Many organizations use the word community as a buzzword, and particularly so in education. We believe this is in large part because educational institutions so often utilize practices and structures that are isolating at best and dehumanizing at worst, and buzzwords can often distract people from focusing on organizational or institutional shortcomings. At Abrome we are not on a mission to do schooling better; we are focused on building liberatory educational experiences and environments. And liberatory education requires community building.
We are currently reading Emergent Strategy by adrienne maree brown with some other education visionaries from across the country. The book stretches readers to imagine and create a better future without being constrained by the dominant culture, "the way things have always been done," or a devotion to order. It challenges us to reconsider our human relations and central to that is our understanding of community.
We have written before about the corrosive effects of competition in educational settings, and about the toxic pyramid structure of society. adrienne maree brown encourages us to think beyond the socialization of independence (and a world where we compete against others) to move toward interdependence (a world where we collaborate and support one another). This requires community.
At Abrome we are building community in a variety of ways. First and foremost we treat everyone in our mixed-age space as equals. Like democratic schools, we believe every Learner should have the ability to impact and shape our culture without limitation on the basis of age, experience, education, or other qualification. At Abrome the adults are not more important than the Learners, and we do not expect Learners to outsource their decision making to us. We instead utilize tools such as the Community Awareness Board to provide supports for Learners to co-create culture with us.
It is only in relation to other bodies and many somebodies that anybody is somebody. Don’t get it into your cotton-picking mind that you are somebody in yourself.
Second, we work to expand our community beyond the walls of Abrome. This is why we invest our time in people and programs outside of Abrome through our participation in our local public library (e.g., free play, public talks, Smart Schooling Book Group), Raising Resisters, and the Education Transformation Alliance. By helping others learn about liberatory ideas, and to have a taste of Emancipated Learning, we can help create a more welcoming and tolerant world for autonomous young people.
Third, we work to get Abrome Learners out into the broader community as often as possible. We do not believe that learning should ever be confined to the walls of a school, and that there are untold numbers of people eager to engage with our Learners if only given the opportunity to do so. So we take Learners into the community multiple times per week on offerings, and once every three weeks on dedicated field trip days. We are not constrained by any notion of seat time.
And fourth, we want to begin to bring people into Abrome to support our community of Learners. We know there are many people of all ages and experiences who would love to support children and adolescents in a Self-Directed Education setting. So this is a formal invite to all of those who have been following Abrome and wanting to get involved to reach out to us to learn more about how you can provide offerings (e.g., story telling, skill sharing, art, creative writing, science experiments, historical knowledge) and to serve as resources for young people who believe they can improve the human condition.