I'll start by saying you don't have to be a "kid of color" to wish you looked like the blond angels on the wall -- I'm a brunette who grew up with blond white dolls or brunette black dolls and wondered where the brunette Jewish dolls were. All kids go through that wondering about the "other." Having read "Black, White and Jewish," I think I understand why that issue was accentuated for you, but trust me, even blond white kids go through some questioning, too. And where you might see "white" and think homogeneous group, some of us "white" people never felt comfortable in that grouping and never felt as part of it as you might have thought we were.

I think it's great that you researched the school. Frankly, though, I would've found it offensive had you asked that first question in a tour the way you wrote that you did. I would think that the time for a question about whether or not a school is an Austrian/Aryan cult would be better handled in a private one-on-one moment, either before or after the tour.

All of that being said -- if your gut is finding it difficult to get comfortable with that school, and you've got others you're interested in, drop it from the list. It might be a learning experience for you to open to the ideas and images from a school like that; you might also not ever be comfortable with what is being fed to your son, and that discomfort will be translated to your son, absorbed by your son, and your son will be affected by it.

I'm by no means saying that the school you choose should always look just like you. I think there's tremendous growth in going into different perspectives and groups. But if you can't open up to it (assuming, of course, it's not an Aryan cult in disguise), then it would be confusing to your son to be sent there.

My two cents. Generally I think new parents take the issue of preschool way too seriously. I've seen genius kids who came from fingerpainting-filled preschools and really dull kids who went to Montessori.

I consider you fortunate to be able to wade through the crowded waters of pre-school education alternatives and I respect your choice to be discriminant over an important undertaking. The lofty pricetag of tuition to a Waldorf school has helped maintain the homogenous numbers that fill the desks over the years.

If you find the tenants and methods of any particular institution to rub you the wrong way, that "Aryan " farm system you overtly alluded to at an arguably inappropriately timed moment during your tour of the Waldorf, well consider the alternatives and move on.

My father could not afford to move us into a better performing school district, so his alternative was a "secular" choose, parochial school. A black man raised in a Southern Baptist tradition of worship sending his child to Catholic school, unheard of? My dad never bought into any of the Catechism of the Holy Roman Church either. Naw, it was a strategic move. Yours should be too.

I confronted this same question about 2 dozen years ago, when my eldest daughter was approaching kindergarten, having spent preschool at a wonderful, parent-led cooperative nursery school. I wondered, would my African American Jewish daughters flourish in this very Euro-centric environment? I asked about the folktale traditions, and whether the range of stories could be expanded to include the traditions of enrolled students. I also asked how they would teach a child who would enter kindergarten already reading, when their philosophy was to wait until around age 7 to teach this skill formally. The answers to these questions, along with other factors, led me to search elsewhere for a school that would be compatible with my family. I was fortunate to find a public school that embraced a multicultural approach, treated all students with respect and genuine caring, and encouraged students to pursue their academic interests and relate them to their lives. This school became a true "home away from home" for us!

With both the preschool search and the kindergarten search, I brought my daughter to visit the most promising schools. After each visit, she shared her impressions. Every time, she included a count of the children who "looked like me."

Keep searching until you find the place that feels right!

In my opinion, it’s not very product to worry about IF any particular preschool is going to be racist or anti-Semitic (or sexist or homophobic, etc.) because they ALL ARE; just to different degrees.  Hopefully, you can find one that teaches that differences don’t make some people better or worse than others, but what’s most important is that YOU teach your son that his worth (and the worth of others) isn’t dependant on how much they conform to anyone’s ideal.

As for the particular school you described – it sounds to me like you are sensing that in one way or another they are teaching (no matter how subtly or unconscious) that some people are “more equal than others” but you just can’t articulate exactly what gives you that feeling.  Whatever reasons there are in favor of putting your son in that environment don’t negate your right to choose something else for your son.  Everything positive that can be gained can be got someplace else.

On the other hand, if you teach your son that nothing diminishes how much people are worth there is nothing that will go on at that school or any other you choose that can do much damage.  You have to decide if that atmosphere is a deal breaker or merely a nuisance and if it’s just a nuisance if it’s one you are willing to put up with.

The bottom line is to make it clear that neither you nor you son are better or worse people (or mother or son, respectively) depending on whether he goes to this or any other school or not.

We've just waded similar waters, our serious choices included a Reggio Emilia based school, several Montessori schools (which varied drastically b/c there is no trademark on the name) and a Friends School.

