RSSKL

Part 1

Here is a reprise of news items dealing directly with — or touching tangentially on — the unfolding drama at the Rudolf Steiner School Kings Langley (RSSKL).

Following a brief three-part prologue (bereft of Waldorf Watch commentary), I will present news items that were given the full Waldorf Watch treatment.

— Roger Rawlings

PROLOGUE

I.

DailyMail.com

Sunday, Sep 3rd 2017

5PM

Liberal school that's just too liberal: 

Top £10,000-a-year Steiner school is ordered to close 

amid child safety fears after series of damning inspections

• The Rudolf Steiner School, in Hertfordshire, has been ordered to close down 

• Inspectors say teachers were meeting up with students outside the classroom 

• There were also concerns about students being free to walk off the site at lunch

• The school is appealing the closure will run as normal until this is settled 

By Paddy Dinham For Mailonline

PUBLISHED: 08:19 EDT, 3 September 2017 | UPDATED: 12:03 EDT, 3 September 2017

A top £10,000 a year school has been ordered to close following a damning report from Ofsted [the Office for Standards in Education] that flagged up serious fears of child safety.

The Rudolf Steiner School, in Kings Langley, Hertfordshire, will close down after failing to make improvements since the education watchdog's last visit in December, when it stopped any new pupils from coming aboard.

But now the school has been ordered to close down for good, with inspectors saying data protection had been breached, pupils were able to wander off-site during lunch breaks and that there were no 'professional boundaries' between students and teachers, with some meeting up outside school.

The school is currently appealing the decision and will continue to operate as normal until a decision on this has been made..

[http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-4848266/Top-10-000-year-Steiner-school-ordered-close.html]

II.

THE TELEGRAPH

Safeguarding fears mount over controversial Steiner schools

By Camilla Turner, education editor 

...[A]n investigation by The Sunday Telegraph has revealed that the inspectors have raised concerns about safeguarding at almost half of Steiner schools in the country in the past four years. 

Several of the 22 independent Steiner schools — which charge up to £12,000 per year in fees — have faced regulatory action by the Department for Education (DfE), amid fears over child safety.... 

[E]mergency inspections have been ordered at eight of the schools. 

It comes after Britain's flagship Steiner school was ordered to shut down....

Earlier this month, The Sunday Telegraph revealed that The Rudolf Steiner School Kings Langley, which is appealing against the order to close, issued an apology to children and their families for “real and serious failings going back several years”....

Briefings produced by civil servants — obtained under freedom of information laws — raised serious concerns about Steiner schools years ago, when the DfE had dozens of applications to set up state-funded Steiner free schools....

Despite the warnings, ministers have approved four state-funded Steiner schools since 2010, two of which were marked as “requiring improvement” at their most recent Ofsted inspection....

A spokesman for the DfE said: “Where an inspection finds that a school is not meeting the independent school standards we may take regulatory action.”

[9-13-2017  (downloaded 9-16)   http://www.telegraph.co.uk/education/2017/09/16/safeguarding-fears-mount-controversial-steiner-schools/]

III.

From the Anthroposophical "news" service, NNA (Nexus News Agency CIC):

Kings Langley Rudolf Steiner School 

on reforming path to avoid closure

Tue, 24 Oct 2017   By Christian von Arnim

A long-established Rudolf Steiner School in the United Kingdom is fighting to stay open following a decision by the Department for Education (DfE) in England to deregister the school from the Register of Independent Schools. If the school cannot reverse the decision, it will have to close.

Kings Langley Rudolf Steiner School (RSSKL) received the deregistration notice in July following a series of school inspections which found serious failings in its compliance with the independent school standards, particularly relating to the welfare and safeguarding of pupils, as well as management and leadership issues.…

The school has acknowledged that there were “real and serious failings going back several years” which it described as “unacceptable” in a public statement and it has apologised for failing “to provide the safe and supportive learning environment it should and would wish to provide”….

The school has embarked on a thorough process of reform. A completely new board of trustees has been appointed as well as a principal whom the school describes as having “extensive experience in school improvement and transformation”….

[http://www.nnanews.org/news/article/tx_ttnews%5Btt_news%5D=2668&cHash=adf6ce85ac0b36b5828e71a7e40d8c4f]

For other preliminary reports on the problems at RSSKL, see

Aug. - Sept., 2017

and

September, 2017

at the Waldorf Watch Annex.

WALDORF WATCH NEWS

Here are news items that appeared on the Waldorf Watch news page

with accompanying commentary.

In some cases, RSSKL is mentioned in these items only tangentially.

More often, RSSKL stands at the center of attention.

The first item, surprisingly, comes from 

the other side of the world.

(The bit about RSSKL comes at the end of this item: 

Look for the asterisk.)

