February 4, 2012
TECHNOS QUARTERLY Spring 2001 Vol. 10 No. 1
Interview with Daniel Greenberg
by Carole Novak
In
1968, a grand experiment was begun in an idyllic New England setting: a democratic
school, one in which all children, ages four and up, would be allowed to choose
their own path of education. There would be no curriculum, no tests, no requirements
for graduation, other than what the students chose for themselves to demonstrate
that they had prepared to become productive American citizens. And, being
democratic, all decisions at the school—including staff retention or
dismissal—would be made through vote at the School Meeting, in which
everyone was allowed to participate. This experiment is Sudbury Valley School
(SVS) in Framingham, Massachusetts, and it is still going strong 33 years
later. Begun by a group of founders that included the husband-and-wife team
of Daniel and Hanna Greenberg, SVS has demonstrated that the grand experiment
works: its graduates are accepted into the colleges of their choice and are
employed in jobs of their choosing, and they report a high degree of satisfaction
with their lives. TECHNOS spoke to Dan Greenberg one week after the 2000 Presidential
election.
The Interview
You write extensively of the democratic process as it exists in Sudbury
Valley School. I’ll bet the kids have really been busy studying that
process as it has worked—or not—in this Presidential election!
That’s been very interesting, actually. It has been a topic of conversation, of course. One of the things that sets our kids apart is the fact that they have a great deal of experience with the democratic process here. And they understand that to be an effective member of a democracy, you have to accept responsibility. For instance, in our School Meeting voting, they know enough to ask questions if they don’t understand the ballot or, if there is a problem, to request a new ballot. So, to our students, what’s happening in this presidential election is bizarre. And they understand the concept of human frailty, that people make mistakes; they accept that. They know that there is no perfect process for election.
Describe the election process at SVS.
Well, for one thing, we have no tenure here, so all staff—including myself, after 32 years—are elected (or re-elected) to our positions through a vote in the School Meeting, which includes everyone. All the election results are counted by teams, and the kids take this very seriously, so they put a lot of time into it. We have about 150 voters [out of 225 students plus staff], so most, but not all, participate in our elections. And there have been times when we had bitter divisions among the voters, nothing acrimonious, but strong divisions of opinion. But they counted the ballots and abided by the outcome. And they understand there is no perfect process for counting ballots.
And I’ll bet graduates of that system could deal with the present state of affairs in a mature way . . .
Well, most of them now are moving into their late forties, and their experience at SVS has made them able to stand up for themselves and make sure their opinions—and I would expect, their votes—are counted. Many of our graduates are entrepreneurial, self-employed, outspoken, and expect to be treated with respect, as they were here.
You and your wife, Hanna, both have Ph.D.s in the sciences; yours in theoretical physics, Hanna’s in biochemistry. What spurred you to work on founding this school?
There was a large group of founders. For Hanna and me, it was having our children that made us want to give them a different educational experience than our own. Hanna and I had two completely different schooling experiences, both unfulfilling. She was raised in Jerusalem, and often ended up running and playing in the streets rather than studying, because, as she puts it, she spent 12 years “in a fog” as far as school went. I had exactly the opposite experience: I was a very conscientious, studious kid. I have called myself a “lifelong recovering ‘A’ student,” and it’s true. I followed the rules, and I was a high achiever. But, neither of these educational scenarios worked for us, so when we started a family, we wanted a different school for our children. And the other founders felt the same way.
It really began for me when I was teaching in college. I tried all the pedagogical tricks; I tried to entertain them; I used all kinds of motivational techniques. I would deliver lectures that got standing ovations, but later, in the tests and essays, it was clear to me that the students just didn’t get it. I wasn’t getting through to them, and it was very frustrating, very disappointing. I asked my colleagues about it, and they all said the same things: “Don’t feel bad. It’s these kids today. They don’t work hard, they don’t care about studying and learning.” But I just refused to believe it was the students’ fault! Gradually, I came to understand that learning occurs when it is self-initiated, when kids are self-motivated. You can’t make someone learn something—you really can’t teach someone something—they have to want to learn it. And if they want to learn, they will.
When you wanted to learn something, how did you do it? You found something you were curious about, and you immersed yourself in studying it. You had a desire to progress in your learning. That’s what we allow in Sudbury Valley School.