Waldorf was never a serious consideration b/c of the things listed as well as a host of things that I read  on mothering magazines forums. I went to college with a Waldorf alum, who is a wonderful person so I don't think that they are churning out Aryan purists by any means : ) And our local school seems to be more racially and ethnically mixed than many of the other private or public schools. It just wasn't a good fit for our family.

We're really excited by what our local Friends school has to offer so hopefully it will be as enjoyable an experience as we expect.

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A major problem with schools based on the philosophy of an individual is that the people who run the institutions years later do not consider when it is appropriate to change with the times. I sometimes wonder if the person who developed the program would laugh to see how it was being strictly enforced a century down the line.

It is appropriate as our world becomes more interdependant that the literature they read come from a greater diversity of cultures. It is silly to assume that because the founder read these stories 150 years ago that they would not choose different stories today. The problem is not with the philosophy of the Waldorf schools but rather with the rigidity with which the original curriculum is followed.

I was on a home school group based on the philosophy of a delightful and progressive woman of the 1880s named Charlotte Mason. The group stuck with her curriculum so closely that it was by today's standards racist. They went so far as to say that by the 11th grade you could start supplementing music studies with individuals like Miles Davis. Lets just say that in my home Miles was studied in kindergarten.

When you send Tenzin to school though you don't have that control. Send him somewhere else. I learned that our public school was way better than I had expected it would be.

I grew up in 3 different Waldorf schools from pre-K through 12th grade, and so was excited to see you writing here about Waldorf education.  I'm tremendously grateful for my education in these schools, and was shaped by some excellent teachers and a curriculum rich in arts, time spent outdoors, etc.  

Waldorf schools are not a racist, anti-Semitic cult as the WaldorfCritics web site would have you believe.  However, they have a stronger Christian influence than they sometimes like to admit.  In most US Waldorf schools, all the common Christian holidays and some less common ones are celebrated.  Depending on the school or class, Jewish and other holidays might be part of the school festival rhythm too.  Teachers tend to have a particular spiritual view of child development in accordance with Steiner's philosophies.  Some schools say God in the morning verse they recite, others don't.

I agree with the last comment that a problem with Waldorf and some other forms of education is "the rigidity with which the original curriculum is followed." Though Steiner himself said he did not want his curricular suggestions followed dogmatically, they often are.  I'm a blond-haired white girl, so in many ways, the curriculum reflected me and my history.  As a whole though, the curriculum needs to change.  Some innovative Waldorf educators are adapting to meet the times and to better serve their students, and I wish there were more of them.  Waldorf education isn't about golden-haired maidens and Christian festivals, but those are the trappings it often comes in.  I am always excited to hear about schools that are changing this (it sounds like the school in Hawaii is doing a few innovative things).  

Waldorf education can offer a wonderful, nurturing education, and has a particularly unique curriculum for young children.  A lot depends on the individual school, and on your child's teacher, and on what you are looking for.    

This is a Waldorf dad from Chicago weighing in.

I saw your earlier post about your visit to a Montessori school.  I was intrigued by your reference to Kenneth Chenault, and followed your link to his Wikipedia article and then to a Business Week profile.  Chenault’s Waldorf high school teacher said that his leadership abilities were recognized early, and he was a leader all through high school.  It seemed like the opposite of racism – recognizing and developing a student’s abilities.

To call Waldorf racist or anti-Semetic seems to me kinda absurd.  Waldorf is one of the most liberal educations available.  Waldorf started when the managers of a Waldorf cigarette factory approached Rudolf Steiner to ask him to run a school for their workers’ children.  This was in Weimar Germany, shortly after the devastating WW I.  Steiner decided to devise an education that would make wars like that impossible, by raising kids that would not blindly follow orders.  The education today tries to create confident kids who have learned how to think for themselves.

Waldorf is not a religious education in any conventional sense.  In pre-school, you will hear a lot of songs about mother earth, and lots of seasonal festivals.  There is no religious indoctrination, no catechism, no evident religiosity.  The sound bite “Christian mystic” isn’t true in Chicago, though the “mystic” part is true.  Waldorf has an ethic that each child is a unique spirit, whose nature becomes evident through schooling.  Waldorf shares this religious impulse with many other religious schools.

