Announcements

We're Changing Our Name and Our Focus

Part of founding a school means getting really deep regarding what it is we'd like to achieve and what kinds of experiences we'd like to host.

Initially, we wanted to be a Sudbury school because of Sudbury's focus on child liberation, freedom, and democracy.

We loved the idea of no required classes, no grades, and no curriculum.

As we started to reach out to other school founders around the country, we realized that, actually, we wanted to make two departures from the Sudbury model.

1. Democracy.
When we say "democracy," we don't mean how the US government does it. We don't mean a representative democracy. We mean a direct democracy: one person, one vote, and all votes are equal regardless of age or status.

This sounded really good, until we took a deeper look and talked to other schools. What can happen in a democracy is that it creates a sense of "us vs them." When the vote is taken, and the decision made, you have some people who are really happy and some people who are really upset.

Since our values prioritize mental health and community building, using a democracy to make decisions didn't seem like the best course forward.

We took a look at what the Circle Schools do instead: sociocracy. Similar to a direct democracy, where every voice counts, a sociocracy attempts to take all views into consideration to make decisions. However, instead of voting for or against something, each student is free to say whether or not they consent to the proposed rule change. Can they live with it? And if not, why not? Instead of a vote, it becomes a conversation. We seek to discover how we can enter into another person's point of view, to experience what they are experiencing. We seek to explore nuances. In the end, the goal is to keep understanding and keep adjusting our proposed rule changes to the point where everyone can consent to it.

Plus, how amazing is it to learn practical consent from such an early age!

The other departure we realized we wanted to make from the Sudbury model is in regards to...

2. Adult-Initiated Programs.
In a pure Sudbury model, all ideas must come from the children. The reasons behind this make a lot of sense. Children who have been to school have internalized the belief that the only ideas that are valid are those that come from adults. Further, due to the coercive and manipulative nature of compulsory schooling, children learn that if an adult suggests something, it is actually a command. In an effort to refrain entirely from the form or appearance of coercion, children are given the freedom to pursue their passions without an adult telling them what's what.

We appreciate and applaud these efforts. In our conversations and discussions on this matter, however, we came face to face with some of the problems some of us faced in our own childhoods, to wit, the absence of meaningful adult relationships. We told stories of growing up feeling lost because of the lack of adult contributions to our ideas of what to do.

To be clear, this is very different from an adult insinuating, even innocently, that a child might do such and such. Rather, we are referring to the nature of relationships where each person shares their interests with the other. In this case, this would refer to the staff at our school sharing their interests in kayaking or podcasting or writing. Like any natural relationship, perhaps these conversations would spark an interest in a child, who then might decide to pursue it. Returning to the situations that came up in our discussions about feeling neglected as children, one of us said, "You don't know what you don't know." We realized that we didn't want a child to go through our program never knowing about the interests of the other people in the program, including the adults.

In talking these things over with other alternative schools, we came to the conclusion that, if we were to make these two departures from the Sudbury model, we couldn't rightly refer to ourselves as a Sudbury school.

This is sociocracy in action: we came into the discussions open-minded regarding the outcome, while remaining cohesive on the ultimate goal: a place that prioritizes children's mental health and a real-life education based on their own genius.

When we discussed the vision further, we talked about how we see the local Spokane community being very involed. We wanted our education experience to be immersed in the placefullness of Spokane and all that it has to offer. We imagined inviting storytellers, craftspeople, and musicians to come visit us. We imagined hosting workshops for people from out of town and collaborating with them to create new things that none of us could do on our own.

In short, the word "school" started to feel much too small.

The word "cooperative" or "co-op" started to sound like a much better fit.

And so it is for all of these reasons that we decided to change the name and the focus of our community from "Spokane Sudbury School" to "Spokane Learning Co-op."

But some things haven't changed at all. We continue to promote and advocate for children's rights. We continue to maintain that children and full human beings. We are still committed to child liberation and freedom. We continue to maintain the idea of no required classes, no grades, and no curriculum. We continue to reject an agenda of control and manipulation.

If our vision speaks to you, please reach out. We're looking for more people who feel called to do this kind of work. We need your drive and your passion to bring this vision into reality. Please visit our site (link in the comments) to add your name to our mailing list.

If you'd like to talk to someone right away about how you'd like to get involved, please contact us. We're so excited to hear from you.

May there be Peace of Earth.