SVS Press Ad

For fifteen years , we at Fairhaven School have relied on the voluminous writings and videos from the Sudbury Press. For forty-two years, students at Sudbury Valley School (SVS) have been free to spend their time as they choose, and have had to take responsibility for their choices and lives. Just like at Fairhaven, the young people of Sudbury Valley have been playing, thinking, and learning on a lovely, dynamic campus. Almost from the beginning, people at SVS have been documenting the school’s philosophy and history. Although we did release our first book two years ago (Like Water), we still rely heavily on Sudbury Press materials.

From the day our school founders group opened its first SVS “Startup Kit” full of books, cassette tapes, and a management manual, we knew we were going to become a viable school. Their follow-up studies of graduates alone have proven invaluable through the years. Yes, the school is a wonderful, arresting idea, but, as the expression goes, the proof is in the pudding.

Now there are DVDs and CDs of Sudbury Valley School  alumni. Who are they? What do they do? How do they connect their years at SVS with their adult lives? Their material has been priceless for us, and has inspired our Public Relations  Committee to one day compile our own alumni information.

All of this is to say: check out Sudbury Valley’s new bookstore.They’re even having a sale to celebrate!

http://sudburypress.com/

In the aforementioned article, one family in Westford, Mass.  is taking charge of their children’s education and letting them decide what they want to learn and do. “Unschooling is self-directed life-long learning,” said Christine Yablonski, the kids’ mom. The most accurate definition of “Unschooling” is: “a home- schooled education with the child taking the primary responsibility instead of the parent or teacher.” Fairhaven is a lot like this in that they follow the Sudbury model of school, which also means that the student is in charge of their individual education. This by no means proves that we are in any way “unschoolers.”

I spoke with a few of the staff members about Fairhaven in regards to the Sudbury model of schooling. Caity Pittenger, a staff member who transferred to Fairhaven her sophomore year of high school as a student and now teaches here, said that at Fairhaven, she had more confidence in herself as a student and became more direct as a student. She also commented that school and education felt fun again because she could pace her own learning.

Sudbury schools are a radical transformation from the accepted idea of school. An article published by Fairhaven School and written by former staff member Romey Pittman, discusses the similarities of Sudbury Schools to other school such as Montessori, Waldorf Schools and, home school. As with Montessori, Sudbury schools allow for the students to have more freedom to make decisions. It holds the general assumption that students are curious about life on their own. (“Unschooling” holds the same idea.) In comparison to a Waldorf School approach, Sudbury cares about the child as a whole, with interests beyond academics. Also Sudbury schools are interested in the overall happiness and potential of every student. The wisdom of a child is respected as with their view on topics such as society, politics, and world issues. The needs of the student (which are self determined) are heard and responded to accordingly. The idea of “unschooling” was first seen in home school, which is much like the model of Sudbury schools. The idea is that learning is possible without teaching, and students want to succeed in life. Lastly, the Sudbury model and “unschooling” share the idea that kids learn from experience and experiments over textbooks.

Education is necessary to the advancement of people no matter where you receive your education. For some, good ol’ fashion, traditional schooling is best; for some “Unschooling” is their method of choice. Personally, I prefer Fairhaven’s model of education primarily because I can learn what I want, when and where I want. This drives me to want to learn more because I am the master of my educational destiny. Before I go, I want all students reading this: to know that education is power. Work to the best of your ability and never let someone hold you from your educational destiny, and most importantly, pursue your dreams!

~Kiara Marie

A Fairhaven parent sent me a link to an article in this month’s Atlantic Monthly about Melvin Konner’s brand-new, 900 page book The Evolution Of Childhood that provides clues. (http://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2010/04/play-8217-s-the-thing/8028/) Here’s a paragraph from the article:

Konner is especially interested in play, which is not unique to humans and, indeed, seems to have been present, like the mother-offspring bond, from the dawn of mammals. The smartest mammals are the most playful, so these traits have apparently evolved together. Play, Konner says, “combining as it does great energy expenditure and risk with apparent pointlessness, is a central paradox of evolutionary biology.” It seems to have multiple functions—exercise, learning, sharpening skills—and the positive emotions it invokes may be an adaptation that encourages us to try new things and learn with more flexibility. In fact, it may be the primary means nature has found to develop our brains.

