How long has it been since your high schooler was actively and enthusiastically interested in school?
If you are a parent who has steadily watched your son or daughter drop out of school mentally if not in actuality, a new type of high school, soon to be located in our area, offers you an alternative.
Matrix, as the new school will be called is a “free school” typical of the free school movement (some 800 schools) throughout the U.S. A free school trys to offer an alternative to the “joylessness, authoritarianism and general stifling which they see in established schools.”
The new school which has only been in operation a month and a half, was started by a group of dissatisfied parents and professionals in University City. They met and formed two groups, one to establish a high school along the lines laid out by authors prominent in the free school movement such as John Holt and another to establish a companion elementary school.
An interview with Jack Flynn, one of the core teachers now in the process of getting his masters degree at Washington University, revealed that the group hopes to locate the school on Pershing if they can find a backer to co-sign for the two properties, one for the high school and the other for the elementary school called Greenways.
The school will charge a tuition fee of $500 a year, a reasonable price somewhere in between the costs of the neighborhood Catholic school and the nearest private school. The charge is necessary, Mr. Flynn pointed out, so the school can be independent, so that the students feel they are contributing to their education.
The core staff, many of whom are taking a drastic salary cut, are experienced teachers who will live in the school building where they will teach. Presently they have 30 students, most of whom are on a part-time basis. They are involved in such projects as marketing organic spinach for Morning Dew after school and on week-ends.
This summer the staff plans a summer program much of which will be incorporated into the full-time winter courses. They will offer free classes in decoupage, organic foods, guitar, improvisial drama, car repair and mechanics (VW autos to begin with), pottery and sewing, candlemaking and filmmaking. One group of students plan to investigate and contrast lifestyles in the city, county and rural areas. At the end they plan a multi-media presentation including a film. Call Jack Flynn 863-0828, Fred, 652-2246 or Alex, 645-2900 to register.
The curriculum, or as a newsletter states, “the course is where the runner runs” plans an interrelated mixture of the practical and ascetic. Where many free schools have failed, according to Jack, is in their failure to tie their courses to reality. Thus, a course in architecture may involve remodeling a home. However, as the newsletter on the school cautions, the content of what an individual or the group as a whole studies will depend on individual interest and the nature of the group experiences.”
What the school does promise is a staff which will be constantly available to the learners to stimulate and assist them in their search. Matrix will consist of three faculties the core faculty, a second group of resource persons that will work with learners on specific projects or studies and a third group that will be available for general consultation and the development of highly specialized interests.
One of the most important goals of the school is to “foster the skill-attitudes necessary for becoming an autonomous learner or a self-actualizing person. These are: reasoning. communication and media skills, who and how to be in vital contact with one’s feelings and surrounding world; and why and how to activate one’s imagination and fantasy.”
One of the prime ingredients of the school will be active community involvement. Jack, who terms high school students as “an untapped natural resource”, sees the students giving outdoor plays for children throughout the summer, remodeling a home and tutoring the elementary students in the companion elementary school, Greenways.
The school considered seeking state approval, but decided that such approval and the requirements that go with it were against the spirit and form of the school.
However, to help students have a diploma recognized by the state, the school will offer a course on the high school equivalancy test.
Matrix, as the phamplet states, is a philosophy of learning and an attitude about the way people relate to one another and to the world.”
All the school needs are students willing to learn these attitudes, parents who see the school as an answer to their needs, and a community willing to accept it.
If interested call Jack Flynn ( 863-0828), Alex Bornstein (645-2900) or Fred Schmelzer (645-2900). (Editor’s note: a story on the Greenways school will appear in the next issue.)
Archive note about the issue date
The running header on page 4 prints June 1970, while this issue’s front-page masthead reads June 1971. The continuation matches page 1; the June 1971 issue identity is retained without changing the original scan.
Originally published in The Paper, June 1971.
Read this article in the original newspaper issue.
Original source: SD_Times1971_06.pdf, printed page 1, 4.
