Steiner Academy Bristol, A Challenge: Be Open With Parents

Andy, an excellent piece.

It has always been my view that non-racists do not choose to associate themselves positively with racist versions of ideas that are current elsewhere or can easily be devised without the racist content. I think one of the reasons that the Anthroposophical hierarchy refuse to be open and clear about the extent of their belief (or not)in Steiner’s racial hierarchy is that they think it has some merit. Thus far, all of the Anthroposophical and Steiner/Waldorf statements concerning their disagreement with racism fail to explain how they managed to agree with it previoulsy and what in them, or in Anthroposophy, has changed.

When the National Front, The British National Party and The English Defence League claim not to be racist we rightly wish to see a self-published expose of their prior racism and a rationale for the change of heart – they don’t do it and we don’t believe them. Likewise, we have conflicting messages from Anthroposophy; some followers claim Steiner was not racist, some claim he was racist but they are not, some simply say they reject racism (so why follow a racist doctrine?) and some even claim that they reject writings that might be racist but think that Steiner was not racist.

It is my belief that a genuine non-racist would not join a racist cult in the first place unless they did not know about the racist elements. When my daughter was small, I spent quite a time looking at Steiner education via their Kings Langley School and decided against it because of their aggressive anti-science and anti-modern technology comments. A few years ago, I found out about their racist underpinnings and have been writing and commenting on and off every since. I would never now, knowing what I know about the racist and ‘spiritual’ elements of Steiner, wish to associate positively with them. If any Steiner supporters or advocates really are non-racist all they have to do is leave Steiner and Anthroposophy behind – after all, if they don’t support racism they can choose a non-racist religion instead; there are plenty to choose from or one can invent one’s own.

Until advocates of Anthroposophy and Steiner/Waldorf reject their vile religion I will continue to assume they are a bunch of racists because there’s no other reason to add racism to reincarnation when hundreds of millions of people believe in reincarnation without the need for racism.

You are right to foreground the issue of racism in your critique of Waldorf Steiner, however it is not just racism but the whole cult philosophy underpinning the education, and its concealment, that is the problem. To be clear: if the anthroposophy movement issued a statement tomorrow categorically rejecting all the racist writings of Steiner, the belief system would continue to be a pernicious influence on education and the welfare of children in Waldorf Steiner schools.

We have many Church of England schools in the UK and they aren’t a particular cause for concern because they don’t teach CofE science, CofE art, CofE music etc. Also the moral ethos of the CofE is well understood and generally considered ok: so “do unto others” is compatible with our secular understanding of morality, whereas “that kid is getting beaten up/has special needs because of past life karma” is not.

The Steiner spin has it that the schools are places for the imagination. Unfortunately the imagination that is omnipresent in Steiner schools is the bizarre and warped imagination of Rudolf Steiner: in his dreary art, his bizarre fantasies about reincarnation, karma and the spirit world; his pedalling of medieval medicine whereby every child is categorised in terms of “humors”; his weird dance rituals and banal music; his bowdlerisation of Goethe and Rousseau. The imagination of children in these schools is constrained to the dictates of anthroposophy.

Steiner proponents need to be challenged on every aspect of their practise and asked: why do you do this? We know why Steiner advocated this practise; you claim to have moved on, so do you have a rational basis for this practise or are your practises simply unevolved spiritualism?

The Steiner free school phenomenon is an unhappy marriage of the government’s desperation to deregulate education with the Anthroposophy movement’s opportunism. The government needs to seriously do some due diligence now or this policy is going to smack them in the face. Unfortunately the partial privatisation of education (along with health) is such an ideological obsession that they may be happy to get into bed with anyone.

Hi Andy,
I’m here to respond to your challenge as best I can. I’ve drafted a piece that deals with the relationship of our prospective school to Anthroposophy, which I have circulated for discussion round our steering group; I’ll post it here if everyone is happy with it. I think you’re right in that I agree that schools have a duty to be open with parents about the philosophies behind their teaching as well as the content of their curriculums. I also agree that state-funded schools have a rather higher duty of public accountability in that regard.
I can answer a few points straight away.

1. Yes, we will be open about our relationship with the Anthroposophical Society. We currently don’t have one and none of the members of our steering group are members. We have no plans for any formal connection with them as a school.
2. I’ll get back to you on this one. I could tell you what I think right now but I’m speaking here for the group so I will hold back…
3. I’m not sure how much further I can go than the statement that was made on the Evening Post piece. We reject Steiner’s views on race; we reject racism in all forms; our school will operate according to a publicly available equal opportunities policy which will include appropriate disciplinary measures for any breaches by staff.
The ECSWE statement of 2007 (http://www.steinerwaldorfeurope.org/downloads/statements/ecswe_discriminationstatement.pdf) makes the stance of Steiner/Waldorf schools on racism and discrimination pretty clear. To my mind they slightly underplayed the role of race in Steiner’s work, although again to my mind Steiner’s critics greatly overplay it, so perhaps we fall somewhere in the middle…
4. Steiner’s work will only influence the way in which we teach science – teaching within multi-disciplinary, project-based lessons as well as single-subject lessons and using practical experience as well as theory. His work will not influence the content of our curriculum, which will be based on mainstream, evidence-based science and will build towards the eBacc including Core Science and Additional Science GCSEs.
5. Our curriculum will not teach any particular religion or faith as fact. We will teach about faith and religion, but we won’t promote or denigrate any particular faith or religion. We will celebrate a calendar of festivals, which will reflect the diversity of the local community, including the traditional northern european festivals that Steiner schools often celebrate (winter solstice/Saint Lucia etc) alongside festivals from Islamic, Hindu and other traditions.
6. We have no plans for a school doctor, Anthroposophical or otherwise. We believe that vaccinations and other medical treatments as well as homeopathy and other alternative medicines are matters for parents and are none of our business as a school.
7. There will be lots of gnomes. Small, felt gnomes for children to play with, I should add.

I should be clear that I’m speaking here for Steiner Academy Bristol. All Steiner schools are independent and have their own ethos and ideas. They are networked via the Steiner Waldorf Schools Federation, but not controlled by the SWSF. I can’t possibly speak for ‘Steiner Schools’ or ‘The Anthroposophical Movement’, and to be honest I’m also not that interested in debating what Steiner actually wrote or what he meant by it. What I can do is to tell you about our actual plans for our new school.
Best wishes,
Joe Evans
Steiner Academy Bristol steering group

As someone who knows relatively little about this subject, this thread is interesting. At least the Bristol guy has politely tried to answer your questions, in the form you asked them. In fact this is a courtesy, as the principle of Steiner free-schools has now been generally accepted, which he is not personally responsible for.

I hope you will give him the opportunity to flesh his ideas out further without simply accusing him of lying, or he might not bother.

I have heard all this stuff before. Why don’t you self-appointed guardians of the public good get a life and let people do their own homework? I would encourage any parents considering a waldorf education to talk to parents, teachers and particularly students and ex-students. Make a note of how many brain-washed zealots you meet. My son attended a Steiner school in Alice Springs and loved it. He is a well-rounded young man, who enjoyed science, maths and English at high school and did very well. He also became a good violinist thanks to the music education he received. He is now in his third year of aerospace engineering at Monash university. he shows no interest in anthroposophy, and nor do any of his friends who went through the school with him. As far as I can tell, he is an agnostic, probably tending towards atheism. He shows no signs of racism, and i have never heard make him a racist remark, even after he has been attacked on apparently racially motivated grounds a number of times when he was growing up in Alice Springs. I investigated anthroposophy and found it curious, but not for me, while I found what I considered the essential tents of Steiner education convincing and worthwhile. Which is my business as a parent. Finding out what education you think is best for your child is your business as a parent. Don’t be misled by people who spend all their spare hours ferreting skeletons out of the closet, often because they are motivated by an evangelical agenda, whether it be Christian fundamentalist (who also hate Waldorf) or atheists. Remember many “great men”” in history had complicated lives and minds, and believed in strange things. George Bernard Shaw were keen on eugenics and H.G. Wells advocated people become “enlightened nazis” in order to advance their ideas. You will find in any education system teachers, especially in the state system, who want to model children according to their own beliefs. For my part, I have seen Steiner education and it works.

Why don’t you self-appointed guardians of the public good get a life and let people do their own homework?

And what do you suggest that homework should comprise? I note you have addressed none of the factual concerns that have been raised, such as Steiner’s views on a racial hierarchy. Can you refute the evidence that Andy has presented that Steinerists systematically misrepresent what their real views are and prefer to engage in PR exercises to conceal the unpalatable parts of Steinerism rather than confront them? Of course, these tactics would rather undermine the homework that you advocate.

If Steiner education is stripped of nonsense and unpleasant ideas, what are you left with?

You also seem happy with you son’s education. But, there is no meaningful way to respond to the outcome of a single student, you have nothing with which to compare it in a controlled objective manner. If that needs to be made more explicit, you cannot know whether your son would have done better under a different system, you cannot know whether he performed well by the normal standards despite Steiner methods rather than because of them.

We also have no way of testing at this remove what your and your son’s attitudes are to race and other personal beliefs and how they may have been coloured by the education process. What Andy and others have shown is that Steiner beliefs are highly coloured by a number of beliefs that appear either weird or just plain wrong. Education tells a child what is ‘normal’ and we have no way of knowing what version of normal your local school has presented to its students. The point is that, by definition, you would regard that as normal and be incapable of comparing it with other standards.

Let us look at one objective measure, the adoption of fringe medical practices by Steiner followers: did you follow a normal childhood vaccination protocol; do you use homeopathic remedies?

Dave

I have a few minutes spare so will pick up another of your comments.

George Bernard Shaw were keen on eugenics and H.G. Wells advocated people become “enlightened nazis” in order to advance their ideas.

It may have escaped your notice, but neither GBS nor HGW have bands of followers in the modern world dedicated to the founding of schools explicitly based in their philosophies and beliefs. We are free, therefore, to enjoy their works of literature, examine their ideas and consider the more barmpot of their opinions in an historical proper context.

Actually, if Dave has not finally left the building, I’d be interested to know how he found this blog. Obviously Andy Lewis is a world-straddling global power whose name rings out even in the dead heart of Australia like it does everywhere else, but how does a simple passing cobber who just happened to send his son to Gnome School also just happen to find this blog amongst the whole interweb.

Just wondering.

Good question o irregularly hirsute simian.

I believe that the supremo at Quack Central HQ allocates one nutter per sceptical post to wreak havoc with our patience and tolerance and to exasperate us beyond belief. That is why there is usually only one per posting (apart from the Hopi ear candling one which really drew the nutters out of the earwax). If it is not AFC it is Iqbal or some other fruitcake. My favourite was “Not A Witch Doctor” on DC’s site (she was).

