Geof Syphers: from the Alliance for Public Waldorf Education Conference

Four board members packed up in mid January for a trip to Rudolf Steiner College outside of Sacramento.  The draw was the weekend conference hosted by the Alliance for Public Waldorf Education.  We joined over two hundred educators, administrators, parents and other people interested in a public, tuition free Waldorf inspired education.

The theme of the conference was “Sheparding Stewardship:  Teaching about Nature and Sustainability in Schools Inspired by Waldorf Education.”  To be honest, when I first heard the title, I was curious how it would play out in a conference setting.  Would we sit outside in a circle admiring twigs or watching worms wriggle out of the ground? (The answer to that is, yes, if you wanted to.)

But the conference was much more.  The Alliance for Public Waldorf Education brought together some amazing people like Andrew Kimbrell, a lawyer who argued successfully before the Supreme Court to halt the company Monsanto from releasing genetically modified grains on the U.S. market.

The last morning of the conference, board members Jennifer, Anna Sarah and I set off for a pre-lecture walk  to the Sacramento Waldorf School.  We were joined by early riser Geof Syphers.  Syphers was at the conference as a presenter to share his ideas on sustainability developed through his work as an architect and developer.  When we pressed him for more detail on our walk, he smiled and said he’d talk more about it in his speech.  My inner skeptic wondered what does his experience have to do with a public Waldorf education.  The answer in short is everything.

Our mild mannered hiking partner was an incredibly dynamic speaker.  When he took the stage, instead of sharing pictures of his projects or how his work will save the planet by reducing impact on resources, he talked about the day he lost his future.  He spoke about the day he realized what he did as an architect building ultra-energy efficient LEED platinum homes and buildings was not enough to build a sustainable planet.

If every person on the planet lived like a North American (right now, at this very moment), we would need five and a half planets to sustain our lifestyle.  Even if all buildings on the planet were modified or built to LEED platinum specifications, the impact would be marginal at best.

So what can we do to deal with the actual limitations of our resources–living on this one planet with a growing population?

Syphers asked us to look into the future…2100…ninety years from now…about two generations.  What will it look like?  What will work look like?  How will people live?  What does transportation look like?

Then he opened up the discussion for feedback with the question, “What are the good things about the future you envision?”

The responses emphasized localization, localized food and greater use of public transit to name a few.  Then Syphers challenged us as an audience to move beyond the idea and create the context for the idea to mature into action.  For these changes are going to take a few generations.  What can we do right now to prepare the soil for those changes to take root for future generations?

This idea of nurturing individuals, young students…children, to discover who they are and be who their are in relation to their communities and their world…what it is now,  what it can be and what it will be in the future…is what a Waldorf inspired education does.  Educating a child is about nurturing a person to define, shape and answer questions of the future.

Geof Syphers shared the story of working in his small San Francisco garden one afternoon.  His work was interrupted by the thundering pipes of a badass tattooed biker who stopped before him and silenced his engine.  He asked Syphers about his garden, then left.  Later the biker returned with slats and slats of tomato starts.  The biker unloaded his gifts with detailed stories about how each plant grows.

Then Syphers challenged us to be like that biker.  Break out of your world and reach out.  Create what Syphers calls “contact experiences” where you reach outside of your community to someone else who knows nothing about you and may not share your values.

Envision the positive aspects of the future.  Talk about it.  Dare to make the story, be wrong, then change your mind.  Make your vision specific.  Then live a piece of that vision right now.