December 9, 2017

WALDORF ADVOCACY, 

CLAIRVOYANCE, & THE ROOT 

From The Gympie Times [Australia]:

Speakers to support 

Steiner education 

in Mary Valley

THREE speakers will add their support to Steiner-inspired education for the Mary Valley at the third meeting of the Mary Valley/Gympie Steiner School group at Pie Creek Hall on Monday, December 11 from 5-7pm.

At 5pm, Jonathon Anstock will present an overview of possibilities for the proposed school. Mr Anstock is an educator of more than 45 years, ex-Steiner teacher, Steiner advocate, [etc.]...

At 5.20pm, and [sic: an] overview of primary Steiner education and homeschooling will be given by Tim Nixon, who has been a Steiner teacher for 13 years and is currently teaching class 5 at Noosa Pengari Steiner School....

At 5.50pm, local happiness coach Kylie Dean will talk about Steiner Inspired Big Visioning.

Ms Dean recently returned from America where she visited or connected with three Steiner inspired schools and ventures...."

[12/9/2017   https://www.gympietimes.com.au/news/speakers-to-support-steiner-education-in-mary-vall/3286007/]

Waldorf Watch Response:

Education authorities and ordinary citizens often face difficulties when assessing proposals for new Waldorf schools. Often, there is an organized push for the schools by Anthroposophists and their allies, whereas there is little or no organized opposition. Most people outside the Anthroposophical movement know little or nothing about Waldorf education.

Often, the image presented by Waldorf advocates is extremely rosy. Waldorf can sound quite lovely. The challenge is to dig beneath this glowing surface — a task that can be difficult and time-consuming. (For one iconoclastic, highly critical report published today, see "Rudolf Steiner, Clairvoyant, Educationist and Racist" in The People's Daily Morning Star. Be advised: The People's Daily Morning Star is a socialist newspaper, a fact that may or may not be relevant to your assessment of the article.*)

If all three scheduled speakers at a public forum focused on Waldorf education have allegiance to the Waldorf movement, this fact should probably be relevant to your assessment of the forum.

"Steiner Inspired Big Visioning" is an unusual term, not often encountered. But anyone trying to assess Waldorf education should realize that this form of education is based on the "clairvoyant" visions of Rudolf Steiner, the founder of Waldorf education. Steiner claimed to be clairvoyant, and many Waldorf teachers today believe they are clairvoyant. This fact should certainly be relevant to your deliberations about Waldorf.

A few relevant quotations:

◊ "Not every Waldorf teacher has the gift of clairvoyance, but every one of them has accepted wholeheartedly and with full understanding the results of spiritual-scientific investigation concerning the human being." — Rudolf Steiner, WALDORF EDUCATION AND ANTHROPOSOPHY (Anthroposophic Press, 1995), Vol. 2, p. 224. "Spiritual science" is Anthroposophy. "Spiritual-scientific investigation" is the disciplined use of clairvoyance. If "not every Waldorf teacher" is clairvoyant, then at least some Waldorf teachers are clairvoyant, according to Steiner.

◊  "Must teachers be clairvoyant in order to be certain that they are teaching in the proper way? Clairvoyance is needed...." — Waldorf educator Eugene Schwartz, THE MILLENNIAL CHILD (Anthroposophic Press, 1999), p. 157.

◊ “Modern exact clairvoyance, as developed by him [i.e., Rudolf Steiner], reveals spiritual facts to spiritual vision as clearly as men's ordinary senses reveal to the intellect the facts of the physical world.” — Floyd McKnight, RUDOLF STEINER AND ANTHROPOSOPHY (Anthroposophical Society in America, 1977), p. 4.

◊ “[Acquiring] spiritual perception, enhanced consciousness or knowledge of higher worlds [i.e., clairvoyance]...is the same path that should be followed by every teacher who takes his vocation seriously.” — Waldorf teacher Roy Wilkinson, THE SPIRITUAL BASIS OF STEINER EDUCATION (Rudolf Steiner Press, 1996), p. 115.

If clairvoyance is a delusion, then there is no basis for Waldorf education. And the fact is, clairvoyance is a delusion. It does not exist. People who think they are clairvoyant are deluding themselves. Please think carefully before authorizing such people to "educate" your children. [See "Clairvoyance", "Exactly", "The Waldorf Teacher's Consciousness", and "Why? Oh Why?"] — R.R.

* Excerpt:

THE Rudolf Steiner School, in Kings Langley near Watford, has been ordered to close after a totally unsatisfactory Ofsted inspection.

...[W]ill the Steiner school in Kings Langley survive? That is important to nearly three dozen other private Steiner schools which also dream of getting state funding.

Or will the school close and the resulting post-mortem and enquiries help shine a bright cleansing light on the nasty, nutty, racist beliefs of Rudolf Steiner and end the scandal that allows state funding for this awful education system and the racist and superstitious philosophy that is at its root?