Acting as a Rapid Respone Unit of highly untrained solo Quack Ninjas they can easily cover huge swathes of the Internet and tie up gigabytes of bandwidth annoying the readers of The Quackometer, Respectful Insolence, Improbable Science and their ilk.

If logistics and ninja allocation permit they also act like tag wrestlers or relay teams (a la the ear candlers) and mount concerted drivel assaults on sites. Jabbophobes and the Goddidit Brigade are very good at this.

The reason they only tend to show up once is that all the rational feedback down that bandwidth enters their brains and sets of a Cognitive Dissonance Bomb which addles their already somewhat precarious minds. The attrition rate is very high.

Unfortunately so is the supply of replacement nutcases.

So we, and the prospective parents and students of Bristol are none the wiser as to the beliefs and practices of the proposed Bristol Steiner School; it seems true to pattern – cult followers do not consider lesser mortals worthy of a proper explanation; I expect they think we are too spiritually unaware to understand; particularly those of us who, being yellow or brown, are already showing our past misdeeds – not on our sleeves – but on our very skin. I sincerely hope those are not values actually believed by the Anthroposophists but the fact that they illicit curiosity amongst the faithful rather than horror or disgust makes me think my position is realistic rather than fanciful.

Could I ask a question (for once a genuine one).

Is there any demonstrable benefit to postponing the age at which children learn to read (and presumably write and learn arithmetic).

Intuitively I feel there is no benefit.

Is anyone with some knowledge of the processes, practices and theories of learning able to comment on this.

The reason for asking is simple. I read a lot of biographies of “famous” scientists (and some infamous ones – step forward Midgley). Despite huge variations in background, historical period, class, education etc one theme which appears regularly is the ability to read very early on (for example being able to read English and Latin at the age of five).

It seems to me that being able to read is a “gateway” to all other education. After all you could not even cobble together some quack or creationist drivel if you cannot read Conservapedia or Answers In Genesis.

Any views?

Really great post and some great comments. A few thoughts:

Nick wrote: “I think one of the reasons that the Anthroposophical hierarchy refuse to be open and clear about the extent of their belief (or not)in Steiner’s racial hierarchy is that they think it has some merit.”

Yes. That’s my experience as well. Initially (years ago), I assumed that anthroposophists and Waldorf supporters didn’t reject the racist Steiner because they didn’t know about the racist parts or somehow didn’t really understand them. For many Waldorf parents, that may be true. However, years of interacting with zealous anthroposophists online opened my eyes. It sometimes takes awhile for it to come out, but if you get an anthroposophist to fully engage in discussing the actual racist texts in Steiner, eventually, they will often end up revealing that they agree with them. They just don’t want to say so in so many words, because they know it’s socially unacceptable to be racist.

Joe Evans:

“Yes, we will be open about our relationship with the Anthroposophical Society. We currently don’t have one and none of the members of our steering group are members. We have no plans for any formal connection with them as a school.”

Yes, that’s usually how it’s done. “Formal” connections are conveniently eschewed. “Informal” connections do just as much harm if not more, for the very reason that they are eschewed.

“We reject Steiner’s views on race; we reject racism in all forms; our school will operate according to a publicly available equal opportunities policy”

This is the usual confusion between racism and “equal opportunities.” No one is accusing the Steiner school of failing to provide “equal opportunities” to anyone. The Steiner schools have never, to my knowledge, been accused of discriminating against anyone in terms of admission or equal treatment of students. It might almost be better if they *did* discriminate, because the issue is that the racism in Steiner’s teachings, which – presumably this is obvious – is more deleterious to those against whom they are so pointedly not discriminating.

Steiner believed that everyone, regardless of skin color, race, etc., is able to progress spiritually. The curriculum is designed to equally aid ALL students in this process. The problem is just that he believed that some people had further to go to progress spiritually – namely, those with darker skins, as he believed that darker skin reflects a lower level of spiritual advancement in general.

Melanie:

“This seems to be the pattern when the initial organisers don’t come from the anthroposophical community. I was involved in the setting up of a Steiner school in London just over a decade ago and was for a while a trustee of that school. None of those who founded the school were anthroposophists, we relied on the pedagogical guidance and opaque expressions of the kindergarten teacher/priestess sent by the SWSF with an ‘impulse’ to support the initiative, and were often baffled by the consequences. Occasionally Christopher Clouder of the SWSF drifted by in a suit, holding a clip-board, but I was usually cleaning the kindergarten loos (this is what the mothers do) and was not invited to join the conversation.”

This is hysterical, but exactly what happens time and time again.

Alicia asked why doesn’t the anthroposophical movement have a problem with people like Joe, but also answered her own question – it’s because he’s useful. (Not just he, but Melanie, and me, and countless others who have helped get a Waldorf school up and running, only to find that *some other someones* with some *other* ideas had in mind all along swiftly giving us the boot once much of the dirty work had been done.) As Alicia put it, he can’t spill the beans ‘cus he doesn’t really have any beans to spill. Thus, he is quite useful. Almost all Steiner schools are started by parent dupes, useful idiots.

The Steinerist lobby say they refute all Steiner’s racism, you say it’s still part of the curriculum, therefore actively creating racism. Meanwhile Michael Gove wants to take Mary Seacole and William Wilberforce out of circulation for all schools, dumbing down black history for everyone.

Do you have any evidence that students coming out of Steiner are actually more racist than anyone else? I’ve read all your post etc but this seems like a stalemate. You say yes, the other side says no. What is needed is evidence, not of Steiner’s racism but of Steiner education producing racists today. Then it would move beyond the level of a chat, towards something more constructive.

Hi Andy
You wrote:
“This leads to people with different coloured skin being systematically treated differently within the education system according to Steiners rules.”
This is exactly the kind of evidence that is needed. Where is it?
If they’ve made public statements refuting both Steiner’s racism and current racism and there are no incidents being recorded, why is the onus on them? How can they prove a negative?

Andy, I agree about the nature of institutional racism and I consider it to be more dangerous, in some ways, than open violence. When skin heads used to ‘own’ many of the roadside pubs in the late 1970s and early 1980s at least we knew where they were and who to avoid. But when the racism is more subtly applied it’s very hard to present solid evidence but the consequences can be devastating. When objective tests can be done – necessarily covertly – hidden racism is often exposed.

But, Sally, to assume that firm evidence is available to prove social forces exist is to confuse the nature of social discourse and scientific discourse; the latter being able to be tested because it’s possible to replicate experiment. The former, however, does not have a stock of replica societies available to provide controls or randomisation. But we know, for example, that the misogyny and homophobia as written into the major Abrahamic religions’ texts still resonate throughout the world today. We know that empires have been built and genocides carried out on the flimsiest of unwritten racist assumptions. We know also that racism (and misogyny and homophobia) has been rife in schools that do not subscribe to a specific racist doctrine.

The Steiner/Waldorf education system is today unique (in the UK) in that it is a modern system based on racist underpinnings that has a written racist hierarchy at its heart. And the fact that such Anthroposophic influences stretch into farming, banking, disability politics and many other areas of life is of great concern. Finally, there is the direct effect that racist sentiments have on those of colour who come into contact with them; we feel at the very least unwelcome and often physically unsafe – not because those around us might be overt racist thugs but because they have willingly and cheerfully (and often with great confidence) signed up to a racist system from which racist thugs gain succour and legitimacy. To even consider that a written racist doctrine promoted by a powerful and wealthy organasation can be considered harmless is to be, at best, somewhat naive about how racism has been propagated throughout history and might be considered to be offering an excuse for inexcusable behaviour.

Work by many universities and organisations such as the Joseph Rowntree Foundation and the Runnymede Trust have accumulated a large amount of data that suggests that institutional racism and the misnamed ‘petty racism’

continued from above

Work by many universities and organisations such as the Joseph Rowntree Foundation and the Runnymede Trust have accumulated a large amount of data that suggests that institutional racism and the misnamed ‘petty racism’ in the UK severely diminishes the life-chances of non-white people. It is not up non-white people to prove that racist ideologies lead to racist social systems (no social effects are open to proof) but it is up to people following racist ideologies to adequately explain their inconsistent position when they claim to oppose racism.

I honestly don’t see it’s a problem. After all there are all sorts of faith schools and no one seems to point out that the Bible has passages that promote slavery, genocide, underage sex and all sorts of nasty misogynistic stuff.

To be honest I’m worried that you are a bit of an ‘occult basher’ motivated by… who knows?

I’d like to address a couple of points.

John H and ‘patty’, on the subject of leaving reading until age seven: As evidence of the benefits of waiting until children are aged seven to start direct and systematic teaching of reading, the Steiner and anti-phonics lobbyists can be relied on to flag up Finland, where all children achieve literacy within weeks of starting formal school – aged seven. What they don’t say is that Finland has a completely transparent alphabet code, and most parents teach their children to read pre-school as it’s so easy to do. They also omit to mention Denmark where, as in Finland, the school starting age is seven, but it has an opaque alphabet code. Danish children ‘experience difficulties in acquiring the logographic and alphabetic foundation processes which are comparable to those observed in English, although less extreme’ (Seymour/Aro/Erskine) Additionally, they neglect to cite evidence from the Netherlands. Children in the Netherlands start formal school at the same age as British children (5yrs.old). Despite this ‘early’ start, they, along with the majority of European children, learn to read and write accurately within the first school year. ‘Foundation literacy acquisition by non-English European groups is not affected by gender and is largely independent of variations in the ages at which children start formal schooling’ (Seymour/Aro/Erskine p150) http://www.dyslexics.org.uk/main_method_2.htm

‘Sally’ says that, ‘Michael Gove wants to take Mary Seacole and William Wilberforce out of circulation for all schools, dumbing down black history for everyone’

In actual fact Seacole and Wilberforce were never in the statutory history curriculum, so they can’t be taken out.

Andy, I’m concerned that you have not published my (2) replies to Pete, above.

I have also written a reply to Nick (which I was checking over prior to posting) as he too seems to want to interpret my comments as somehow colluding with racism whereas the opposite is true.

I’m appalled not to be able to correct this when in actual fact a LOT of assumptions about my own experience of racism have been made here! It’s important that any person should be able to answer such insinuations on a blog post which is all about racism!

Would you please clarify whether my comments have somehow gone awry, and not come through or have you decided not to allow me to correct this mistaken impression. It’s hard to believe that you would allow others to insinuate that I condone racism without knowing anything at all about me, and without allowing me to reply… Especially on the basis that I suggested strong and specific action to remedy it.

From your earnest approach to the subject you certainly don’t seem like the sort of guy to do that, but about wanting the debate. I’m confused. Please can you clarify this for me. Cheers

With the Republican sweep at the state level in the last US election, there is a renewed push for charter schools. Like the UK they come in all stripes. The charter schools typically get the same state and local funds per pupil, but no contribution toward facilities.