I understand your concern that Tenzin might not recognize himself in the myths and fairy tales told at Waldorf.  The debate here in Chicago recognizes that Waldorf’s stories, intended to be universal, are too parochial for today’s complex world.  Teachers here discuss broadening the stories.  My feeling is that the stories are universal enough to engage the kids’ spirits, and that the kids are smart enough to see though any surface differences.  As a parent, you have to choose whether Tenzin is better in a school that reflects his social, racial and religious identity, or in a school that tries to transcend identity.

But I have a sneaking suspicion I know which you will choose.  You named Tenzin after the Dalai Lama, already pointing him out into the larger world.

At the core of a Waldorf School, there will always be the teachings of Rudolf Steiner.  The inner group of the faculty, called the College of Teachers, will be devotees of Steiner's home-brewed religion known as Anthroposophy.  Don't bother asking the teachers questions about Anthroposophy; go get a few books of Steiner's, read them and then ask yourself if you feel comfortable sending your kids to a Waldorf School.

Interesting.  I'd never heard of Waldorf schools before reading this article, but I think I can safely cross them off my list of potential schools.  Thanks for doing some legwork for me!!

My grandchildren attended Waldorf schools in Germany.  They are of American and British parentage. My granddaughter (blond, fair and fluent in the German language) was bullied, physically abused and treated poorly by other students.   Specific student comments were of the sort that she was not "German."   Requests to teachers to address this situation were met with disregard. Unsatisfied with the type of educational program there, my daughter transferred both children to an international school as soon as possible.  They have now moved to the U.S. and are enrolled in the American school system. I researched the Waldorf school and found it to be cultish and reeking of material that promulgated the notorious political groups of the 20th Century.

I am a former Waldorf School parent. Luckily for our child, she saw througth the Steiner crap really fast and amazingly clearly for a 7 year old - something we could not see. She was there for only the 1st grade. And that was plenty.

A word to parents which think that the school should bring up your children instead of you yourself: The school is supposed to teach them how to write, read, count - geography, history, biology, etc. - not be a CONVENIENT substitute for PARENTING. Waldorf is promoting itself as a SUBSTITUTE FOR YOUR PARENTING. How convenient. Waldorf teaches ABSOLUTE OBEDIENCE TO AUTHORITY.

The same teacher through 8 years or more IS SUPPOSED TO SUBSTITUTE YOU - a busy parent. It is a very CONVENIENT solution for the affluent, busy, hard-working parents - why don't I just PAY SOMEBODY to "shape" my child. Great. The memory od Waldorf School brings a shiver down my spine, how easy it is to brainwash parents nowadays by scaring them with "inferior" public education while presenting this idyllic Steiner setting - yes, we got brainwashed too - but it was our child who pointed to the weird phenomena in her class and who opened our eyes.

Why - because we never PAID anyone to BRING UP our child prior to that Waldorf adventure and our child TALKED to us despite clear instructions from the WALDORF teacher NOT TO TALK to parents about what is happening in the school. HOW ABOUT THAT ONE, HUH?. I am still angry about it - and stay away from the subject as the Waldorf teachers turned ugly against us and threatened a lawsuit - like any cult - when confronted with questions. America is a free country and everyone has a choice - including a convenient and egoistic choice to pay someone to take over YOUR role as parents.

We made that mistake but for only a year. Don't do that. And research widely before you commit your child to any private unregulated educational institution in its promise to relieve you from parenting - and from shaping your child yourself.

Dear Mr. Brennan:

"Steiner decided to devise an education that would make wars like that impossible, by raising kids that would not blindly follow orders.  The education today tries to create confident kids who have learned how to think for themselves."

Yeah, right. Actually EXACTLY THE OPPOSITE is true. You will find out later.

Dear Mr. Brennan:

"Steiner decided to devise an education that would make wars like that impossible, by raising kids that would not blindly follow orders.  The education today tries to create confident kids who have learned how to think for themselves."

I wonder why Hitler, after kicking Steiner out, adopted the Waldorf methods. Maybe he wanted the Germans to think for themselves, instead of following authority? Duhhh...