[12-9-2017   http://www.morningstaronline.co.uk/a-7272-Rudolf-Steiner,-clairvoyant,-educationist-and-racist#.Wiwdv7aZMo8]

.

.

.

April 14, 2018

STEINER SCHOOL 

STILL UNDER CLOSURE ORDER   

A leading Waldorf school in the U.K. is apparently still in danger of being closed by education authorities. A new inspection has confirmed previous findings that the school fails to adequately safeguard its students.

From The Hemel Gazette [Johnson Publishing, UK]:

Hertfordshire private school 

fails Ofsted safeguarding test 

- again

by Ben Raza

A troubled private school which is threatened with closure has failed its safeguarding requirements again.

Rudolf Steiner School in Kings Langley had another visit by Ofsted [Office for Standards in Education] inspectors in February, and was found to have not fulfilled its safeguarding requirements. 

Parents have now been asked to come to a meeting at the school next week, where they will discuss how [the school] will move forward. 

Interim principal Tim Byford said: “This has clearly been a step backwards, which we’re very disappointed about....”  

Mr Byford did not want to go into details about what would be discussed [at the meeting], but said that the school would be making “significant decisions” in the coming weeks and wanted parents, staff and school association members “to be of one mind”....

And Mr Byford confirmed that the school was looking again at its legal representation. 

Rudolf Steiner Kings Langley is currently being represented in its efforts to stay open by Mishcon de Reya, the prestigious London firm which represented Princess Diana during her divorce from the Prince of Wales.... 

An Ofsted spokesman said the report from February’s monitoring visit will be published once the school half-term is over. 

>Issues at the £9,250-a-year Rudolf Steiner School date back to March 2016, when the School Inspection Service made an emergency inspection following complaints from a number of parents. 

Ofsted then became involved, finding the school to be ‘Inadequate’, with ‘serious weaknesses’. 

And last August the Secretary of State for Education said she intended to remove Rudolf Steiner School from the Register of Independent Schools — effectively forcing the school to close.

The school is now appealing that decision.... 

[accessed 8/14/2018    https://www.hemeltoday.co.uk/news/hertfordshire-private-school-fails-ofsted-safeguarding-test-again-1-8456711   This story originally appeared on April 12.]

Here here excerpts from a previous news article dealing with the situation at The Rudolf Steiner School Kings Langley:

Telegraph News 

Exclusive: Top Steiner school ordered to close 

by Government over child safety fears

[by] Camilla Turner, education editor

Britain’s flagship Steiner school has been ordered to close amid fears over child safety, The Sunday Telegraph has learned.

The Rudolf Steiner School Kings Langley had already been banned by the Department for Education (DfE) from admitting any new pupils, following a series of damning Ofsted inspections which uncovered a raft of safeguarding failings.

It comes after Denis McCarthy, a senior staff member who was also a leading figure in the UK’s Steiner school movement, was sacked from the school for gross misconduct.

“He was a senior figure in anthroposophy,” a source close to the school told The Sunday Telegraph. “He was the most powerful person in the school, he had a large following.

“The school did everything that they could to protect him: minimising or dismissing concerns, and deleting safeguarding emails."

The development raises questions about the 34 other Steiner schools in the UK and Ireland, which includes four state funded Steiner academies....

The Rudolf Steiner School Kings Langley charges up to £9,570-a-year in fees and is set on ten acres of grounds on the site of a 13th-century Plantagenet royal palace in Hertfordshire.

The school has issued a public apology to children and their families for “real and serious failings going back several years”, acknowledging that it failed to act on “repeated concerns raised by parents” over safeguarding.

The school was notified in July of the Secretary of State for Education’s intention to remove it from the independent schools’ register, a decision which the school is now appealing.... 

[9-2-2017  http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2017/09/02/exclusive-top-steiner-school-ordered-close-government-child/]

Waldorf Watch Response:

Waldorf schools often have difficulty meeting the ordinary standards set by education authorities for the schools in their jurisdiction.

Waldorf schools exist to serve what they deem to be higher purposes — they have their focus on otherworldly, spiritual concerns. At least, this is the case in genuine Waldorf schools, schools that operate in accordance with the precepts and doctrines formulated by the founder of Waldorf education, Rudolf Steiner. [See, e.g., "Soul School" and "Spiritual Agenda".] From a Waldorf perspective, ordinary standards may seem irrelevant or even damaging. The schools may feel that such standards do not apply to them and must be actively resisted.

Many parents select Waldorf schools for their children because of the perception that Waldorf schools provide safe havens from the hurly-burly, materialistic, technology-dominated modern world. It is especially disappointing, then, when Waldorf schools fail to safeguard students adequately. And yet, over the years, there have been many reports of such failures in the Waldorf system. [See, e.g., "Slaps" and "Extremity".]