There have been a couple of virtual school proposals floated and that has caused much controversy. The popular characterization is of a remote, uncaring faculty siphoning off money with no “skin in the game.” I await further developments on this front.

“With the Republican sweep at the state level in the last US election, there is a renewed push for charter schools.”

I wonder if Mitch McConnell will be leading the charge… 😉

I want to pick up a comment from Sally that is not solely related to the issue of racism, so I’ll start a new line of discussion with it.

Are parents in these schools dopey and unable to recognise the effects of such brutal teaching?

I’ve commented before in other places about a curious overlap between the hippy-dippy altie fringe and a fascistic worldview. Essential to many New Age believers is the idea that we have control over our minds and bodies and that all diseases and illnesses can be controlled by the proper exercise of the will over our personal biology. If your SCAM therapy fails to cure you then it is significantly your fault. I think there are two motivations for this. One is a genuine belief that we do have this power, so a logical consequence of a failure of treatment is to blame the individual patient. However, time and again, I have seen a tendency by therapists and commentators not directly involved in a specific case to blame the individual for not trying hard enough which is thrown up as an ad hoc excuse for the objective failure of the given therapy to have any effect. This is one if the most distressing features of the case histories of patients who have given themselves over to SCAM treatment for cancer.

This tendency to blame the individual is at the core if many of these belief systems, so it comes as no surprise to me that the flaky parents of Steiner kids would find it easy to accept the ideas of karmic consequences and in-built racial deficiencies.

I hereby invoke Godwin’s Law. Even a brief consideration of the whole back-to-the-land volk wisdom of the Nazi era and its esoteric religious underpinnings would detect a lot of similarities with New Age beliefs. On the surface you may see dirndls versus kaftans, but, underneath, the similarities are unmistakable.

As a final aside, I do wonder whether this essential unpleasantness at the core of much New Age belief is why its followers turn so nasty so quickly when challenged.

At https://sites.google.com/site/waldorfwatch/atoms I found a quote by Steiner on electricity:
“[T]hrough the electrification of the atoms we transform them into carriers of evil …
[W]hen we imagine matter in the form of atoms, we transform these atoms into carriers of death; but when we electrify matter, Nature is conceived as something evil. For electric atoms are little demons of Evil.”

Quoting Steiner seems sufficient to parody him.

Perhaps the best caricature of a Steiner school would be to use the witch’s house in Hansel & Gretel. Gnomes, dancing and music on the outside and terrible karma on the inside.

I can’t reply to the comments to Pete and Nick specifically, perhaps the limit on replies has been reached, so I’ll just add my two pennyworth here.

In spite of Pete’s capitals, I’ll stick to my guns here, thanks. Of course I wasn’t referring to whether or not the teacher has done anything wrong ‘within’ the Steiner world, I think (hope) we’re all on the same page here that there is racism, that they are promoting it, and that they all apparently absolutely love all that.

I was actually talking about the fact of discrimination in the r e a l world, where people are only subject to such normal secular cults as celebrity etc., In the real world, that teacher is totally responsible for their actions, discriminatory as they are, whatever insiders think.

I’m sure if I was a Steiner person reading this I’d be going “no no there’s nothing wrong with any of that at all”, as Pete keeps saying, but I’m not and I hope it’s ok with Pete and others that I’m not too keen (putting it mildly) to look at the situation from their point of view at all, so please take my comments as simply not coming from anywhere near that position.

So to Nick’s points:

I’d be really interested to see the records of the attempts you mention to bring such matters to ECHR. Are you saying that you personally have taken the Steiner issue there? Can you share that info in detail please? Why weren’t they interested? What kind of disinterest was it?

I also totally get that you’re looking at this from the point of view of institutions having to prove that they have healthy policies regarding race, rather than victims having to prove that they don’t and I’m genuinely interested in that. In that case it’s great to know that “evidence of right-doing is required from the organisation – not evidence of wrong doing”. Have you brought such an action against Steiner? Would you be able to share the details?

It’s still true that the non-burden of proof you’re referring to is because of the type of law you’re talking about using. In no way does that contradict any of my points about using specific laws governing fomentation of racial hatred, discrimination etc., under which actions are continually brought and which does rely on having evidence of wrongdoing.

I don’t see much argument between our positions; we both seem to agree that actions are necessary and we’re both advocating different sorts of actions. Surely in such a hard case, the more active approaches the better.

Banning all Steiner schools for being racist, if that’s what you’re advocating, while very commendable is also extremely ambitious. With a large movement that appears so used to ducking and diving, such a “once” approach is very interesting. However, they do seem adept at proliferating in ‘alternative’ forms of Steiner-lite etc., and making blanket public statements to the effect that they’ve now refuted Steiner’s racism completely. How are you going to prove, without going back to specific and concrete evidence, that that isn’t true?

It sounds to me as though you have tried some really commendable and extremely ambitious actions and I’m sure I’m not the only one that would like to know the details. Are they all in the past? What’s happening now? 🙂

Fantastic piece and some great comments –
Absolute classic, a Steiner rep comes on very friendly and answers bugger all !

Thanks to Andy for another wonderfully incisive piece. I agree with Diana’s reply to Sally about being able to pin down the way Steiner’s beliefs about race can seep into the classroom. One problem is the way Steiner teachers are trained; it seems to be as much a training in the teacher’s personal path of spiritual development as the children. It appears that the teachers are trained to take all that Steiner said as undeniable “truths”, so “Steiner said” is apparently the way so many things are resolved.

So when Rene Querido, (prominent Steiner teacher trainer and author) invites teachers to consider a child’s “temperament” race and ethnic background to understand a child, it isn’t seen as strange; it helps the teacher “understand” which “spiritual stream” the child has come from, and understand the child’s “previous incarnations”. Steiner told teachers to use a child’s outward physical appearance as a guide in their education.

So who is to know which teachers are using which of Steiner’s proclamations as a guide?

Read Maimuma’s posts here,
http://www.mumsnet.com/Talk/education/a713603-waldorf-steiner#15177737

or Lolapoppins, who was told by a steiner teacher that her son “was a ‘black soul’ put on earth in the incarnation of a blonde haired, blue eyed boy for the purpose of spiritual deception. That I was dark as I had committed evil in a previous life and that evil was living on through my child who was born in order to deceive.”
(this thread has since been deleted from mumsnet…..)

I posted this before, but I think it’s significant since it’s a current Steiner school’s photo
http://elmfield.com/learning/

Actually, in my view the biggest Steiner education problem is their deception; Melanie and Diana said it better, people like Joe have no idea what’s really involved; in my view he’s being used.

The “racism problem” is so subtle; the black girl is the witch, the blonde girl is the princess, the quirky girl is the oxen….any other school it would be a huge political incorrectness, in Steiner it could be a spiritual observation to help future incarnation or something…..

Hi all,
I’ve prepared a short document that will go onto our website, covering some ground relating to Anthroposophy, education and faith – the text is below.
There’s a point running through this thread that I’d like to pick up. Various people have refused to believe that I, or the others in our steering group, have any real understanding of Steiner education, and that we are acting as ‘useful idiots’ for the shadowy, sinister, bearded Anthroposophists who seem to occupy your imaginations. For the record, I have been a parent/step-parent of children at Steiner schools for over a decade; my partner attended a Steiner school and her parents helped to set one up. I am now on a steering group with several experienced Steiner teachers and we have had input from people who have been involved in Steiner education for decades. The Steiner Waldorf Schools Fellowship, who hold the trademark for the names ‘Steiner’ and ‘Waldorf’ in education, have been involved in the preparation of our bid and are fully aware and supportive of our curriculum, policies and general stance.
I would say that frankly, we’re dealing with the reality of Steiner education and many here are dealing in fantasies. Steiner Academies, as the state funded Steiner schools are known, have been approved after an exhaustive process in which the Department for Education pick over every aspect of the ethos, curriculum and policies for each school. They are now closely monitored by DfE and Ofsted. How could that be, if there is a racist impulse behind Steiner education? I’ll suggest an answer: there is no deep-seated racism in Steiner education. There’s a couple of anecdotes about one or two lessons in which one or two teachers regurgitated a piece of Steiner’s writing without giving it any thought. That’s it: no wave of complaints from parents, no official investigations, no written evidence, nothing. That doesn’t sound like systemic racism to me.
I don’t expect to make any converts here. But I do agree with you all on one thing, which is that new schools have a duty to be open. That’s why we intend to have a community forum as well as a governing body; the community forum will consist of people from outside the school including businesses, other schools and colleges and so on. They will have access to the curriculum and content of lessons and will act as a sounding board to keep our school open and connected to the broader community. We will also have a representative from Bristol City Council on our board of governors, alongside parents and others.
We intend to run an open, accountable and efficient school. We’re getting out and talking to parents about our plans and we’re meeting with huge enthusiasm. Like I say, I don’t expect to make any converts here but I’m glad to say that we have a lot of support across our city.

Joe Evans, for the Steiner Academy Bristol group.

Anthoposphy and Education

We believe in the value of Steiner education because we have seen how it works in practice. We have seen how it can help children to achieve their potential as active, independent-minded and creative adults, and it is for this reason that our school will be based on the Steiner tradition.
Rudolf Steiner was a philosopher and a mystic. He saw his work as forming a coherent philosophy, which he called Anthroposophy. Steiner saw all aspects of life as being rooted in mystical truths, and the practical ideas that he put forward were based on Anthroposophy, his own spiritual philosophy.
We recognise the importance that spirituality and religion have for many people; however, we believe that they are matters of private belief. We will therefore neither promote nor denigrate any particular religious or spiritual beliefs. Our school will uphold the right of all individuals to hold their own beliefs and values, remaining neutral and inclusive on all matters of religion and spirituality.
Because of this, we will neither teach nor promote Anthroposophy. Individual staff and parents are free to come to their own interpretations of the philosophy that Steiner saw as the basis for his ideas, accepting or rejecting the spiritual elements according to their own private beliefs. We are committed to the practice of Steiner education, but this can be approached from many different viewpoints; this diversity can only enhance the vitality of our school.
Within Steiner education teachers and parents have always formed their own interpretations of Anthroposophy. Steiner himself insisted that his ideas should be tested and disputed rather than being simply accepted and this critical spirit has allowed Steiner education to evolve to meet contemporary needs. We will be part of this ongoing evolution, open to ideas from other educational traditions if they help us to deliver our vision of an excellent education within a creative, happy school.
The evolving nature of Steiner education has meant that interpretations of Steiner’s ideas have changed over time. In particular, some of Steiner’s Anthroposophical writing relates to race and ethnicity. His ideas on race reflect the racism of the time and place in which he lived, and have been rejected within Steiner education. Instead, Steiner schools have focussed on his ideas of the unity of humanity and the value of the individual, above any categories of race, gender or nationality. Our school will share these values, building on Steiner’s vision of a common humanity and rejecting all forms of prejudice.
We feel that the educational practices of Steiner schools stand on their own merits. For example, Steiner felt that children should not be taught to read and write until the age of seven. For him, this related to the stages by which the soul is incarnated into the body; before seven, the spirit is still adjusting to the material world. However, there are other reasons for delaying formal literacy teaching. It gives time for children to develop imagination, social skills, oral literacy and fine motor skills including pen control, laying the groundwork for later learning; it also younger children to learn from play and freely express themselves in an unpressured environment. As may be, successive studies have suggested that a later start in reading and writing has no negative effect on literacy later on (eg. Suggate, Schaughency, Reese, Early Childhood Research Quarterly, 2013). This is recognised in the mainstream educational policy of some European countries.
Steiner education works. It is a tried and tested system that has evolved over a hundred years to meet the needs of children in many different cultures around the world. Our school will be part of the ongoing global development of Steiner education, valuing its roots in Steiner’s work but moving forwards without dogma, in a spirit of love, curiosity and freedom.