With freedom, we gravitate to play. My best writing time feels  playful and open-ended. The results of play are serious, sometimes even life-changing. As Konner documents, a habit of play balances life, and stimulates growth. We seem even to be hard-wired to do it. Here at Fairhaven, it reigns supreme, setting the table for the mysterious transformation from childhood to adulthood. Fortunately, our democratic structure at school compensates for the pervasive play. Rules, limits, and consequences  keep chaos at bay. Should the doll-players not clean up, they might lose access to the room. When the Nerfers left water balloon shrapnel on the grounds, they had to do grounds work. And so on.

Next week I travel to Sudbury Valley School to serve on their diploma committee, and in preparation I’m reading the theses of eighteen graduate candidates. The thread that runs through all of their papers? Play. Coming (and staying) to your nearest Sudbury school, it is the sine qua non of successful development, the pinnacle of human developmental adaptation.

“The true object of all life is play.”

G.K. Chesterton

“Letting your mind play is the best way to slove problems.”

Bill Watterson

“If you want creative workers, give them enough time to play.”

John Cleese

Mark McCaig

May, 2010

To our youngest students, the school must seem big in every way. We have twelve acres, with a forest. We have a veritable forest of older students to wander among and one day comprehend. We have two buildings with some twenty-odd rooms, not to mention the six bathrooms. The lawbook is huge. Young students who pass the computer certification also have limited access to the internet.

Then, one might ask, how large is a young person’s imagination? For surely they have unlimited access to it here. Whether through play, or books, or art room supplies, even our youngest students surf the endless wave of their own minds at play. So, yes, being a student at Fairhaven must seem enormous in many ways .

As they grow , our students learn their place in all of these areas. They learn the paths in the woods, often finding their favorite spots. They might master climbing the swingset poles. They become friends with students of all ages. They learn the rules, then learn to follow them. Always, it seems, they discover the contours of their creative worlds. Their worlds sing, they might splash green across a canvas, they might dance across the Chesapeake Room floor. Often, these young people play at being older. It might be “house” and she’s the mom. It might be “school,” and he’s the teacher. Cops and robbers, war games–the mind wanders.

Then, one day, they are older. Most years, at least one senior Fairhavener explains their bad mood to me by saying, “Fairhaven’s just not like it used to be.” I look at them: they used to play in the stream and now they’re a lifeguard. Or they used to ride the scooter down the hill and now they drive a car on food runs. They used to spend most of their time as a defendant in the Judicial Committee, and now they’re a JC Clerk . You get the picture.

By the time somebody leaves, the school seems small, and the big rest of the world beckons. They leave with their imaginations intact, with their creativity still keen. Mostly, they leave with a sense of mastery, over this place, over information and how to get it, over themselves, and, crucially,  mastery over the fears about whatever awaits down the road. We can only wish them well, and look forward to seeing them when they come back to visit.

Maybe they’ll check out the newest, smallest students and remember their first days here. How big it used to be.

Mark McCaig

April, 2010

I have so many friends.

I recommend it for all ages, girls and boys.

All the staff are great.

Class

It rocks and I love it so much.

Finally, I have so much freedom and joy at this school.

Jae Fish

March, 2009

Fairhaven Players peform at Parent Appreciation Night. (photo by Salvia Lani)

On behalf of parents and Assembly members I would like to thank all of the Fairhaven students and staff who worked so hard to execute an absolutely flawless and enjoyable evening dedicated to parent appreciation.  Although we as parents have a pretty good idea of the amount of work involved in producing such a soirée, you succeeded in making it appear effortless.

First of all let us thank the public relations committee for sponsoring an event where our only responsibility as parents was to show up, eat, and be thoroughly entertained. Kitchen Corporation provided us with a superb menu of Italian cuisine that included vegan lasagna that was well worth going back for seconds. Our evening’s musical entertainment provided by Music Corporation included a delicate violin solo, rhythmical percussions and a rock out performance from the Fairhaven Players band. Theatre Corporation performed a sneak preview of one of their upcoming one acts, and I am confident many of us will be back to enjoy the full production.

