In a recent letter to parents, our school director Megan Neale shares her perspectives on the role of Waldorf education and our children’s inner education.

After a remarkably wet winter season, the first hints of spring are all around us. The days are slowly growing longer and wildflowers are blooming across the hillsides in Lucas Valley. Here on campus, students are immersed with their work, cozy in their classrooms, and growing almost as quickly as the green winter grasses.

We all are affected by the steady, predictable change of season and the ongoing relationship between light and darkness. With attention, we can become sensitive to the subtle but profound changes in nature that take place throughout the year. As the world awakens from its winter sleep, the approaching spring equinox offers a welcome moment of balance, when night and day are equal lengths.

For our faculty, late winter is traditionally a time for reflection and growth. During the February break, we host the annual Bay Area Center for Waldorf Teacher Training's midyear conference, providing a space for teachers from across the country to engage in professional and personal development. This moment of reflection is vital in bringing ourselves into balance, like the seasons. It also brings us closer to our deeper purpose as educators.

Since its founding over 100 years ago, Waldorf education has been committed to social renewal and the conscious development of healthy human relationships. Over my six years as school director, I have thought deeply about how Waldorf schools, and our school in particular, can educate children so that they may connect with and serve humanity, even in a world that seems to be pushing people further apart. Today, we have a thousand encyclopedias’ worth of knowledge at our fingertips, AI can generate seemingly thoughtful responses to deep philosophical questions, and social media allows us to live within a bubble created by algorithms. Society and politics are riddled with the polarizing forces of war, hatred, and violence, dividing us further.

At Marin Waldorf School, we are concerned with the inner education of our students: guiding them to recognize their life's purpose, to respond to the quest for social and environmental justice, and to build rich and meaningful lives, based on a real human connection. It isn't easy. True communication—true listening—takes openness, practice, patience, and interest. It often includes conflict and tension as part of the process. Our job as educators, and as parents, isn't to fend off pain or eradicate tension, but to strengthen the forces within young children so that they may meet life’s inevitable challenges with love, care, and strength.

Community is something that must be demonstrated, not just taught. As teachers, we connect to our own humanity so that we can teach it to students. By listening to them, we show them how to listen to others. I believe these skills are essential to every child, as well as to the future of our local community, our greater society, and the world.

Last week, our families demonstrated their commitment to these values and to our school community by signing their reenrollment contracts for the next school year. For me, it's a deeply gratifying moment: grounded in the present and looking ahead to the future, with optimism. Nature teaches us to accept change. It also shows that there are moments of equilibrium, balance, and hope in a constantly evolving world.

Thank you for being a part of our extraordinary school community.

With optimism,

Megan Neale
Director

From the Director's Desk: A Balanced Education