Will your school have compulsory eurythmy Joe? And will the teachers use “temperaments” to classify the children? Will there be detailed written records of thursday staff meetings and the teacher’s “child study” meetings?

Joe wrote:
“For the record, I have been a parent/step-parent of children at Steiner schools for over a decade; my partner attended a Steiner school and her parents helped to set one up.”

Snicker… Been there done that Joe. You’ll make a great Waldorf Critic in a few years.

“There’s a couple of anecdotes about one or two lessons in which one or two teachers regurgitated a piece of Steiner’s writing without giving it any thought. That’s it: no wave of complaints from parents, no official investigations, no written evidence, nothing. That doesn’t sound like systemic racism to me.”

When the school APPROVES THE LESSON? And is a WALDORF TEACHER TRAINING CENTER? Yeah, no big deal Joe.

Funny, when I search my blog for parent reviews that refer to racists and racismm in their own Waldorf schools, it seems like more than one or two.

http://thewaldorfreview.blogspot.com/search?q=racism
http://thewaldorfreview.blogspot.com/search?q=racist

Just one or two nutty parents causing all the fuss, right? ALL Anthroposophists are racists Joe. Racism is at the very core of Anthroposophy. You are just demonstrating to everyone here that you just don’t “get it” yet. Someday, perhaps, you will.

…from a former Waldorf School starter… 😉

Maybe it’s good time to link to Peter Staudenmaier’s recent document about how Waldorf schools went out of their way to align themselves with the Nazis in pre-WWII Germany.

http://www.academia.edu/2429972/Education_for_the_National_Community_Waldorf_Schools_in_the_Third_Reich

Waldorf representatives will say and do absolutely anything they think parents want to hear… as long as they can have your children for their own purposes.

A couple more points that I should have mentioned. Firstly re vaccines, our school will offer the HPV vaccination on site, in line with most secondary schools.
Secondly re parental choice, I think parents are very well informed about Steiner education, on the whole – that’s the great thing about the internet. The people we speak to at consultation events seem to have read both the pro and anti-Steiner sites and we’ve had lots of discussions at events about Anthroposophy, racism, mysticism and so on. Each consultation event has resulted in a big spike in sign-ups, so we can only assume that people are happy what they’ve heard.
Anyway, we’ll be adding information to the website as we go, especially if our bid is approved, so you can keep in touch with the project as it develops.
Cheers,
Joe Evans, Steiner Academy Bristol steering group.

Joe, I’m delighted that The Bristol Steiner Academy will not teach Anthroposophy or have formal or informal connections to Anthroposophy so that means: No links to Triodos, Biodynamics, Eurythmy, The Christian Community, other Steiner Schools or Camphill Communities. Wonderful! Erm… then why call the school a ‘Steiner School?’ Why choose Steiner’s racist versions of banking, farming, dance, Christianity and care for people with learning disabilities? Oh, because Steiner’s version is more ‘spiritual’? So, according to you, a self-confessed racist is more spiritual than a non-racist? Give me a break. And as for the historical ‘defence’:

“His ideas on race reflect the racism of the time and place in which he lived, and have been rejected within Steiner education.”

Steiner himself must have known that people have been fighting racism for as long as recorded history has existed; racism is a useful tool for dictatorial regimes and Gurus and there’s no excuse. Clearly racism was rampant in Steiner’s era but that’s all the more reason to reject Steiner – it’s not an excuse for following him! Sorry Joe, but you’ve still not explained why (for example) you prefer Steiner’s racist spirituality to a non-racist spirituality. A non racist would never knowingly choose a racist ideology over a non racist version. Which aspects of Steiner-ism do you consider to be more important than combating racism?

Not that any rational conversation with believers in Steiner makes a shred of difference – they don’t believe in rational discourse and have contempt for rationality. A preference for mysticism means you can invent whatever you like as you go along and claim your opinion, view or policy is the work of a higher power. I think I’m wasting my time trying to fight these racist mystic crackpots but I keep doing it so that, perhaps, one less person will be crushed by the weight of assumed racial supremacy.

OK, the main question I’ve got is, where’s Nick’s evidence of going to the ECHR? That was very interesting, and I note that people on this thread are pretty scathing of Steiner people who don’t answer questions!

Diana said:

“We agree that the teacher’s statement was completely unacceptable. It was probably not “discrimination” in the legal sense, however. It just isn’t illegal to be racist, or even to teach kids racist things. Therefore I don’t think a legal solution to that particular problem is the wisest approach.”

Wasn’t it discrimination? Isn’t is illegal to teach racism to kids? I’m also doing a bit of research and it seems clear that laws do cover the teaching of racist doctrine in any non-historical manner. In the case of Pete’s quote above, it would be clearly legal to say that “Many people used to believe that black people were less evolved” or whatever – that’s education, but to actually be promoting that idea and calling it teaching – no of course that’s not legal. Of course it’s discrimination. Haven’t quite managed to ascertain exactly how many laws apply to it yet, but there will be more than one.

So we’re back to proving whether that happened or not. Clearly from what Pete says, there was no attempt to place this ‘information’ into a historical context so it clearly was discriminatory. It seems obvious that with that all elusive proof, such a situation would be actionable.

Thanks for the links Melanie, I’ve had a quick look but will read more carefully as time allows. Even my quick look, however, threw up the very same conflicts about proof, resulting in the mom who had accusations of racism saying – I’m paraphrasing – “we have the proof, call the journalists”.

There is also a Steiner teacher on there, continually asking for proof in a very arrogant manner and basically laughing at everyone because there wasn’t anything concrete.

You (Melanie) said, “none of us want a family to have to come forward after a negative experience in a Steiner school to provide that ‘concrete proof’. Any family will want to protect their child, and the consequences of exposing a child to the scrutiny of the media (isn’t that what you mean, Sally?) should be taken seriously.”

I’m not sure what connection you are making between making any sort of legal moves, and necessarily exposing your children to the media, especially since you also say “If a parent chooses to pursue an individual case that is their prerogative, and for very good reasons we may not know that they’ve done so.”

That sounds a bit contradictory to me. You also said:

“Many parents post their experiences anonymously and then want to move on, and they have a right to their anonymity and their privacy.”

Surely that’s relative as well. Say for instance that you knew for a fact that children were being sexually abused in a school. Would you still say that an individual parent’s “right” to just walk away and leave that going on is more important than their responsibility to do something about it? I’m sure that most people would at least want such knowledge to be shared, for the protection of other peoples’ children. So where do you draw the line?

Perhaps it comes down to how serious the effects are? I don’t know about you, but teaching racism is about as serious as it gets. That’s why I think the argument about ‘sacrifice’ etc., is a bit of a red herring. What I don’t understand is why?

It’s pretty easy to see that the suggestion of “less talk, more action”, has wound people up here, and, heck, I’m here talking too so I’ve obviously nothing against it per se and I’ve already agreed that talk is an important part of organising.

It’s just that I can’t see any evidence that it can solve the problem by itself. And some of the comments dismissing the potential of bringing actions to prove racial discrimination are a bit vague to say the least. eg. ‘racism isn’t illegal’, “this is a private school and in the US that means they can get away with teaching this stuff on “legal” grounds”. Private schools are not above laws on discrimination are they?

This argument is pretty much circular and has got very muddled indeed, for example, when Diana said:

“there are certain situations that are amenable to legal solutions. The fact that Steiner taught some racist things, isn’t one of them, IMO.”

Because firstly we weren’t talking about Steiner’s ideas on their own but about a contemporary adult using them as an excuse to deliberately advocate racial discrimination to children. Secondly, whether or not that could be actionable depends entirely on what law there is, not on anybody’s personal opinion.

The thing that’s bothering me is this, why would you downplay any possible actionable discrimination by a system you’re decrying and seemingly only on guess-work? In the real world, I mean. I just don’t get the combination of outrage together with a reticence to explore individual actions as a legitimate means to help achieve your aim of exposure.

Melanie said:

“If we’d known any of this when we were part of a Steiner initiative we would have removed our children and our support. We would not have needed a family to sacrifice their privacy and the potential well-being of their child to give us a reason.”

That’s you, it doesn’t say what others would do. Of course it’s important to inform parents, but even they need facts because otherwise they could be persuaded by the ‘historical teaching’ argument. Facts are persuasive, and documented proof with all parties named, is usually in the real world enough to have a real effect. I’m totally in agreement with that.

But in view of Joe’s confident assertion that after all their talking, parents are obviously more, not less interested, it’s obviously not that hard to convince people at the moment. Anecdotes and stories may be worrying but they’re not conclusive. Without the embarrassing proof, many people are obviously falling for the ‘historical teaching’ line.

Melanie said:

“It’s a happy marriage politically, at least until the curtain goes up and all those skeletons fall out of the cupboard.”

It’s how that’s going to happen that I find perplexing. What’s the plan here? It can’t be simply for a group of (I’m guessing mainly white) people to bring down an entire education movement on the basis of race without using legal process or having any actual proof, surely. That seems almost…. a very privileged expectation.

Sacrifice to fight discrimination is just a fact of life for those who live with discrimination. I don’t know of a world that changes simply by the weight of my opinion. You’re very lucky if you do.

Sally:

“OK, the main question I’ve got is, where’s Nick’s evidence of going to the ECHR? That was very interesting, and I note that people on this thread are pretty scathing of Steiner people who don’t answer questions!”