I attended Wladorf School for twelve years, therefor I am decidedly biased. I pity those who missed out on this magical and imaginative childhood, filled to the brim with art and science and language and appreciation for the cultures of the world. My childhood was absolutely magic. In Waldorf Schools you are taught to think for yourself, to express yourself in a way that I think few schools offer. When I was in first grade, I was an extremely dreamy child, I had terrible difficulty staying focused in school. My teachers, concerned that I was so far behind the rest of my classmates, sent me to be tested. The result of those tests was this: I was severely learning impaired, I would NEVER learn to read or write, or for that matter function as a productive member of society. They recommended  that my parents send me to a special school for the disabled. Instead, my parents sent me to Waldorf. And I continued to lag behind my classmates. I didn't learn to read till third grade. Three years later, I was tested again, and was reading at the college level. Waldorf gave me the opportunity to develop at my own pace, in my own way. Had I gone anywhere else, I doubt I would ever have learned to read. Waldorf has this to say for it- it educates the whole child, works with the child, the specific child. I can't imagine allowing my children to miss out on the magic of art, of knowledge, of mythology, of dreams and imagination, that spirit that Waldorf gave me and my friends.

It has only been in the last few years that I have begun to realize how much Christian myth was part of our education. We had no idea that there was any Christian connotation whatsoever. Ours was a decidedly non Christian upbringing, far more pagan than otherwise. As far as we knew, Christian myth was given just the amount of faith as Hinduism, Buddhism, , Judaism, Islam, Norse Myths, Greek myths, Babylonian myths... All were given equal footing. We never felt in any way that we were a Christian School, an aryan school, and certainly not a racist school. Rudolph Steiner developed the Waldorf curriculum after he was approached by the owner of a tobacco company during WW1, who asked that he develop a curriculum for the children of his factory workers. His main desire? That Steiner develop an education that would produce children who would never wage war, who would never hate others. That was his goal. It was decidedly not an Aryan plot.

Waldorf education is expensive. Very few of my classmates and friends in Waldorf didn't have parents who worked at the school in order to pay for the education that they wanted for us. They didn't have much money, but felt that it was worth it. They believed in it enough for it to be worth it. For this I am eternally grateful.

Oh, wow, I just wanted to add, for the obviously upset former Waldorf parent: I'm sorry you had a bad teacher for your daughter, that is most unfortunate. But where in the world does this idea that the teacher is there to substitute for the parent come from? That is an absurd distortion. The reason that you have the same teacher for eight years is that the teacher and student can develop a personal relationship, in which the teacher must deal with that childs specific educational needs. In a school where the teacher only has to deal with a child for one year, the specific issues a child may face do not need to be addressed by that teacher. If the child has problems, that teacher knows that they won't have to deal with them again the next year, and therefor doesn't necessarily need to deal with it. In Waldorf, the teacher/student, teacher/parent relationships have the opportunity to develop over the years, allowing all concerned to be working together for the benefit of the child.

Again, it is unfortunate that you had a bad experience with a teacher. But that has nothing to do with the curriculum, any more than bad teachers in the public system are a reflection on its fundamental curriculum. That is absurd. I also attended public school, so I have some basis for comparison, and without a doubt I had teachers in public school who were far more indoctrinated /crazy/dogmatic than anything I ever experienced at Waldorf.

Yes, Waldorf can have problems just as ANY organization can. But just as I don't assume that UPS is a fundementally terrible organization because they broke my wine glasses, you shouldn't make mass accusatory generalizations about Waldorf, or those who find value in it. It isn't for everyone, but nor is Catholic School, or Public, Or Montessori...

I went to a Waldorf school for three years during preschool. I am a brown eyed, brunette Jewish girl, and have only the best memories of my time spent there. Was  I ever uncomfortable with the other children? Not at all, and I wasn't the only child there who didn't fit the traditional blue eyed, blond haired mold you describe. To be perfectly honest, though, I only know that now from looking at class pictures - I couldn't have done much more than tell you my friends' hair colors when I was that young. Race, and even religion, was never emphasized in any way by the teachers.

The best part about Waldorf is that it allows children to imagine and pretend to a great degree. Even now, as a science major in college, I still think slightly out of the box when compared to my peers. The only personal caveat I have about Waldorf education is that art is deemphasized for the first few years. I really missed drawing and painting at school (due to the philosophy of anthroposophy) , which I only realized after I switched schools for first grade (due to a job change in my family).

All this being said, it really depends on your local school. As with any private school, the greatest factor is the atmosphere created by the teachers. Ignoring all the history, do the kids look happy there?

As a half-Jewish Waldorf teacher and former Waldorf parent, I thought I'd offer my two cents.