So whatever contribution you made to the evening’s festivities (be it digital dancing provided by Computer Corporation, slinging food in the kitchen or entertaining us with your talents), let it be known that we parents enjoyed the opportunity to be appreciated and to celebrate as a community. Moreover, watching all of you function together with such exquisite synchronization made us very proud and earned all of you a few more rides to and from school.

Thank You

-John-

John Schertler

Assembly President

Fairhaven School

In April, 2005, film-maker Danny Mydlack made a lovely documentary abour Fairhaven School, Voices From The New American Schoolhouse. Here is the trailer. Enjoy!

Danny staffed here at Fairhaven for the 2007-2008 school year prior to founding Arts And Ideas Sudbury up the road in Baltimore.

In the patch of woods just outside the school office, three boys sneak by. Two more lurk deeper in the trees. Suddenly, they’re sprinting across the school grounds. Two outdoor games have been big on campus  lately: “Hunters and Prey” and “Infected.” Both are hide-and-seek variants and can  involve anywhere from ten to thirty students at a time. Hallmarks include people flashing past, hiding as long as possible, and shouting from deep in the forest. Games can last for hours.

Crossing from one building to the other yesterday, taking a few minutes to deeply notice the players,  I again asked the question we ask so many times : what’s going on here? Obviously, the players are breathing fresh air, exercising, and developing relationships, all hallmarks of outdoor play. Furthermore, the open-ended quality of the games fosters critical and strategic thinking in the players. But what about these particular games makes them so compelling?

Intense games of hiding and seeking seem to reinforce biological drives and instincts. Quoting from landscape theorist Jay Appleton’s Prospect-Refuge theory,

“at both human and sub-human level the ability to see and the ability to hide are both important in calculating a creature’s survival prospects . . . . Where he has an unimpeded opportunity to see we can call it a prospect. Where he has an opportunity to hide, a refuge. . . . To this . . . aesthetic hypothesis we can apply the name prospect-refuge theory.”

We are hard-wired, then, both to take refuge and to seek higher ground. For millions of years on the savanna, or in the woodlands, humans needed both prospect and refuge to literally survive. Here in the Mid-Atlantic, wolves are long gone, as are saber-toothed tigers.  Most students get their food from supermarkets. Still, they  satisfy basic drives when they play their games. Although whether or not they will survive may not be at stake, whether or not they will thrive surely is. Brains and bodies anticipate the need to find prospect and refuge, to seek and to hide. At Fairhaven, the students fulfill this need.

Our working thesis is that free range young people develop best. Playing Hunters and Prey, from a point of prospect, they are learning how to take stock of a situation and they then experience the good (or bad) things that this assessment brings. They are also learning how to hide, or more broadly put, to take refuge. Refining these individual traits in the social matrix of a game only intensifies their value. Given the stakes and the outcomes, the oft-repeated phrase it’s just a game falls short of the complexity.

Later in the day, two students relax from the prospect of the wrought iron rockers on the porch, the highest ground at Fairhaven. Noticeably pleased to be blending in by talking with me, they tell me casually that they’re playing, that they’re part of the game swirling below. Nevertheless, some aspect of them stands ready, at a moment’s notice, to spring from their spots at the merest whiff of an approaching hunter.

Mark McCaig

January, 2009

At Sudbury schools conferences, the wise words from SacVal staffers always got our attention. Likewise their contributions on our listserve. Two Sacramento Valley staff members, Kaye-Lynn Peterson and Brenda Gustin,  served on Fairhaven’s Diploma Committee in recent years. Former Fairhaven staff member Cameron Lyons used to work at Sacramento. We Sudbury schools are a small community!

As you good people move on, we write to offer our gratitude, appreciation, and these words of encouragement: your work has changed hundreds of lives, and bolstered thousands. May we all be so lucky!

Best,

Mark McCaig

and the crew at Fairhaven School

A slideshow of Fairhaven School presented at the Greenfest during October 2009.