I don’t have time right now to write a detailed reply to all your questions, Sally – I’ll try to come back later tonight – but I would say, for starters, this seems hostile. You appear to be saying you don’t believe Nick. What are you asking him to do exactly? He gave an accounting of the occasions when he contacted the EHRC. Did you want him to scan or copy emails here or something? Are you saying you won’t believe he really did this, otherwise? It seemed that some of the contact was by phone, as well. Do you think there is some reason he would lie about this or invent this? I don’t get what is going on here, exactly, but it has a “not good faith” feel to it – or at least quite aggressive, like people here should prove their bona fides to you? Who are you?

Regarding laws about what can be taught in the classroom, I don’t know where you’re located, Sally, but these laws will vary quite a bit by locale. In Europe, for instance, there is a lot tougher stance than in the US, against written materials that contain racist content. Pete’s kids attended a school in California.

‘It’s pretty easy to see that the suggestion of “less talk, more action”, has wound people up here,’

“Wound people up here”? What do you mean by this? How would you know what people here do? You seem to have an idea we’ve all given up on life and somehow decided we’d just hang out on Andy’s blog instead.

What are you doing about the problems you perceive in Steiner education? Could you give us an accounting of your own actions in this regard? Where are you located?

I’ve been doing this for more than a decade. At the Waldorf school my child attended, the racism I perceived was along the lines described by Cathy above – e.g., the pic in which, among a bunch of white girls and one black girl, the black girl is the witch. This is subtle, probably not “actionable.” I’m fairly sure no laws were broken. I would have absolutely nothing I could have sued anybody for at that school.

On the other hand, I’ve read a lot of Rudolf Steiner and participated in online debates attempting to publicize the racism in Steiner. I guess I do see a value in speaking out. Doesn’t impress everyone, of course.

Pete’s story about the “more evolved” blood of Europeans is a little more tangible in that some of the material was written down in a lesson book, but a lawsuit on the basis of that lesson would be a long shot.

Diana. I’ve replied to Nick and apologised for not seeing his reply earlier. I’m not hostile, but I am impatient with what I see an any excusing of racism, which assuming that it isn’t actionable kind of is to me.

The thing that Pete described, and some of the things in Melanie’s link are abhorrent, disgusting, hateful. And yet every suggestion that they should be prosecuted is met with “oh I don’t think you can do that”, or “it’s not illegal” or “we don’t want people to have to do that”.

But it is illegal. Or if it isn’t, then why no campaign to change the law so that it is? I mean, Obama is ruling this country in which a teacher is allowed to talk to black children like that? Something wrong! I know that Pete’s example happened six years ago, but it must still be going on. It’s so wrong.

From my scant research so far, it appears that the Supreme Court have ruled that hateful race speech is not protected by the First Amendment. What Pete described certainly is hateful race speech!

So if it’s illegal, it should be pursued, and if it isn’t, then the lawmakers should be pursued to close that loophole. Would you agree it’s a loophole?

How will you get rid of this disgusting propaganda otherwise, because if it’s legal, then there’s no argument because the school isn’t legally doing anything wrong. So they convince people that it’s ‘historical teaching’ or something and just carry on. And that’s wrong.

I can apologise for missing Nick’s reply above, but not for hating racism and wanting to see action taken!

Speaking out is great, but if you’ve been doing it for ten years already and Steiner’s actually getting State funding in new countries….?

Sally
For your information I also contacted the EHRC and got the same response as Nick and sorry to say ,no proof as they rebuffed me on the phone and told me to go to Ofsted.

Ofsted said,” We are not here to investigate schools.we are here to inspect them based on a framework of criteria.” In the letter John Gornall thanked me for the information and gave me a link to ‘Ofsted main inspection documents for inspectors ” then they told me to write to the DfE.

The DfE told me to write to Ofsted.

I wrote to Michael Gove in 2010,2012 and 2013. I took the DfE proof.

Because the SWSF on paper disowns Stener’s racism and says they won’t discriminate the organisations above can say that everything is covered. After all the BNP is a legal party and the The Alliance of European National Movement ( which includes the BNP ) are about to get funding for 400,000 Euros.
Does everyone understand that this group is racist and discriminatory -yes of course but in Europe it is legal to be that way.

I decided to write to the EASS today ( Equality Advisory Support Services who have taken over from the EHRC ) and see what they say. If you are interested I’ll keep you posted as they said they would answer me within 24 hours, don’t hold your breath though…

MK

Hi again. I want to pick up a few points again. Firstly, on the key issue of racism, I can only reiterate that we absolutely reject Steiner’s ideas on race, which quite clearly reflect the dominate narrative of social and racial Darwinism of his era. I would personally have absolutely no part in any project which was in any way linked to a racist or discriminatory ideology. I’m fully aware of what Steiner wrote on race, but in my personal experience, and the much wider experience of the group I’m part of, none of us has ever come across any suggestion of institutional or personal racism within Steiner education. I’m not here as a spokesperson for the wider Steiner education movement, but I would say that I simply don’t recognise the picture being painted here of Steiner education; if it was true, there is absolutely no way my own children would be anywhere near a Steiner school and I would certainly have nothing to do with this current project.

The response on this blog to my statements on Steiner’s racial ideas has been to suggest that I am either an idiot or a liar. No-one commenting here has (to my knowledge) met any of our group, had any correspondence with us directly, or seen the details of our proposed curriculum and teaching practices. I’m very open to rational, skeptical, evidence-based criticism and discussion, but unevidenced ad hominem attacks don’t represent an especially high level of debate to my mind. They also don’t do your cause any favours. When I read through a debate and see one side resorting to personal abuse, I tend to assume that their arguments lack substance. I’m not alone in thinking that – I’ve spoken to several parents who have told me that they read through some of the anti-Steiner sites and were put off by the sheer venom directed at people.

So, onwards…
@J Rowlands: “What you seem to be saying is that your new school will implement all of the rules of WS educations as mandated by the SWSF. Although these rules are entirely founded on what most people would consider nonsense, i.e. Steiner’s “spiritual science”, you will stick to those rules but allow people to decide for themselves whether to believe the nonsense that they are based on. Is this a fair summary?”
I wouldn’t phrase it quite like that, but in a way you’re not far off… How about:
Our school will be based on the system of education that has been developed in Steiner schools over the last hundred years. Steiner education has its roots in Steiner’s spiritual ideas, but interpretations of those ideas vary widely. Our school will therefore leave spiritual belief to private individuals and concentrate on practical education.
I should add that the SWSF don’t ‘mandate’ anything – they are more of a collective, their trustee body being formed of representatives from each UK Steiner school. So our school will be part of the management of the SWSF, rather than being managed by it, if you see what I mean.
I should also add that if you feel that Steiner’s work was irredeemable nonsense from which nothing good could ever spring, that’s fine – just don’t send your children to a Steiner school. Equally, if you feel our logic is incomprehensible in starting a Steiner school when we thoroughly reject some of his ideas, that’s ok by me as well. I’m here to set out what we’re trying to do as best I can, not to try to tell anyone else what to think.

@Mark H: “As you know, one of the requirements of SWSF membership is that the school demonstrate that “an Anthroposophical impulse lies at the heart of planning”. In practice, what this appears to mean for other schools is that a senior management role – the principal or chair of the college of teachers – has the same understanding of Anthroposophy as the SWSF management. If Anthroposophy lies at heart of everything the school does, yet you don’t promote it, how do you square this circle? This is the apparent contradiction that your explanation needs to make clearer.”

Yes – the agreed definition of a Steiner school includes the idea that “an Anthroposophical impulse lies at the heart of planning”. I suppose the problem is that given Steiner’s vast and inconsistent output, there are a lot of Anthroposophical impulses to choose from… How about this one:
““Our highest endeavor must be to develop free human beings who are able of themselves to impart purpose and direction to their lives. The need for imagination, a sense of truth, and a feeling of responsibility — these three forces are the very nerve of education.” – Rudolf Steiner
That’s the kind of “Anthroposophical impulse” that our school is rooted in.
Re the SWSF, my experience of working with them is somewhat different to the image presented here. The SWSF consists of a trustee group, formed of representatives of each UK Steiner school, and paid staff members, who are managed by the trustees as in any charity. Within the trustee group there’s a huge range of opinions about anything and everything, so there isn’t really an ‘SWSF opinion’ as such. To generalise hugely, I would say that the staff are probably more concerned with the technical details of moving Steiner education forwards – engaging with DfE and Ofsted, looking at accreditation and how to build towards GCSEs within a Steiner curriculum and so on, whereas the trustees, being mostly reps from small private schools, are maybe more concerned with supporting one another, sharing resources and so on.

As for squaring the circle between running a school based on Anthroposophy yet not wanting to promote it, I suppose it comes down to your values and ethos. For our school, the heart of our ethos lies in mutual respect and understanding. We respect the views and beliefs of others; we want to teach children how to think for themselves and not what to think; we want a school in which diversity of belief and opinion is seen as a strength and not a weakness. If those are the values that you take from Anthroposophy, as we do, then it’s obvious that you are not going to want to force your own beliefs onto anyone else.

One more post then I need to do some work.
Someone – Melanie? questioned our figures for demand. These were gathered according to DfE requirements, which are quite rigorous, and submitted as part of our application at the beginning of January. I think the figure is now just reaching 1000 supporters.
We obviously can’t know exactly how many people who have said that they would choose our school will actually go on to do so, but we already have something like five times the demand to fill our opening places. Of our existing supporters, something like 14% currently have a child at a Steiner school. However, as our admissions code will be ‘nearest first’, the great majority of parents of children at the existing Bristol Steiner School would not get places at our school, which will be on the other side of town.

On diversity – my children are currently at the Bristol Steiner School and it’s relatively diverse, for a private school on that side of town – there are black and Asian teachers and families. For what it’s worth, the most passionate advocate of Steiner education that I know is a Nigerian-British woman whose son is at a Steiner school. She has read Steiner’s work quite widely and sees no problem in taking the positive elements and rejecting the bad.

Our proposed site is in an extremely diverse part of Bristol. If our application is approved, we’ll be running consultation events in the area and I think we’ll run a public meeting / discussion on ‘Steiner education in a multi-cultural context’ or some such title, so that we can have a proper, open conversation with parents about our ethos and our plans; it would of course include discussion of the issues raised on this blog.

Finally, in response to someone ages ago – yes, Eurhythmy is part of the curriculum. I suppose it’s another example of our approach – it has spiritual value within Anthroposophical thought which you can believe in or not, to taste, but it’s also great for coordination, concentration, cooperation and so on. Personally I’d like to see it phase into contemporary dance for older pupils but that’s something we’ll sort out once we have a teacher in post.
No, we can’t possibly make teacher’s meetings public – there would be discussion of emotional and behavioural issues for individual pupils, as in any school, and from point of view of confidentiality and data protection I doubt that it would even be legal.
Yes, child studies – all teachers give careful thought to the character and needs of individual pupils from time to time, it’s part of teaching. A child study gives some structure to that. We’ll be developing guidance for teachers on this as part of our training and supervision of staff.