School inspectors often have difficulty evaluating Waldorf schools. Most Waldorf practices, including instructional methods, are unusual and difficult to assess. Moreover, an atmosphere of idealism and spirituality pervades many Waldorf schools, and there is usually a dazzling display of faculty- and student-created art in most classrooms and hallways. The schools seem high-minded, and they are often beautiful. Seeing beyond this surface sheen can be challenging.

Moreover, Waldorf schools have a long tradition of manipulating and misleading inspectors. Starting with Rudolf Steiner himself, Waldorf authorities have understood that they need to deflect the judgments of outsiders if they are to proceed with their own agenda. The schools have thus often been secretive and defensive. [See, e.g., "Secrets" and "Visits".] Inspectors who manage to persevere and reach objective conclusions about Waldorf schools deserve special commendation.

A former Waldorf teacher has given this account of efforts made by his colleagues to deceive school inspectors:

"[I]n these schools, misleading state officials is commonplace. For example, I witnessed that, when a teacher is scheduled to be inspected in class, s/he will commonly be replaced by another teacher who has the [necessary] skills or qualifications. Then the students are asked to 'play the game' when the inspector is present, and to act as if the teacher who conducts their class [this day] is their regular teacher. Similarly, it may happen that there are health and hygiene inspections. I remember one time when the inspectors had to check how the children ate in the canteen. However, in this school, the children did not eat in a canteen, but in classrooms with their teachers who watched them and made them recite their prayers before meals. For this inspection, the teachers were notified 24 hours in advance, so we organized three successive meal services in a canteen for the students, so that everything appeared normal. In the evening, during a faculty meeting, teachers congratulated themselves that their students had 'played the game.'" — Grégoire Perra, "He Went to Waldorf".

— Compilation and commentary by Roger Rawlings

April 19, 2018

FURTHER COVERAGE OF 

THREATENED SCHOOL CLOSURE    

From The Watford Observer [UK]:

Rudolf Steiner School in Kings Langley 

fails Ofsted safeguarding inspection

[by] Nathan Louis

A troubled private school which has been threatened with closure has failed its latest Ofsted [Office for Standards in Education] inspection.

Rudolf Steiner School in Kings Langley has “put children at risk” by not vetting the teachers properly and accepting sub-standard applications.

The Department of Education is considering removing the school from the Register of Independent Schools, which would force it to close for good.

The latest inspection, held in February, found the school had failed its safeguarding requirements again, despite passing them at its last monitoring inspection.

Teachers "do not consider the needs of the pupils and do not always act in the best interest of the pupils"....

[4/19/2018  http://www.watfordobserver.co.uk/news/16170883.Private_school__which_could_close__fails_latest_Ofsted_inspection/]

Waldorf Watch Response:

We have been following the situation at the Rudolf Steiner School in Kings Langley for some time; we have seen several previous news reports about the problems there.

The school has taken various measures, such as hiring high-powered legal representation, but so far it seems unable to meet Ofsted's standards for student safety.

Waldorf or Steiner schools generally have a reputation for providing safe havens in which students are sheltered from many of the problematic conditions found — or allegedly found — in the outside world. And yet, over the years, many reports have emerged from these schools indicating dysfunctions of various sorts that impinge of student welfare. [See, e.g., "Slaps" and "Extremity".]

Sometimes the problems become so severe, the schools cease operations. New Waldorf schools are opened almost every year in countries around the world; but at least some of these schools fail. [See, e.g., "Failure".]

One former Waldorf teacher has written that systemic problems within Waldorf schools often result from the blurring of lines within the schools:

A Confusion of Roles

When I worked in one of these schools, I myself was quickly caught up in the whirlwind in which all lines of separation are erased. Very soon, our colleagues become a kind of family, brothers and sisters, fathers and mothers. Students become for us both our children and our friends and associates. There reigns a sort of permanent "incestuous" atmosphere that can go haywire very quickly for everyone. A mantra recited by the teaching community at some faculty meetings reflects this total confusion of identities: 

Me in the community,

And the community in me. 

Far from being a saying designed to encourage healthy collegial solidarity, these words rather reflect the total confusion of identities prevailing in the Waldorf school system. Nobody there knows who he is or what exactly his role is. This confusion between an educational institution and a family structure is reflected in the language used in schools, where students must call the teachers who oversee their individual work at the end of schooling (the masterpiece) their "godfathers" and "godmothers." Hierarchy officially is absent from the schools (since the teaching community is supposed to be self-organizing), but this produces power games and other profoundly unhealthy influences. Also, it is not surprising that this nebulous dissolution of personalities and responsibilities gives rise to accounts of illicit relations between teachers and students. It is what often happens. When the leaders of a Waldorf school gain knowledge of misconduct, they often respond by using it as leverage to control colleagues. I twice heard the stories of colleagues who were directed to one of the members of the College of Teachers (steering committee) of the school, to whom they confessed grave professional misconduct in their dealings with students (the teacher dating a student since she was in Third). No reprimand resulted, but they knew that the leaders of the school now possessed their secret and could use it against them if necessary. Criminal behavior by teachers was accepted within the pupil-teacher organization of the school, and it became leverage for the leaders. For what could be more intimidating than a fault that the leaders know about but choose to "keep under the table"?