To me this posting and related comments distill a lot of the reality that surrounds the Waldorf movement.  People in this day and age have strong opinions/biases and they interpret the world through those filters.  If you remove the incendiary terms, "cult", "Aryan", "antisemitic", etc., much of what is listed here is true in one way or another.  It's true that Steiner was a Christian mystic, but not true that he preached anti-semitism or pro-Aryan perspectives (in fact the Waldorf schools were shut down by the ***) nor that Waldorf schools demand absolute obedience (as a Waldorf teacher, the irony of this claim is hilarious).

It's true that we teach all those ancient cultures and religions, but we do it because it's important to know where humanity came from and because these subjects address the developing needs of the child, since as each child grows and develops he/she recapitulates the evolution of humanity in his/her stages of growth and consciousness.

It is also true that many Waldorf schools are struggling to know how to integrate contemporary and global culture into their work and vision.  The curriculum came to us from Europe and it is our challenge to make it relevant and universal.  It is true that many Waldorf teachers (and other human beings) are over-identified with tradition.

It is true that if Rudolf Steiner were to walk into many Waldorf classrooms he would either shrug, or possibly even wither.  Pick any great teacher of any age and ask him/her how he/she feels about the way his/her teaching is being promulgated now.  It's pretty humbling.  What happens to the profound wisdom that if offered to us by these great people?  It gets diluted, manipulated, "spun".  Yet we must all do the best we can to expand upon and take up great thoughts.

It is true that Anthroposophy is based on Christ-centered mysteries, but it is not true that we as Waldorf teachers bring that into our lessons (except, I believe, in one high-school level course, in some schools).  As Waldorf educators we strive to bring the children an experience of the world, of humanity, of nature in as all-embracing a way as we can, so as to enable the children to be strong, balanced, healthy, free-thinking stewards of the future.

Sometimes we succeed and sometimes we fail.  And each teacher is an individual with strengths and failings and biases.  But if you read the material that comes out of the national and international Waldorf sites (try http://www.whywaldorfworks.org/) you will see that as a movement we are striving for the highest good for man/womankind.

I am sorry that Rebecca and the others who have posted here have had disturbing experiences at a Waldorf School.  But please don't judge the whole lot based upon specific experiences or tales.  Who of us would want to be pre-judged based upon the actions of those who look like, talk like or otherwise represent us?

If Rudolf Steiner wanted one thing more than anything else for the people who listened to his advice it was for them regard all the world with warmth, to learn how to keenly observe reality, to think for themselves and to act accordingly.  We need these capacities now more than ever.

Whoops.  Looks like the blog filtered out a "bad word" (see asterisks).  What I tried to say is that the group of which Adolf Hitler (will that also get bleeped???) was the leader closed down the Waldorf schools. Steiner was no friend to those people.  In fact it is said that they tried to assasinate him.  Why?  Because he was promoting freedom of thought.

THE PROOF IS IN THE PUDDING

I am Asian American and all 3 of my kids went to Waldorf schools. I agree with those who describe it as a system that promotes freedom of thought. Since they graduated in 8th grade (no Waldorf high school in our city yet) they appreciate their education more with each passing year. They are often frustrated at classmates in high school and college who are more concerned about grades than actual learning. My oldest 2 now attend "name brand" colleges (youngest in 11th grade). Their HS and college teachers have often commented on their astuteness, curiousity, and initiative. These kinds of observations by non-Waldorf teachers about W grads is really common. W grads have not lost their love of learning! My oldest is now studying women's health in Mali, and my second child is studying post-colonial gender studies in NYC.

As for the question of multiculturalism and diversity, yes, this is an issue that our society is struggling with and so are W schools. They are slowly becoming more diverse in student body and curriculum. Our school is 70% voucher students, so is extremely diverse and ahead of the curve of most W schools. People of color who send their kids to W schools are playing an important role in shaping the culture and pedagogy to be more multicultural.

This has been a very interesting discussion to read.  I think that people today can easily confuse religion with spirituality--in our culture, the two terms seem to be used interchangeably.  However, in Rudolf Steiner's day, and in the German language, they are not.  A fallout of the Industrial Revolution was that various religious institutions discarded the idea of the threefold human being--body, soul, and spirit--and only affirmed body and soul.  Steiner recognized the need to acknowledge the spiritual element in the world around us, and within ourselves, in order to unlock our own potential and serve the world.  This is spirituality.  With tenets and doctrine and practice it can become religion, but it in itself is NOT religion.  And I think that this is at the heart of the Waldorf as a religious education debate.