Without Anthroposophy at the heart of it a Steiner school wouldn’t be a Steiner school.
If Bristol Steiner school is going to do any of these things it is following Steiner’s curriculum and that curriculum is all about helping a child’s karma and reincarnation process :

Wet on wet painting
Veil painting
Holding off reading until age 7
An aversion to corners !
Black lines,hard edges being a no no
No computers till age 14
No football
No CD’s recorded music
No text books
Copying from the board
Not questioning the teacher’s ideas
Having a teacher that is with the class till age 13 / 14
That teacher having to teach every subject
Listen to a lesson on how gnomes are real
Learning about myths,Romans,explorers etc and the right time for the child’s karma
Lets not forget knitting
Daily prayers and candle lighting
Hardly ever including contemporary writers let alone artists,musicians etc before age 14

Compulsory eurythmy classes -yes eurythmy may ALSO be good for co-ordination but as Joe says eurythmy ‘has spiritual value within Anthroposophical thought which you can believe in or not’ that ‘spiritual value is that it is used to ‘right’ a child’s karma -how can I choose to believe in that or not if it’s not clearly written in the prospectus ???? The way you just described it is EXACTLY as the prospectus do-spiritual thought sounds sort of wooly and nice and as I said before says bugger all !

Child studies are about character and needs in so much as the teachers note the head shape ,nose shape,skin colour .walk etc and work out how to help the child’s soul development.They are often done without the parents knowledge.

• “[T]he purpose of [Waldorf] education is to help the individual fulfill his karma.” — Waldorf teacher Roy Wilkinson, THE SPIRITUAL BASIS OF STEINER EDUCATION (Rudolf Steiner Press, 1996), p. 52.

• “[Waldorf] education is essentially grounded on the recognition of the child as a spiritual being, with a varying number of incarnations behind him, who is returning at birth into the physical world … Teachers too will know that it is their task to help the child to make use of his body, to help his soul-spiritual forces to find expression through it, rather than regarding it as their duty to cram him with information….” — Anthroposophist Stewart C. Easton, MAN AND WORLD IN THE LIGHT OF ANTHROPOSOPHY (Anthroposophic Press, 1989), pp. 388-389.

• “Waldorf education is based upon the recognition that the four bodies of the human being [the physical, etheric, astral, and ego bodies] develop and mature at different times.” — Waldorf teacher Roberto Trostli, RHYTHMS OF LEARNING: What Waldorf Education Offers Children, Parents & Teachers (Anthroposophic Press, 1998), pp. 4-5.

• “The reason many [Steiner or Waldorf] schools exist is because of the Anthroposophy, period. It’s not because of the children. It’s because a group of Anthroposophists have it in their minds to promote Anthroposophy in the world … Educating children is secondary in these schools” — Former Waldorf teacher “Baandje”. [See “Ex-Teacher 7”-

see http://www.waldorfwatch.com/curriculum

No I’m not some man called Sune, I don’t know anything about Bristol. It seems as if any point of view not within group boundaries creates a conviction that you are a Steiner person! That is a fairly narrow and even dogmatic view which is exactly what you appear to be complaining about. I’m not totally surprised when Joe says it puts parents off examining the anti viewpoint.

I came on here in good faith, a passion for the subject of racism and a perfectly rational, logical and sensible idea to fight it using law (and if not possible to change law so it is). You’ve shocked me into doing more research into the law – but not changed my view about the necessity for evidence or process.

The arguments on here are both completely clear: Joe states the position that he’s not buying or doing the racist bits and the others (who all seem to buoy one another up as a policy) dismiss everything he says at which point he resorts to the “well don’t send your kids there” argument.

I think this is probably going to go on for some time…..Here’s a prediction.

Joe and others will open their schools in Bristol and elsewhere and the anti-camp will moan and accuse them. And that will be it.

If public money is going to lead to public scrutiny, then that’s a good thing. But to achieve that the anti-camp will in the end have to resort to the kinds of evidential process I’m talking about, because the Government has already endorsed Steiner, so what is here being referred to as scrutiny will soon be seen as harassment.

At that point we’ll be back to the discussion of evidence.

So if I can find anything useful I’ll come back and share it. This current circular argument is non productive in my view.

Thanks Nick for sharing your personal story and I wish you strength in your struggle for equality. I don’t think you’re going to find it here among the circles.

Melanie (who’s comments seem to get progressively more and more personal) said that Andy’s approach is having an effect.

Looking back at this blog, he started writing posts about Steiner a little less than a year ago – and now Steiner has begun to receive Federal money and loads more in the pipeline…..Some effect!

“No I’m not some man called Sune, I don’t know anything about Bristol. It seems as if any point of view not within group boundaries creates a conviction that you are a Steiner person!”

That’s not what I said dear… I said “This is the type of hysterical conclusion-jumping I would expect from the likes of someone like Sune.”

Perhaps I should have added – “but not from people who want to be considered “Waldorf critics”, which is, as you know, a very prestigious title bestowed on those who always use evidence to support what they claim.”

It’s actually a very easy club to get into… you just need to have evidence to support what you say. And yet, to people who have difficulty with that prerequisite, it may seem like critics are setting “boundaries”. They are, of course, but those are very good boundaries.

The arguments on here are both completely clear: Joe states the position that he’s not buying or doing the racist bits

I am opening a butcher’s shop. I will be selling meat that has had dog shit on it. But not to worry, the shitty bits will be carefully cut out before I put it on the counter. Look, customers will perfectly understand that I’m going to have to recruit butchers who are used to working in this rather specialised field. It’s not really a problem that the training schools for these butchers have manuals of butchery that say that dog shit improves the taste and nutritional quality of the meat. The ones I recruit lend no credence to those ideas and you can take my word for that. You will also understand that a butcher’s cutting room can be a dangerous place, there are sharp knives and, in our case, old bits of shitty meat lying around the place, so it really wouldn’t be safe to have members of the public see how we work. Fortunately, the public can be assured that we have secured the services of a specialised food-safety inspection service because, of course, the local trading standards people really don’t have the training to judge a shitty meat business.

I look forward to your custom.

Oh, I should also point out that dog shit is sticky stuff and sometimes it gets into places where it’s hard to spot, but you can be confident that we know what we’re doing and if any of our meat leaves you with a slightly shitty aftertaste this is really all in your imagination and, in reality, is just the rich fulsome taste of high-quality meat of a type that most people are not used to eating.

I’ve been to see the new Les Mis film. I really love the Master of the House song. I don’t know why it has just popped into my mind. My favourite stanza goes;

Food beyond compare,
Food beyond belief.
Mix it in a mincer
And pretend it’s beef

I have never accused Nick of lying. That’s almost comical. This is a skeptic’s blog but a request for evidence is immediately and repeatedly referred to as an accusation of lying. Sounds way more religious than skeptical! I’m a skeptic so I don’t tend to accept things just on someone’s say so. I asked for details and evidence of his EHRC story and he provided it. I was a little impatient, it’s true, and I did apologise for it: It was genuine and I’m happy for Nick to accept that or not.

As for Pete, when I pointed out to him that he had directly asked whether I was Sune, (“you’re not *him* are you?”) and that that’s what I was responding to, he said: “So you see some great distinction between being Sune and sounding like Sune? Neither do I.”

Well yes I sure do. If Sune is also asking for evidence of racial discrimination in Steiner, then I guess I might sound like him, but I’m not him, so there’s your distinction right there. This is very basic.

Pete also said that getting into the “Waldorf Critics” club is “actually a very easy club to get into… you just need to have evidence to support what you say. “

Considering how easy Pete contradicted his own statement and misquoted himself, the bar for joining your evidence club sounds like it might bring tears to a professional limbo dancer. Whatever evidence Pete has, I hope it’s more watertight than the “Sune” discussion above.

Diana: You’re the only person using the word ‘contempt’, sure I’m impatient with talking shops about racism, but still agreed that talking about it is a necessary step to action and carried on doing it. It’s seems important to you to present that as contempt, but I never said that – that’s just your interpretation. For some odd reason, which I don’t understand, this skeptical blog seems to contain a disproportionate amount of evidence-haters. That’s why the ad-homs about me not accepting other ways of doing things is funny, because how would that kind of information, or the discovery of process to address this racism, hurt your cause in the slightest?

Is it really racism that’s the problem? Or has the problem now become impatience with racism? Andy’s seems quite happy for such an important discussion to derail to pursue that in facile ad homs, rather than addressing racism at all, except to describe it’s existence in Steiner. Doesn’t it go any further than that? The title of this post calls righteously for Joe’s new school to be “open”, but is this just a numbers game, where the “openness” is only required of Steiner? Is this narrow-focus anti-group actually deliberately installed here to police everything, and to misinterpret any skeptical requests for evidence as accusations of lying?

Why can’t we stick to the subject of racism in education and how to fight it? I thought that was the point. Teaching racism in any school is wrong, we’ve all agreed that. What’s the whole deal with dumping that discussion to misinterpret a call for evidence as being the problem?

“Well yes I sure do. If Sune is also asking for evidence of racial discrimination in Steiner, then I guess I might sound like him, but I’m not him, so there’s your distinction right there. This is very basic. ”

Sune is a troll who pretends to be other people on-line… And I think that’s where the distinction between you and him starts to fall apart. If you’re looking for a distinction here, it is that Sune is still able to post as himself too.

Andy, I had no idea that asking to see evidence would be judged to be derailing a thread and lead to the blog owner telling me to leave – on a skeptical blog!

I have sent out requests for information regarding racism and Californian law, and if I find something interesting, I hope you’ll allow me to post it here.

Just like I hope that you will allow me to respond should the people who in my opinion truly are derailing this thread, write about me again, like Pete and Diana have above. I hope their latest comments clearly show you where the personal attacks are really coming from.

I would never have expected to meet such hostility on a blog supposedly designed to uncover evidence.

In germany, all “Free Waldorf Schools” (as Steiner Schools are called in germany) are publicly funded to a certain extend (round about 85%) – although they are private schools. But the city-state of Hamburg has concrete plans to open a 100% publicly funded Steiner School.
I find this scandalous for the same reasons you present on your blog. So I contacted the german skeptics society (www.gwup.org) and we took some action against these plans.
We are currently running an online petition (https://www.change.org/Petitionen/gegen-die-geplante-staatliche-waldorfschule-in-hamburg).
I’m happy, that german media is covering our actions. So germanys biggest serious newspaper printed an article (http://www.sueddeutsche.de/bildung/kritik-an-erster-staatlicher-waldorfschule-steiner-vom-staat-1.1583357) and today one of the biggest radio stations broadcastet a short feature: http://www.dradio.de/dlf/sendungen/campus/2004639/
I hope we manage to create a political cost for failing science, as Mark Henderson demands in “Geek Revolution”.
Andy, I think you are doing a brilliant job here, providing the public with essential information, that the Steiner movement is unwilling to give!