— Grégoire Perra. "The Anthroposophical Indoctrination of Students in Steiner-Waldorf Schools".

[See "He Went to Waldorf".]

Whether Perra's comments apply to the situation at Kings Langley remains to be seen. We will follow future news reports.

It would seem that the school in Kings Langley should be able to resolve its difficulties, at least sufficiently to satisfy the Ofsted inspectors. But so far, this does not seem to be the case.

— R.R.

April 25, 2018

A STEINER SCHOOL

SATISFIES AN INSPECTOR

From The Hereford Times [Hereford, UK]:

Steiner school keeps good Ofsted rating

[by] Rebecca Cain

A STEINER school in Much Dewchurch has maintained its good Ofsted [Office for Standards in Education] rating.

An Ofsted Inspector visited Hereford Steiner Academy in March for a short inspection after the school was judged to be good in July 2013.

The inspector said the school continued to be good and said "leaders seek continuously to make the school the best it can be”….

In 2008, the school became the first Steiner Waldorf school in the UK to become a state-funded academy.

The inspector said leaders have worked with the local authority to review the strength of the school’s safeguarding arrangements and the policy now fully reflects current government guidance.

Ms Hayes said weaknesses in the system remain which, while these do not put pupils at risk, mean that essential information is not readily available to those who may need it.

[4/25/2018      http://www.herefordtimes.com/news/16182156.Steiner_school_keeps_good_Ofsted_rating/]

Waldorf Watch Response:

While one major Steiner school in the UK has made news by failing to satisfy Ofsted standards [see, e.g., news accounts from April 19 and April 14], the Hereford Steiner Academy demonstrates that Ofsted inspections need not represent an insuperable barrier. Much depends, of course, on the thoroughness of the inspection in each case.

Whether Steiner or Waldorf schools should accept state funding and submit to state-defined standards has been a controversial issue within the Steiner/Waldorf movement. Some proponents of the movement fear that the unique characteristics of Steiner education will be eroded in the effort to satisfy educational authorities. Becoming a "free school" in the UK or a "charter school" in the USA may mean submitting to standards and rules that would undermine the Steiner approach.

A formal inspection or even an informal visit by outsiders can be a cause for worry within the Steiner/Waldorf movement. The problem has been felt within the movement from the beginning. At the first Waldorf school, founder Rudolf Steiner sweated out various inspections. As he said during one faculty meeting:

"Yesterday, I was sitting on pins and needles worrying that the visitors would think the history class was too religious. We should not allow the history class to be too religiously oriented. That is why we have a religion class. The visitors seem to have been very well-meaning people. Nevertheless, had they noticed that, they could easily have categorized the Waldorf School as being too anthroposophical and of bringing that into the classroom.” — Rudolf Steiner, FACULTY MEETINGS WITH RUDOLF STEINER (Anthroposophic Press, 1998), p. 655.

Steiner often claimed that the Waldorf school did not teach the students Anthroposophy, and this claim is often repeated by spokespeople for the movement today, applying it to Steiner and Waldorf schools generally. But Rudolf Steiner's words, above, do not actually support this denial. Steiner was not worried that the visitors would see that a Waldorf history class was imbued with Anthroposophy; he worried that they would think it was imbued with too much Anthroposophy. This is quite different. Steiner was implicitly acknowledging that classes in a Waldorf school will be Anthroposophical to at least some degree.

On other occasions, Steiner was even more open (with his teachers, in a meeting closed to outsiders) about the importance of Anthroposophy in Waldorf education. Thus, for instance, he said this:

“The older students often mentioned that we emphasize that the Waldorf School is not to be an anthroposophical school. That is one of the questions we need to handle very seriously. You need to make the children aware that they are receiving the objective truth, and if this occasionally appears anthroposophical, it is not anthroposophy that is at fault. Things are that way because anthroposophy has something to say about objective truth. It is the material that causes what is said to be anthroposophical. We certainly may not go to the other extreme, where people would say that anthroposophy may not be brought into the school. Anthroposophy will be in the school when it is objectively justified, that is, when it is called for by the material itself.” — Rudolf Steiner, FACULTY MEETINGS WITH RUDOLF STEINER, p. 495.