It is a sad day when we cannot acknowledge the great spiritual archetypes of our shared history without being accused of having a cultist view of the world.  And yet this is exactly what people who accuse Waldorf, or any institution that consciously works with the spiritual element of humanity, claim.  As if a person who says that Christ was a moral force for his people, the Jews, is pro-Semitic.  Or if a person who quotes Buddha is a Buddhist.

Religious education is directed at creating a body of followers of a particular doctrine or belief system.  Where is the Church of Waldorf?  Please let me know if you find it in the directory, because I looked and it is not there.  Neither is the Church of Anthroposophy or the Church of Steiner. The people who accuse Waldorf of creating this kind of experience for children don't seem to have anything to prove their claims beyond the types of art displayed in classrooms and the acknowledgment of greater spiritual realities than what we see with our own two eyes.  This is not a crime.  It is a witch-hunt.  And it smacks of the intolerance of that which is different that is tearing our society apart.  And this is exactly what Steiner was working to prevent, through the education of the human being!

I believe that the true difference between the Waldorf haters and Waldorf advocates is that one group works through fear and fear-mongering.  Don't go there, they will turn your kids against you and make them into white supremacists!  The other group recognizes the relevance of all great leaders of humanity in history regardless of religion or race, and courageously takes these archetypes up to inspire children to realize their unique potential to make the world a better place--in spite of the witch-hunters, who seem to think that education is only worthwhile after it has been stripped of what makes it viable and inspired in children's lives.  The proof is in the pudding, when all is told.  Why don't you do a search of Waldorf alumni and see what THEY are doing with their lives?  Their education should speak for itself.

As a brief addendum to what I posted earlier, I should like to say that YES I would be happy to send my child to a Waldorf School.  I am a devout Pagan, and what I am most concerned with is that my child's education embraces the spiritual aspect of the world around us without fear.  If my child said a verse that had the word 'god' in it, I most certainly would not assume that the god mentioned was the god of the Christians, or the Muslims, or the Jews.  I am not afraid of my child growing up with the concept of many spiritual figures in history that we can learn from.  And I am certainly not in any doubt that the religious education my children will receive from me will help guide them to their own choice of worship when they become old enough to make that decision for themselves.  I do not leave that training in the hands of any school, as that is my own sacred trust as a parent.  And from what I have experienced of Waldorf, there is no agenda to provide that training in the curriculum.

My daughter (now 16) started her education in a Reggio-Emilia certified preschool and kindergarten.  She went to a Waldorf school for 1st through 3rd grades, finished elementary and middle school in a public Montessori magnet, and will finish high-school in a public creative arts magnet.  My daughter is white; she's been in the racial majority at the private schools she's attended, in the minority at the public schools (she was one of three white kids in her middle-school graduating class).  

What I've learned from my daughter's education is that parents have expectations that no school, large or small, public or private, flaky or mainstream, can ever meet.  I think a large part of your satisfaction with your child's school will have to do with the quality of your relationships with other parents, and the quality of your child's relationships with his peers.

Our Waldorf school was very flaky -- new, underfunded, plagued by high administrative drama.  I share your ambivalence about Waldorf enough that I took my daughter out of the school after three years, but she's still friends with several of the kids she met there; a lot of them landed in the same high-school after separating in middle school.  I'm still friends with several of the parents I met there.  I can't say the same about the parents I met at other schools.  

Most of the Waldorf parents I know were a weirded-out by the culty Waldorf vibe. It's there, it's real, it's deeply ingrained in the school's culture, but in my experience it doesn't turn kids into loom-weaving Aryan zombies.  Far from it.  The kids who went to Waldorf with my daughter are without exception independent, funny, creative, articulate, motivated teenagers.  

They're hip city kids, but I rarely see them aiming for false sophistication.  They joyfully admit their affection for childhood attachments.  They still know how to play -- among themselves and with much younger kids.  They still sing kid songs.  They can't be bullied out of their childhoods before they're ready.  As freaked out as I was and still am by the origins of Waldorf educational philosophy and some of its practices, just a few years of exposure to it seems to have inoculated this group of teenagers against the joyless, affected boredom many of their peers suffer.  

A lot of that also comes from values their parents held in common that made Waldorf education appealing despite its cultish overtones.  Those values are independent of the Waldorf philosophy, and they support close relationships among families long after ties to the school itself are broken.  Those values certainly don't have a racist impetus.