Andy said:

“Again, you are misunderstanding the nature of evidence and the burden of proof. No evidence about the Bristol Steiner bid does not mean that there is no problem. Given the nature of Steinerist philosophy, there is a prima facie case that Steiner pedagogy will have racist influences.”

You’re making a huge assumption about what I understand or not. I haven’t disagreed in the slightest that there is underlying racism in what you describe of Steinerist philosophy and I certainly haven’t said there’s no problem! It seems important to you to state that I’ve misunderstood, but I think there is a significant lack of understanding here of how law works!!

The problem is, as I’ve tried to explain, in spite of the hostility, is that due to the disclaimers about racism, there is now a situation where the movement has totally rejected all racism (on paper). Isn’t that why the movement is making all those disclaimers all over the place? So what that means is that they’ve managed to convince those in power that they aren’t buying those elements of Steiner philosophy. They apparently did that before gaining the federal funding, it may even have helped. But now they’ve got the green light – so the perceived (and legal) situation is that they are now “in the clear” as it were, until such time as evidence emerges that they are not completely rejecting those racist doctrines. It’s not a question of me undermining the argument, (that’s funny actually), but of there being no actual case to answer. They will just always come back and say “yes but we don’t do that anymore”. And at that point, evidence needs to be supplied to prove that they actually do.

The law doesn’t require them to prove the negative, so how in hell are you going to do it by talking at them? I can see how you could effectively wind them up, probably a lot and for a long time, but actually stopping them from damaging kids with racist propaganda? That won’t happen as long as they can just keep ducking out of the way because there is no evidence. It’s odd that you should accuse me of not understanding this because I’ve noticed that on other subjects you’re generally in favour of prosecuting quacks and totally understand and emphasise the necessity for evidence to do that.

Regarding California private schools, I put through a call through to the Office of Equal Opportunity in California (916 – 445 – 9174) who told me that the legislation concerning discrimination in education applies to all educational establishments, not just public schools. I asked her if she could point me to an overt statement of this, but she said no but that an LEA (Local Educational Agency – can be anything from childcare to private schools), is required to abide by the California Education code Section 220 which prohibits many types of discrimination including racial discrimination. This covers all types of racial discrimination including teaching racist doctrine, as well as the more obvious exclusion or marginalisation of people of colour etc., She said they regularly deal with complaints from private schools in California.

The Office of Equal Opportunity functions as an appeals service. So the parent needs to let the board/owner of the LEA know that there has been a problem, and get a response from them. If the response is unsatisfactory, the parent can then appeal to the Office of Equal Opportunity who have the power to act on the situation. The parent would need to corroborate the situation, and another testimonial to what happened would be sufficient – not a very high bar. If it is found that the LEA has non-compliance with Edu code sect 200, then the OEO can intervene, require training, institute policy etc.,

There is another path, which is to go through the Office of Civil Rights, which is Nationwide and which does not require application to be “on appeal” but you can go straight there with your original complaint. Their number is 415 – 486 – 5555. The advisor suggested that it is a good idea to simply describe the behaviour, or what happened and not use labels, eg racist, because they aren’t helpful and in any case they can work that out for themselves

Complaints have to be made within six months, so obviously this isn’t an option for Pete’s situation above, although had he taken that path, with the statements supporting the racism actually from the school, he would have been in a great position to expose that racism. If it’s still going on, it should definitely be reported to the authorities because it is ILLEGAL.

For some very odd reason that I don’t understand at all, I now anticipate a slew of aggressive denials that this is bunk, won’t work, isn’t relevant etc., which is why I’ve given you the phone numbers, so you can check it out for yourselves. Please don’t deny it, until you’ve got the evidence 🙂

Look, I’m sure there are lots of people who will agree that talking about racism is more important than doing something about it, but I’m not one of them. The ease with which I found this information, given the fury of protestation in this comments section that it’s legal in private schools and therefore impossible to do anything but talk about, is troubling.

Why are you so keen to say that nothing can be done about such a serious problem? One phone call was all it took to dispel that as an unhelpful myth – what a shame that phone call wasn’t made at the time. How many children have had to listen to this shit since then?

Thank goodness for evidence of fully human beings who are still capable of individual thought and deed. I cannot help asking myself if knowing Sally’s ethnic origin is relevant.

Nick said “what law in California says doesn’t have a great deal of bearing on how the laws and regulations work in the UK or how they are interpreted by the Local Education Authorities or the EHRC”.

Correct, but I was quite obviously attending to the question of federal law in California to deal with instances like the disgusting one Peter mentioned and is obviously still really angry about all these years later.

It does have a great bearing on that and shows that there are and were avenues for concrete action, which has been steadfastly denied all down this thread. It’s interesting that the only response is to say its not relevant in the UK! I think you must be challenging me to explore UK law and find some avenues there too. 😉

Nick said “we can rightly assume that they are not taking sufficient steps to ensure equality of opportunity for all their stakeholders:”

Being able to “rightly assume” something isn’t applicable to the execution of law, and if it was it would be even easier for people to frame you or me for whatever they liked!

Nick said “Yes there is a case to answer on many levels – racism, lying about science, inventing bogus concepts to teach children, not communicating their core beliefs to prospective parents etc, etc.. ”

That is not a case. Those are things the schools may be doing, but without proof, they will just worm out of it. Also most of those things aren’t even to do with racism, so you’re veering off the subject as far as I’m concerned as I haven’t made any comment about these other aspects whatsoever.

I think you are mistakenly interpreting my questions about evidence. Obviously these schools have a lot to answer for but that isn’t the same as technically having a case to answer.

It’s very silly for you to try and extrapolate that I’m aligned in some way with Steiner because I’m consistently saying that, on the evidence presented here, they should be prosecuted into the ground for racial discrimination.

These assumptions and generalisations are not a kind of skepticism I’m at all familiar with. Reading back it can only really be because of misinterpretation of my statement about “no case to answer”.

A case is a complicated thing. If you try to bring, as a case, that they have made “mild and blanket statements” about racism, my hunch, after looking at the Steiner Waldorf.Org website is that they will quote themselves as having rejected “any racism, stated or implied, in any of Rudolf Steiner’s speeches and writings”. The burden of proof will fall on “you” (whoever is bringing this action), to prove that this statement is a.mild and b. blanket.

They would probably simply argue that is is not blanket or mild but strong and comprehensive. To stay in the argument you will need evidence, of why it is in fact mild and blanket, or of how they are not upholding the statement. If you haven’t got it, it’s just your word against theirs. I guess if they felt really threatened by that line of questioning, they might just beef up the statement a bit more….

“Sadly, the EHRC and the local RECs are really only interested in dealing with violence or discrimination because they do not have the funding to risk on institutional racism even though it is illegal in civil terms and sometimes in criminal terms – depending on interpretation.”

Yes it’s a shame that there isn’t money to trounce Steiner for racism (you wouldn’t stand a chance on the criminal angle, especially with these statements they’ve put out), but FFS almost every organisation is institutionally racist, (and sexist, disablist, ageist etc.,) so you can easily see why that’s a hard nut to crack.

But these teachings are definitely discriminatory – I hope we are at least agreed on that – so you’re providing an avenue yourself right there, which has a much lower standard of proof which is – that it happens.

You state that this blog doesn’t “displace legal action when it is possible”. But if you don’t pick up your own statement that
“”the EHRC and the local RECs are … interested in dealing with violence or discrimination” and apply it to the very real discrimination in these teachings, and if you don’t pick up on possible actions in the US because they’re not applicable in Britain, I would assert you are definitely “displacing possible legal action” twice right there, and therefore your statement about what the blog is doing is false.

The rest of your comment is heading onto irrelevant personal ground but does illustrate the difference between an evidence based approach and mere supposition so…

Nick said “You claim to be on the side of the critics and skeptics”

Where is that? I’ve stated Im a skeptic, that doesn’t mean I’m siding with anyone or anything but a skeptical viewpoint, which is a priori independent. A viewpoint that takes sides cannot be skeptical by the definition of the word. That’s just using the word skeptic, but really talking about being in some group or other – meaningless in terms of skepticism.

Nick said “you try and deny any agency we might have in the matter.”

Oh come on! It’s not me denying agency all down this thread, even when the law says otherwise. You’ve even glossed over my production of a legal avenue, which several commentators have categorically claimed doesn’t exist, merely because it applies to a specific instance in another country! If that isn’t denying agency I don’t know what is.

What agency do you actually have that I’ve denied? That is a pretty inaccurate statement. It sounds like you just want the schools to go away because you don’t like them! What a wonderful world that would be eh?

“It seems to me you have an issue with Steiner (explain) but actually tend to agree with them on many issues.”

Yeah? Where are you getting that from? Because I state that you need evidence to prosecute? That means I am agreeing with Steiner people on “many issues” which I haven’t even mentioned? Hmmm if you tried that in court I would make a meal of you Nicky baby.

It can be tough for people to understand that law doesn’t function around sensibilities and that subjecting statements to forensic examination is not a hostile act, but necessary to build watertight cases which can succeed.

It pretty obvious that this is not what people here want to do as there is zero enthusiasm for the legal facts of the matter, and no joy at all in learning that schools can be held to account, but only a criticism from Brits that this is only in California – which is where the alleged offensive teaching actually happened!

There seems to be a lot of enthusiasm for positioning around the argument and generalised statements and assumptions – (which I notice is exactly what you are also apparently complaining about re Steiner). Your personal statements about my viewpoint, as well as being irrelevant, are also pure suppositions, based on nothing whatsoever, but appear to be trying to frame my disgust with racism as somehow pro-Steiner, and then asking me to explain that! Whatever that is about, I don’t understand the agenda there at all.

To get back to the important subject that this blog-post claims to be about, racism, I’d be interested to know what agency you actually feel you have without recourse to evidential law and how you are going to use it to actually stop the racist doctrines.

Can you give me any hard info on that please?

Sally,

“Being able to “rightly assume” something isn’t applicable to the execution of law, and if it was it would be even easier for people to frame you or me for whatever they liked!”

Yes it is: the base-line for enacting equality of opportunity in all public organisations in the UK is clearly laid down in EHRC regulations and supported by statute – it is not voluntary. As Steiner organisations do not follow those guidelines – indeed Anthroposophical texts are profoundly outside the guidelines – my assumption is not only reasonable but correct.

If you’re interested in serious research about Waldorf and why not have a look at the WREN website. http://www.ecswe.org/wren/researchpapers_outcomes.html
The second paper down refers to recent research related to racism in Waldorf pupils (done in Germany).