What’s your reaction to the standardization of education in this country—or rather, the setting of standards?
I think you said it right the first time. The specification of outcomes is an obsolete concept; it is absurdly outdated. It’s fascinating to me that today, while the world is moving in all directions and very quickly, that mainstream educators have decided that they want to standardize education, to slow it down, in effect, and to make sure everyone learns the same things in the same amount of time. It’s crazy! And that’s what setting standards is all about. It’s a way for the grown-ups to control what the kids learn. And it won’t work today.
SVS has no curriculum and no tests, and you write no student recommendations for colleges—yet students are accepted to colleges all over the country. How?
Our students get a good education here, and those who are highly motivated to go to college get accepted without the letters of recommendation. They are used to talking and presenting themselves in a way that obviously demonstrates their best traits and what makes them good students.
Do most of your graduates go on to college?
Many do. Some go on to trade schools or get further training for jobs they are interested in. Some go into the arts, some are craftsmen, some take a little time out to travel, and some start their own businesses. But our graduates find and work at what they want to do. [See “Life after Sudbury Valley School,” p. 9.]
Are any of them involved in starting schools like Sudbury Valley?
Quite a few, actually, are involved in education. They have had the same experience Hanna and I had: when they started having their own kids, they didn’t want them to have a poor educational experience; they wanted them to enjoy school.
Do you speak to education students and teachers in training on college campuses?
Yes, quite often I’m invited to do so. We’ve been doing this here since 1968, so we have been identified as an example of a free, democratic school, and many professors want to expose their students to our philosophy.
What do they want to know from you? What do you tell them?
The saddest question of all is, “What advice do you have for us who are in the trenches, fighting to teach every day?” My response is: “Get out of the trench!” Their jobs are fast becoming obsolete. They don’t want to hear that, of course. Whenever culture has gone through a radical change, as ours has—from industrial age to information age—there are people who will deny that things have changed; they resist it and refuse to change. They strive to stay relevant, when it’s impossible. Things are just moving too fast.
I’ll tell you what the real problem is: These people are working under the assumption that they know better about what is good for kids, what kids need to learn to get ahead in this world. This is their worldview, and they aren’t going to give it up. But, if you observe children learning in their first few years of life, you can see that they can and do learn on their own—we leave them alone to crawl, walk, talk, and gain control over their bodies. It happens without much help from parents. But, at some point we decide we know better what kids should learn and how they should learn it. Then, we give them over to teachers, and you know that story.
I saw that your Web site lists 31 other schools that share the SVS philosophy, and that’s nice, but after 32 years it’s not exactly a large number. Is it possible for your school to be duplicated on a large scale, such as in the public schools?
I’m not too worried about that. I am a big believer in modeling. I think people with open minds will observe the way we do things and realize that our goal is to have successful, happy, productive adults, and they will take our ideas and implement them elsewhere for their own children. I don’t think of it in terms of a movement that will sweep the nation. Think how long it would take! Just the concept of personal freedom within a democracy, for instance, is a relatively young idea—only about 300 years old in this country. We are just now beginning to accept such a notion for kids, and it has been a long process. And, of course, not everyone accepts it.
I do take some comfort in the fact that rotten systems have a way of collapsing with staggering swiftness. Look at the Soviet system . . . I’ll bet if you reviewed the literature in 1988 and 1989, you wouldn’t find much that predicted the imminent collapse of the system. But it happened—and very quickly, once it began. So, maybe the change in public schools will occur as rapidly.
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Sudbury Valley School: Freedom to Learn “Here, students of all ages determine what they will do, as well as when, how, and where they will do it. This freedom is at the heart of the school; it belongs to the students as their right, not to be violated.” The Sudbury Valley School (SVS) is a nonprofit corporation. Every parent, all students and staff, and other elected members are full voting members of the Assembly, the corporate membership that oversees operational and fiscal policy. SVS is based on the educational philosophy of self-initiated learning in a democratic community. It uses the following principles in its daily routine, which is anything but routine:
The Site
School Management Admissions Activities Graduation For More Information |
I’m not holding my breath. One thing I don’t remember about my school days is all the fun your students seem to have.