My advice is to meet and mingle with the families at the schools you're considering.  Invite the parents and kids to your house for dinner, get invited to theirs.  What books are they reading?  What art is on the walls? Will you be comfortable hanging out with those moms and dads?  How deep do your conversations go?  In what school are the parents' values, independent of their race or religion or whatever, most like your own?  That's where you and your child will be happiest.

FUTURE WALDORF PARENT OF COLOR

A year ago, my initial uninformed reaction to Waldorf was "Why would I send my children to a school where they don't embrace reading?" But a close friend sends her two young children to the Waldorf school here in our Midwest town.She loves the education and so I went.

I too was uncomfortable with the choice of the stories/myths and their Euro-centrism. I too desire a greater multicultural environment, including diversity of student body. After a great deal of time researching local schools, I see that Waldorf is no less diverse than any other private schools. Yet I suppose that what an earlier writer said speaks to me, that there are aspects of this school that absolutely "wow" me and the ethnic lackings are merely a nuisance. I have toured the school three times, observed the classes, gone to school functions, know many of the parents at this point, mingled with the educators, researched on line, you name it. And it is the presence of diverse thought, and the absence of a stifling, narrowminded, mainstream view of academic success that has impressed me so.

The families that send their kids to Waldorf are looking for a special and magical education for our kids. It IS lovely. It IS creative. Waldorf doesn't teach kids testing skills or rate their level of compliance with standards, or how to make it to the principal's list. It's not a competitive environment. The children are taught to create their own worlds, they are taught to tap into their own individual powers and talents, to manifest their own potential. It's a respectful and natural and engaging environment in which the kids are nurtured to flourish, and they do.

You just can't beat that.

Now let's face it. It is just a school. My responsibility as a parent is far more influential. And my influence is way more powerful than Waldorf's. So here's the catch. I know how to create and celebrate diversity in my children's lives. I have the skill to teach my child about the big beautiful colorful world and to have deep respect and curiousity about all cultures.

I am the grateful recipient of an educational voucher, and I'm thrilled to be able to afford this opportunity of an amazing, and unfortunately misunderstood and underrated education.  

(By the way, I am curious about the numbers of people that send their children to traditional Christian/Catholic schools, yet Waldorf is vilified by some for embracing spirituality. Is it a double standard?)

hey rebecca

no,  I wouldn't/didn't send Luna and Plum to Waldorf schools because to me all those Norse Gods and quasi-christian stuff sends an implicit message about what the ideal is that my kids don't fit. And I don't like the religion/someone else's spirituality part of it. And they don't like kids learning to read until they're seven, and I have a voraciously reading 5 year old who loves the very diverse montessori school she goes to where we get a hecka lot of financial aid. but hey, that's just us.

love to you,

rachel

Hi there,

I am a newcomer to your blog and am really enjoying it.  In your search for a good pre-school, you might consider neither the Montessori nor the Waldorf school.  My mother was head teacher and then director of the child development center at a local college until her retirement a few years ago, so i have a good understanding of things to look for.   First of all there are great resources at the National Association for the Education of Young Children ( www.naeyc.org ).  Important things to look for include national accreditation because to maintain this accreditation requires a commitment to setting new goals and implementing them.  A center must be reaccredited every 5 years and must show how they have achieved these goals and what their new ones are.  Naeyc also tends to set tougher staff/student ratios than many states require.  Play is critical and there should be both free play and directed play.  There should be separate group functions by age group.  Art is important; directed art is not so good.  You should be able to visit and observe without a specific appointment.  Obviously you may need an appointment to speak with the director, but your observation visit can be at a separate time.  Other things to look for-do they have pets, such as frogs, fish, and hamsters/gerbils/bunny; do they have separate play areas for dress up, blocks and reading.  Arre artwork and displays set low so as to engage children at their height.  Is the childrens art displayed? (This is a good clue about directed art!) I could go on and on, but these are good starters.  And on the NAEYC webpage you can find more information and also centers in your area.  (There are 26 in Honolulu).  Anyway, Good luck!

I sent my son to a Waldorf school and wouldn't recommend it to anyone, unless of course you fear technology and believe that being left handed is indicative of a karmic debt, or that children of color are somehow not as "evolved" as their White classmates.  My son's experienced was peppered with all sorts of pseudo-science and dogma.  All other culture's take a back seat to the nonstop Euro-centric folk tales and mythology.  While the school professes to nurture the individuality of the child, the reality couldn't be further from the truth.