“According to the study led by Christian Pfeiffer, Professor of Criminology, pupils at Waldorf schools exhibit the lowest levels of both xenophobia and right-wing extremism. At Hauptschulen (the lowest tier of the German three-tiered school system), 24.7% of pupils harbour xenophobic and 9.5% right-wing tendencies. This drops to 8.3% and 1.9% respectively at Gymnasiums (the highest tier school, the equivalent of grammar schools).But only 2.8% of Waldorf pupils can be considered to have xenophobic and 1.2% right-wing attitudes.

According to these figures, Hauptschule pupils showthree times more xenophobia than Gymnasium pupils,and Gymnasium pupils three times more than Waldorf pupils. This clearly very low figure is especially striking when seen in conjunction with the fact that in some other categories (e.g. graffiti-spraying, shop-lifting and truancy) the study shows Waldorf pupils to be level-pegging with Hauptschule pupils and way above Gymnasium pupils.
The results regarding ‘macho’ attitudes are even more striking, with Waldorf pupils scoring an extremely low rating: Only 0.3% of ninth-year pupils agreed with statements such as ‘A man who is not prepared to react to insults with violence is a weakling’, or ‘If a woman cheats on her husband it is o.k. for him to beat her’. For
Gymnasium pupils the figure was almost seven time higher (2.0%), and for Hauptschule pupils compared with Gymnasium pupils ‘only’ a bit over four times more (8.7%).”

Rather strangely for an apparent racist movement there are Waldorf school around the world (1,000 or so I believe), Europe, US, South America, Africa, Asia. And guess what in Kenya they have black pupils with black teachers and in China they have Chinese pupils with Chinese teachers. And guess what…”under the apartheid regime in South Africa, the Waldorf school was one of the few schools in which children of both races attended the same classes, despite the ensuing loss of state aid. A Waldorf training college in Cape Town, the Novalis Institute, was referenced during UNESCO’s Year of Tolerance for being an organization that was working towards reconciliation in South Africa.” [wikipedia]

All sounds rather odd for an apparently racist movement!

The question is where is the evidence for such a charge being the case in Steiner schools? There is no evidence, that I am aware of, that teachers in Steiner schools treat ‘children differently based on their physical appearance’. And as I note above that would be a strange way to teach Kenyan teachers about how to teach Kenyan pupils! Asking questions and expecting answers is reasonable. What I find strange is the level of polemic as it doesn’t seem to have any evidence base with respect to what is actually going on in Steiner schools in this country. As far as I know you don’t have any special interest nor any special experience of educational pedagogy or child development. If you’re really interested in what goes on in Steiner schools I’m not sure how you could make any meaningful judgements without doing some research in them or at least about them, speaking with the teachers and importantly with the pupils. I’m not sure what bad outcomes you’re concerned about? Especially when there seems no evidence for these actually being the case, perhaps even the opposite. This must say something about what is going on in these schools. Does this mean every Steiner teacher or school is brilliant, no of course not – are there some weak teachers in Steiner schools, yes of course. This can be said of pretty much any school in the country. Will you find disgruntled ex-Steiner pupils and parents, yes…again not so unusual across the board.

For someone who stands by evidence and research I will be interested to hear of the evidence/research as to why the pedagogical approach used in Steiner schools is inappropriate and particularly why the educational outcomes for children, which is after all the important point, are not good.

You may have seen your questions answered on the ‘waldorf answers’ website. If not, and also for the benefit of your readers, it can be found at http://www.waldorfanswers.com/Myths.htm. I think this describes the relationship with anthroposophy, and of course to appreciate that relationship one has to have some understanding of what anthroposophy is and isn’t. I hope this helps.

Andy Lewis,
have you ever set foot in a Steiner school and seen for yourself how happy the kids are? You can actually do this in many countries, cultures and religions, with people of all races and colours. I advise you to do this rather than spend your time writing the nonsense you write here. Life is short.. your next incarnation is looming…

I think Dr Phil has a point.

Also, I’m curious as to whether a teacher in the state school system would be able to sum up the state’s view on child development,the national curriculum, and how these two inter-relate.

Would Mr Lewis be able to do this?

p.s. Why have I been given such a strange little fanged face?

Dr Phil wrote: “If you measure these by the state assessment criteria you will find that Steiner schools perform well above the national average (have a look at Wynstones GCSE and A level results). ”

No, they don’t. Not if you use the statistics appropriately and you’re careful to compare like with like.

It seems only fair to compare Wynstones with other independent schools where pupils may come from a similar socio-economic background. Doing that, we find that in 2012 52% of Wynstones pupils achieved GCSE grades A*/A, below the national average of 60%. 92% at Wynstones achieved grades A*-C, a shade below the national average of 94%. At A-level, the number of pupils taking exams at Wynstones is too small to be sure of a meaningful comparison: the average number of pupils taking any one subject is only 3.

That’s only for one year, which might be unrepresentative, but if you can show me evidence to back up your claim, I’ll happily look at it.

Sources:
http://www.wynstones.com/index.php/aboutus/exam-result
http://www.isc.co.uk/press/press-releases/2012/isc-year-11-exam-results-2012

“Imaginative stories are also used to introduce young children to the arithmetical processes. In this way children can fully engage and relate to numbers, more so than if they are introduced as abstract concepts.”

Yes, and also, imaginative stories are used to introduce young children to ALL KINDS OF THINGS ANTHROPOSOPHICAL as well. That’s what the imaginative stories are for. Take the “Rainbow Bridge” story, for example. This story is told on the child’s birthday… and describes the reincarnation process, and the child choosing their parents (and in some cases it’s extended to include their teacher and classmates). The story relates the ideas of reincarnation and karma to very, VERY young children. It’s part of Waldorf’s effort to indoctrinate them to Anthroposophy.

Dr Phil: “maybe kids shouldn’t be reading bank accounts or doing equations at 7 years?”

Why not? Serious question. I had my own savings account and had a slightly precocious curiosity about algebra at 7 years old. Unusual perhaps, but not pathological. (Unless we’re talking about spiritual pathologies… 🙂

“The Steiner movement is growing partly because it honours the freedom of children to be what they are: children.”

I’m all for a rounded, broad education but as you say, Steiner education is not for everybody. I think this is precisely because it denies the freedom of children with more academic inclinations to pursue their interests. A child who’s interested in reading and maths at an early age is still a child and deserves that freedom, surely?

Dr Phil ,
Forgot to say you are really rude to Andre,wasn’t it obvious English isn’t his first language ?? Im dyslexic by the way so bear that in mind before you complain about the writing in my post.Some people for various reasons may have difficulties academically or using another language, it happens…
It took me a very long time to type this small answer. Steiner has strong views on special needs that I’m sure you are aware of though …

Hi Andy,
I hope you don’t mind me posting this on two of your blogs but I think its so important.

http://gregoireperra.wordpress.com/author/gperra/ The letter is on this blog by another ex teacher

To The Parents Desert Sky Community School and the Arizona State Board for
Charter Schools:

My name is Rachael Colley and I recently resigned from Desert Sky Community
School. I am writing to inform you of the reason for my untimely departure. I
resigned from my position as grade 3/4 teacher because I was unaware that I had
been employed by what is, in my opinion, a religious cult and cannot in good
conscience continue, despite my love of the children and my sincere desire to
give them the best education.

I love that Waldorf education has a rhythm, that there is a large block in the
morning for children to really get into the lesson and that true unstructured
play is encouraged. However,

I cannot work in a place where lighting candles at a staff meeting and
chanting a childs name (without the parents knowledge), as well as reading from
the “Calendar of the Soul” is done and is seen as normal, and even called a
“child study”.

I cannot work in a place where the children are told to walk on the outside of
the circle because the director is afraid they will “break the chalice”. Or
where children say verses (prayers) to “spirit”. I am a spiritual person, but it
should not be required of children in a publicly funded school. When this was
brought up to my superiors, I was told that they “cannot imagine how I think
religion is there”. Yet I was told that the chicken coop must be built in a
certain way because it, “brings the childrens souls to the earth”.

If you have not already looked up anthroposophy, please do. It underpins
everything that is said and done at Desert Sky. Understand that you will be lied
to, and some people at Desert Sky believe that they know more about your child
and what is best for him/her than you do. Many (parents) are referred to in
negative terms behind their backs, and your children are saying prayers with
words that they do not know the meaning of.

There are good people at Desert Sky, people who love your children and also
want the best for them. However, someone needed to stand up and be the voice of
what really happens and what is really expected. Sadly, that task seems to have
fallen onto me.
>
> To all of the families, especially those with children in grades three and
four I wish you all the best.

Sincerely,

Rachael Colley

“As I’ve said before, there is lot in Steiner schooling that just makes sense.. working with rhythm, imagination, movement, mixed classes, narrative, speech, story, art.. many things that have been undermined or lost in the mainsteam.”

What main stream are you drinking from, Dr. Phil? ALL those things are part of mainstream education… every single one!

“The philosophical framework and esoteric aspect.. anthroposophy.. is not taught to children nor does it detract from the common sense pedagogy that many educators, academics and politicians recognize. ”

It is indeed taught to the children – just not as “Anthroposophy class”. The educator we are discussing absolutely believes it detracts from the education.

“I can send you many academic papers on this, if you so wish, written from outside the Waldorf community. I have researched this in some detail.”

Please do! I dare say, many of us have researched this in great detail. What we see is Waldorf pretending to align itself with accepted ideas. What we don’t see is WHY. For example, shutting off the TV sounds like a good idea to many people… it’s an idea that people have embraced. Waldorf claims to be on the forefront of such thinking… UNTIL you start looking into Waldorf only to discover their reasons (the influence of Ahriman in electronic and mechanical devices) are complete NONSENSE. Yet, when they talk about turning off the TV, there is NO mention of the reason behind it… only that there is some support in the mainstream.

Hopefully, you won’t try to bring weak examples of Waldorf ideas being accepted by mainstream educators when you present your material.

Announcement: Andy Lewis to speak on this topic in Bristol.

Title: What every parent should know about Steiner Schools.

When: 19:45 Tuesday 19th March

Venue: Conference Room, Hamilton House, Stokes Croft, Bristol.

All welcome.

Cost: Free, donations to cover costs welcomed.

(Apologies for the ‘on-topic spam’)

Excuse me , I have been going to the Steiner academy for almost 2 years now and the education may be a little patchy in places but no one believes in rudolf steiners racist/homophobic and just downright offensive beliefs.the only thing people respect about him are the way he thought education should work,which really had nothing to do with his beliefs.i personally do not agree with this education type but as a “child” I didn’t have a choice wether I could go to this school or not.
So to the idiot who wrote this article please dont make judgments when u don’t even know what your talking about.

PS.we are not all part of some big Steiner cult.