Anthroposophy "will be in the school," Steiner says. When will it be present? "[W]hen it is called for by the material itself.” In other words, whenever Anthroposophists think their belief system has something "objective" to say about any given subject, then Anthroposophy will be brought into the classroom. And, given that Anthroposophists think their belief system contains the ultimate truth about all subjects, this means Anthroposophy will be brought into the classroom on a regular basis. [Concerning the universal applicability of Anthroposophy, see, e.g., "Everything".] Of course, not all Waldorf teachers are Anthroposophists, but a great many are, and Steiner said that they all should be:

"As Waldorf teachers, we must be true anthroposophists in the deepest sense of the word in our innermost feeling.” — Rudolf Steiner, FACULTY MEETINGS WITH RUDOLF STEINER, p. 118.

Steiner did not require Waldorf teachers to leave Anthroposophy at the door before entering the classroom. Instead, he instructed them to frame Anthroposphy in terms children can understand. So, for instance, he said the following to one Waldorf teacher:

“The problem you have is that you have not always followed the directive to bring what you know anthroposophically into a form you can present to little children. You have lectured the children about anthroposophy when you told them about your subject. You did not transform anthroposophy into a child’s level.” — Rudolf Steiner, FACULTY MEETINGS WITH RUDOLF STEINER, pp. 402-403.

Anthroposophy is present in any genuine Steiner or Waldorf school — that is, it is present in any school that follows Rudolf Steiner's directives. Anthroposophy is brought into the Steiner/Waldorf classroom "when it is objectively justified." It is brought into the classroom in "a form you can present to little children," a form that transforms "anthroposophy into a child’s level.” Anthroposophy may be toned down; it may even be hidden from prying eyes. But it will be present. "We certainly may not go to the other extreme, where people would say that anthroposophy may not be brought into the school. Anthroposophy will be in the school...."

The pervasive presence of an occult belief system in Steiner/Waldorf schools may, indeed, cause difficulties during inspections and visits by outsiders.

As for Ofsted safeguarding requirements, these are hardly onerous. Here is how they are summarized in an official Ofsted document:

"Ofsted uses definitions of the term ‘safeguarding’ from statutory guidance.

"Safeguarding children is defined in Working together to safeguard children as:

"• protecting children from maltreatment

"• preventing impairment of children’s health or development

"• ensuring that children are growing up in circumstances consistent with the provision of safe and effective care

"• taking action to enable all children to have the best outcomes" — Guidance, OFSTED SAFEGUARDING POLICY, updated 8 March 2018.

We should hope that any school, Steiner or otherwise, would be able to meet these minimal, clearly sensible standards. The question regarding Steiner/Waldorf schools becomes whether any of the doctrines or practices of Anthroposophy are injurious, or whether the general effort to lure kids toward Anthroposophy may injure them. [For more on these matters, see, e.g., "Slaps", "Extremity", "Indoctrination", and "Who Gets Hurt".]

— R.R.

April 27, 2018

A STEINER SCHOOL ON THE 

NEW OFSTED WARNING LIST

The United Kingdom's Office for Standards in Education (Ofsted) has sent out a new batch of warnings to private schools that have been found deficit in various ways. A Steiner school in London is included on the list. 

Whereas a Steiner school in Kings Langley has been threatened with closure by Ofsted, the situation in the London school seems less dire — the problems there would seem to be fairly easy to rectify.

From Schools Week [UK]:

Safeguarding, fire safety and segregation: 

Ofsted releases 28 new private school warning notices 

[by] Alix Robertson, Pippa Allen-Kinross/

The government has published the latest batch of warning notices issued to underperforming private schools…. 

The latest round covers 28 schools from around the country which were issued with notices in November 2017, reflecting the government’s recent push to take a tougher line with failing private schools…. 

[An] investigation uncovered 110 statutory improvement notices handed to private schools over a 16-month period. It also revealed that during that time, private schools had breached the minimum independent school regulations 410 times…. 

The bad, the worse, and the ugly

…The London Steiner School lacked suitable drinking water facilities and had not ensured all staff preparing food must were trained in food hygiene. 

[4/27/2018     https://schoolsweek.co.uk/safeguarding-fire-safety-and-segregation-ofsted-releases-28-new-private-school-warning-notices/] 

For information about the difficulties at the Rudolf Steiner School Kings Langley, see, e.g., news accounts from April 19 and April 14, 2018.

The problems at that school have not yet been resolved, although the Steiner Waldorf movement is evidently making a concerted effort to save what has been one of their flagship schools. See, e.g., a report last September at the Quackometer Blog: "The Rudolf Steiner School Kings Langley’s Fight For Existence":

"...To show that the school is committed to change, it is taking on a new headmaster, probably from another Steiner School, and appointing new trustees. All this change should have been done months ago after the first inspection failures and now looks like shutting the barn door a little too late. But the future of the Steiner movement in education in the UK is at stake here."