Researchers who study advanced creativity tell us that the two most conducive elements to learning are play and talk. If you watch young children play, you will notice that they create games, characters, situations, whole worlds in which they immerse themselves with intense concentration. They have a great deal of fun, but they are also learning because they are modeling reality. And there is no better learning tool. You can’t learn by studying “subjects” the way they are organized in schools. In the new century, people will need to be good problem solvers and model builders, and they must be able to play, communicate—and I would add—be confident and feel empowered; that’s where freedom comes in. When kids play, they are working on imagining the kind of world we live in. Just think of it: the whole e-business culture, the dot.com world we find ourselves in, it’s unpredictable and chaotic—but it’s fun. Young people love it.
The young people I know don’t seem too concerned about having tenure or seniority . . .
To them, failure is a good thing because it allows for growth. This is diametrically opposed to the way things are done in the traditional school setting. There, we are required to plan, to set specific goals. In the new school culture (or at least at SVS), the idea is to do stuff when and how you feel like it, to have fun with it. They are allowed to try, to fail, and to learn from their mistakes. I have a story about a little five-year-old kid who had been with us for only two weeks. His mother told me that as she was driving him home from school one day, she asked him if he liked his new school, and he said, “I love it! In this school, it’s fun to make mistakes.” I think that says it all about SVS.
It wasn’t fun in my school when I made mistakes!
Precisely. In traditional schools, you’re penalized for making a mistake. But that won’t work in the new information culture, in the digital world we live in today.
Nice segue to the question I always have to ask: What is the role of technology in your school?
We published a report a couple of years ago on Internet use by SVS students, and we found that it was through the roof. The report sites the Merrimack Education Center’s [SVS’s Internet service provider] figures that we used more bandwidth in 1998Ð99 than the entire Boston Public School System, which has an Internet budget more than 30 times the size of ours. In terms of how much actual use is made of the networked resources, our school’s use of the Internet is comparable to that of a university.
I noticed that. At first, I was surprised, but then when I thought about it, I realized that it would be natural, since your students are allowed to pursue whatever they want in school.
Right. Our kids have complete freedom of choice in how they study, and the computer has become a major tool for them. It is conducive to self-initiated learning because it is non-linear, and the possibilities for exploration and discovery are limitless.
Educational technologists and teachers are calling for integrating technology into the curriculum, but without a curriculum, there can be no integration, per se.
Exactly. In the traditional public school classroom, the content is controlled, and use of the Internet for research is limited. But you know what’s happening? Kids are finding out about the potential for discovery online from other sources; many of them have computers at home, for instance, or their friends have them. Eventually, students will reject the controlled content and say, “The heck with these assignments—they’re trivial. I’m going to use the computer the way I want to.” I call it the Trojan Horse of Education.
Can you elaborate on that idea?
Technology will eventually destroy the way schools are run now. I think this is going to happen, and it won’t take long, either. Educators are still spending way too much time trying to control what kids learn, bending the content to their own purposes, hoping beyond hope to change—by using technology—but not change too much. They don’t really want the kids to take responsibility for their own learning and to find out all the information that’s out there and come to their own conclusions, do they? So, I see technology as a Trojan Horse: It looks like a wonderful thing, but they are going to regret introducing it into the schools because it simply can’t be controlled.
Sounds like a great topic for a TECHNOS essay!
Maybe so.
Editor’s Note: See Daniel Greenberg’s essay, “The Trojan Horse of Education.”
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Life after Sudbury Valley School On January 1, 1991, a survey of Sudbury Valley graduates was done to determine what paths their lives had taken after their SVS experience. The following criteria were met by 237 former students: (1) they left school after the age of 9; (2) they first enrolled under the age of 21; (3) while enrolled, they were in continuous contact with the school for at least one year; (4) they were over the age of 20 at the time of the survey; and (5) they had been out of school at least two years at the time of the survey. Responses were received from 188 former students (79 percent of those meeting the five criteria).
More telling than university degrees and employment are respondents’ comments when asked about their satisfaction with their jobs and happiness in their lives.
Source: Legacy of Trust: Life After the Sudbury Valley School Experience, by Daniel Greenberg and Mimsy Sadofsky (Sudbury Valley School Press, 1992).
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Photos courtesy of Sudbury Valley School.