ultimately determined by the School Meeting. The weekly agenda may range from changes to the school's rules, to spending money within the budget, to hiring and firing staff. All members present receive an equal vote and most decisions are determined by a majority vote. Students and staff receive equal votes.
Several aspects of running a Sudbury School are often delegated to other parties so that School Meetings do not get bogged down with the minutiae of detail. These may include elected administrative clerks (who may be chosen from staff or students), committees of volunteers, also corporations and cooperatives formed by the School Meeting for a specific area of activity that a group is interested in organizing, such as sports, art or computers.
[edit] Judicial Committee
When a school member has infracted against a school rule, such as by harassing or hitting another member, or by mismanaging a delegated responsibility, most Sudbury schools have some form of a committee to handle these situations. This is commonly through a Judicial Committee, made up of drafted students and staff, or through a modified Judicial School Meeting of volunteers.
Usually, there is a set procedure to handle complaints, and most of the schools follow guidelines that respect the idea of due process of law. There will usually be rules requiring an investigation, a hearing, a trial, a sentence, and allowing for an appeal.
Most Sudbury schools have developed a law book that outlines the school's policies that have changed over time. All such laws are subject to School Meeting review, and cover such things as rules regarding safety, personal behavior, and school management.
[edit] Age mixing
Sudbury schools generally accept children and teens, usually between ages 5–19. They do not segregate students by age, so that students of any age are free to interact with students in other age groups. Thus, for instance, School Meetings may be chaired by seven year olds, and classes will be organized by students' interests and abilities, rather than by age.
[edit] Learning by teaching (LdL)
One effect of this age mixing is that a great deal of the teaching in the school is done by students. Here some statements about Learning by teaching in the Sudbury Schools [1]:
- "Kids love to learn from other kids. First of all, it's often easier. The child teacher is closer than the adult to the students difficulties, having gone through them somewhat more recently. The explanations are usually simpler, better. There's less pressure, less judgment. And there's a huge incentive to learn fast and well, to catch up with the mentor.
- Kids also love to teach. It gives them a sense of value, of accomplishment. More important, it helps them get a better handle on the material as they teach; they have to sort it out, get it straight. So they struggle with the material until it's crystal clear in their own heads, until it's clear enough for their pupils to understand.
- As a secret weapon, age mixing is a block buster. It vastly increases the learning power and teaching power at school." (pages?)
[edit] Individual freedom, freedom of choice and learning through experience
A central tenet of the Sudbury model of education is that each student should be free to use her/his time as s/he wishes, not subject to any special curricula. The model contradicts the idea that there is one set curriculum that everyone should learn in order to become a successful adult or to create a better society -- environment teaches through experience. Believing there are many ways for students to learn, and not judging individual choices of subject matter, students are free to design their course of study from day to day. Sudbury Model schools do not believe in the idea, used in some progressive schools, of having students design a curriculum for themselves. Instead, proponents of the Sudbury Model hold that learning happens naturally, and requires no advanced planning or "end point" for the learner at all.
Classes and other planned activities are always voluntary and optional, and may be led by staff or students. Many students may choose never to take a class. The word "class," which is used within many Sudbury model communities, may be misleading — some advocates of the model hold that the term "spontaneous interest group" is more accurate. Often, areas of the school are designated for a particular use, such as an art room, a music room, or a library. Although most areas would normally be free for any students to use, some items or activities may require a student to have completed a certification process to demonstrate their ability to use the item safely. Most of the schools have several certifications, such as to use a sewing machine or wood-working equipment.
[edit] Discipline
Sudbury model democratic schools claim that popularly-based authority can maintain order more effectively than dictatorial authority for governments and schools alike. They also claim that in a Sudbury model democratic school the preservation of public order is easier and more efficient than anywhere else. Primarily because rules and regulations are made by the community as a whole, thence the school atmosphere is one of persuasion and negotiation, rather than confrontation since there is no one to confront. Sudbury model democratic schools experience shows that a school that has good, clear laws, fairly and democratically passed by the entire school community, and a good judicial system for enforcing these laws, is a school in which community discipline prevails, and in which an increasingly sophisticated concept of law and order develops, against other schools today, where rules are arbitrary, authority is absolute, punishment is capricious, and due process of law is unknown.
They emphasize that much more important than the externals of order is the question of the sources of internal discipline: how does a person come to develop the inner strength and character that endows his life with order and coherence, an independent man appropriate to a free republic of co-equal citizens, capable of making decisions within a rational, self-consistent framework -- a person treating and being treated with respect.
Sudbury model democratic schools affirm that the hallmark of the independent man is the ability to bear responsibility and since there is no way of teaching or training another person for self-sufficiency, there is no technique for obtaining or transmitting these traits. Hence, the only way a person becomes responsible for himself is for him to be responsible for himself, with no reservation or qualifications.
Thence a Sudbury model democratic school is structured in such a manner that all the trappings of external support that shore up the weak, all the trappings of external authority that substitute for inner self-direction, all the trappings of external moral pressure that replace the inner moral development and all the well-meaning paraphernalia that enervates and often paralyzes the individual wills of students and teachers alike, are missing. Sudbury model democratic schools assert that in these schools the basic building block is the responsible individual, whose sense of life derives from his overcoming with his own strength the great obstacles, errors and temptations that are strewn in his path, and whose existence is given form by his own creative efforts. [2]
[edit] Alumni
Sudbury Valley School has published two studies of their alumni over the past forty years. They have learned, among other things, that about 80% of their students have graduated from college, and that they have gone on to become successful in many areas of life. There have, as yet, been no formal studies of graduates of other Sudbury schools, but anecdotally, they seem to have similar results.
[edit] Sources
- ^ Daniel Greenberg: Age Mixing, Free at Last — The Sudbury Valley School. (editor?, location?), 1995 ISBN 1888947004, (quoted pages?)
- ^ The Crisis in American Education — An Analysis and a Proposal, The Sudbury Valley School (1970), Law and Order: Foundations of Discipline (pg. 49-55).
[edit] See also
- Sudbury Valley School
- List of Sudbury schools
- Democratic school
- Free school
- Summerhill School
- Sudbury Education Resource Network