[9/5/2017   http://www.quackometer.net/blog/2017/09/the-rudolf-steiner-school-kings-langleys-fight-for-existence.html]

Steiner or Waldorf schools sometimes overlook basic safety measures — their focus is on other, "higher" issues, specifically the spiritual beliefs of their faith, Anthroposophy. In these schools, there is often belief that students will be adequately protected by their guardian angels — teachers and school staff needn't be overly concerned. Also, there is a presumption that the students should enact their karmas — teachers and staff should not, as a rule, interfere. If a child's destiny is to undergo certain trials in this life (such as becoming ill), the experience will accrue to the child's longterm benefit. [See, e.g., "Serving the Gods", "Slaps", and "Karma".]

But practical considerations, specifically keeping a Waldorf or Steiner school in operation, can force the school's hand.

— R.R.

April 28, 2018

TROUBLES AT KINGS LANGLEY —

WORSE THAN THOUGHT?

The Rudolf Steiner School in Kings Langley has been ordered closed by UK education authorities. Despite the school's efforts to save itself, the problems there apparently continue with little sign of relief. Here are excerpts from a news item in  The Hemel Gazette [Johnson Publishing, UK], interspersed with a few comments from Waldorf Watch: 

£750k shortfall, 3 sets of lawyers, 

and a wall of silence from 

Rudolf Steiner School in Kings Langley

by Ben Raza

A private school which has been threatened with closure by the government has had to ask parents for money.

It is understood the funds are required in order to remain open next year.

Rudolf Steiner School in Kings Langley is appealing for cash donations, loans, or for parents to pay their yearly fees early.

And they are also asking if parents can offer other help, such as voluntary work to help with legal advice, financial work, fundraising, or “educational leadership”.

The school is said to be hoping to raise £750,000 from parents, who were asked for the donations in a meeting on Wednesday April 18.

Officials at the school are evidently keeping mum. Interim principal Tim Byford recently agreed to an interview with the Gazette, but then he backed out.  

[Mr. Bydford] instead emailed a statement which praised the “beautiful singing” of staff at last week’s meeting.

It said: “We had a massive turn out by parents, staff and RSSKL [Rudolf  Steiner School Kings Langley] Association members at the whole school meeting. The meeting opened with some beautiful singing by staff.”

The £9,875-a-year school which has been threatened with closure by the government declined to answer questions from the Gazette this week.

One of the primary defensive efforts being taken by the school is to load up with lawyers. The school is reported to have hired three legals teams to help in its effort to reverse the government’s closure order. 

Three separate legal firms have been employed by the school, including the firm which represented Princess Diana in her divorce from the Prince of Wales, in their efforts to stay open….

By some indications, the problems at the school may be worse than previous news accounts indicated. 

The latest inspection report from Ofsted [Office for Standards in Education] has now been released, and is worse than previously thought.

Two weeks ago the Gazette reported on the latest visit from the school inspection body, which took place in February. At the time that report was not publicly available, but it was believed that only safeguarding was criticised.

However, it is now clear that Ofsted also stated standards were not met in ‘Quality of education’, and in ‘Quality of leadership in and management of schools’.

About quality of education, the report says: “Not all teachers planned lessons in line with leaders’ expectations. For example, they did not consider carefully enough the needs of pupils who have additional learning needs. 

“Work was frequently unchallenging and teachers’ assessment of the progress made by pupils was still in its infancy.”

[4/28/2018    https://www.hemeltoday.co.uk/news/750k-shortfall-3-sets-of-lawyers-and-a-wall-of-silence-from-rudolf-steiner-school-in-kings-langley-1-8478872   This story originally appeared on April 27.]

For prior coverage of the situation the Rudolf Steiner School in Kings Langley, see, e.g., Waldorf Watch accounts from April 19 and April 14, 2018.

For an overview of academic standards at Steiner or Waldorf schools, see "Academic Standards at Waldorf". Having their eyes on the spirit realm, Steiner/Waldorf teachers often give low priority to education in the normal sense — that is, they downplay knowledge and brainwork. Thus, for instance:

“The success of Waldorf Education...can be measured in the life force attained. Not acquisition of knowledge and qualifications, but the life force is the ultimate goal of this school.” — Anthroposophist Peter Selg, THE ESSENCE OF WALDORF EDUCATION (SteinerBooks, 2010)‚ p. 30.

“[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.

“A Waldorf school is...an organization that seeks to allow the spiritual impulses of our time to manifest on earth in order to transform society ... [I]t strives to bring the soul-spiritual into the realm of human life.” — Waldorf teacher Roberto Trostli, “On Earth as It Is in Heaven”, Research Bulletin, Vol. 16 (Waldorf Research Institute), Fall 2011, pp. 21-24.

Overall, Waldorf schooling stands in opposition to "fact-based [i.e., knowledge-based] education." — Waldorf teacher Jack Petrash, UNDERSTANDING WALDORF EDUCATION (Gryphon House, 2002), p. 26.

