Ten Advantages to Being Part of the Early Years of a Waldorf High School

on February 22, 2012 in High School

  1. Students get to set the cultural tone for a new institution, creating and growing school traditions and customs.
  2. In a new high school free of an established list of requirements, students are encouraged and able to freely pursue personal passions.
  3. Small is not only beautiful, it’s also flexible. It is easier to pack up a few classes and take them out into the field to learn than when an entire high school with an established and possibly inflexible schedule attempts the same.
  4. During the early years, new high schools often rely on very seasoned teachers as guest teachers. The exciting opportunity to be a part of something new often attracts some of the most senior teachers in the Waldorf movement.
  5. Rules are easier to follow if you were part of writing them up. Budding high schools rely on their students to engage actively in creating the regulations that will guide them as they grow and learn, teaching them valuable life lessons in becoming an adult.
  6. Having helped to create a high school as a teen empowers you to take more creative risks throughout your life.
  7. Creative people—both teachers and students—are more likely to be drawn to a blank slate than to a finished product.
  8. Students unencumbered by expectations established by previous classes are free to explore and build, guided by the school’s faculty, in a fresh and adventurous way.
  9. The first few graduating classes are often more adventurous in their college choices and post graduate activities. Waldorf School of Saratoga Springs had a Fulbright Scholar in its second graduating class.
  10. The bonds between students, teachers and parents are strong. The sense that “we built this together” has a powerful unifying effect, both during everyone’s time at school and long after.