Evidently RSSKL has decided to fight the education authorities in court rather than take the opportunity to make genuine improvements in the school's practices. This strategy may seal the school's fate. But, then, making real improvements might require the school to adopt (or pretend to adopt) a philosophy of education that would violate basic Anthroposophical dogma. 

— R.R.

May 2, 2018

THREATENED STEINER SCHOOL 

PLANS FOR A DOUBTFUL FUTURE 

From The Hemel Gazette [Johnson Publishing, UK]:

New principal revealed for troubled 

Rudolf Steiner School Kings Langley 

[by] Ben Raza 

A private school which is under threat of closure by the government has appointed its first-ever permanent principal. 

Martin Blain will take up the role full-time at Rudolf Steiner School in Kings Langley from August....

Mr Blain said...“I am completely committed to the Steiner Waldorf Education model and my aim is for this to be seen as the perfect place to learn.”

But not everyone was convinced by the appointment, as Mr Blain is best known for his time as headteacher of a new free school, where he left before the school had even opened its doors to students.

One insider, who asked not to be named, said: “We did wonder who they would get to come into a school like Rudolf Steiner, which has so many problems.

“But perhaps Mr Blain is a bit desperate too....” 

Martin Blain made national headlines during his time at Harperbury Free School, near Radlett. 

The project went through a troubled gestation, and opened a year later than was originally planned after a failure to secure a site in time. 

When a site was secured in November 2014 Mr Blain then left one day later “by mutual consent”....

[5/2/2018   https://www.hemeltoday.co.uk/news/new-principal-revealed-for-troubled-rudolf-steiner-school-kings-langley-1-8482930   This story originally appeared on May 1.]

Waldorf Watch Response:

Rudolf Steiner School Kings Langley (RSSKL) has not given up its struggle for survival. It is appealing the government's closure order, and it has now chosen a principal officer to lead it into the future. 

Watching the unfolding drama in coming weeks and months should be fascinating. RSSKL has failed a number of official inspections. Revelations from the inspections indicate that the problems at the school are broad and deep. [See, e.g., Waldorf Watch accounts from April 28, 19, and 14, 2018.]

The new principal professes complete commitment to Steiner education, although his background is elsewhere. Whether the school and/or the new principal are "desperate" is perhaps unknowable, but certainly a crisis prevails. The key issue for RSSKL would seem to be whether to adhere faithfully to the practices and purposes of Waldorf education, or to accept the standards and requirements imposed by the government.

If it chooses the former course, it may go down fighting. If it chooses the latter, it may survive, but at the cost of altering the essential nature of the school.

The appointment of a leader from outsider the Steiner movement suggests that the latter course may be contemplated.

(If the school survives, and if government scrutiny is eased eventually, the school might be able to veer back toward its Anthroposophical roots at some point in the future. Perhaps at least some of the RSSKL faculty have such a possibility in mind.)

— R.R.

May 9, 2018

STEINER SCHOOL 

TRYING TO STAY ALIVE 

The struggling Steiner school in Kings Langley, UK, declares that it will remain open at least for the beginning of the coming fall term. Beyond that, however, it can make no promises. The government's Office for Standars in Educations (Ofsted) has ordered the school to cease operations.

The following is from The Hemel Gazette [Johnson Publishing, UK]:

Rudolf Steiner bosses say that 

school is “highly likely” to remain open 

throughout 2018-19 - 

and blame falling student numbers 

[on] Ofsted reports and bad press

By Ben Raza

Bosses at Rudolf Steiner School [in Kings Langley] say the school WILL be open when the next academic year starts – but that there are “no guarantees” it will remain so. 

Student numbers have fallen by almost a fifth at Rudolf Steiner School since the safeguarding saga began. 

In March 2015 the Kings Langley School had 387 students. 

But by February 2018 that had fallen to 334. 

And the school expects that figure to have fallen to 315 when the next academic year begins in September.... 

A school spokesman...blamed the falling pupil numbers primarily on the repeated problems with Ofsted inspections, and with negative media coverage. 

A series of inspections have criticised the school, culminating with the government threatening to close the school altogether. Another Ofsted inspection is expected during the summer term. 

The school is currently appealing against [the closure order].... 

[5/9/2018   https://www.hemeltoday.co.uk/news/rudolf-steiner-bosses-say-that-school-is-highly-likely-to-remain-open-throughout-2018-19-and-blame-falling-student-numbers-of-ofsted-reports-and-bad-press-1-8482936   This story originally appeared on May 1; notification did not reach Waldorf Watch until May 9.]

For previous coverage of the situation at the Rudolf Steiner School Kings Langley, see news accounts from May 2, April 28, April 19, and April 14, 2018.

May 30, 2018

NEARING THE END?  

OMINOUS EMAIL

Some Steiner schools in the UK receive favorable inspection reports. But following a series of failed inspections, the Rudolf Steiner School Kings Langley appears to be on the ropes. The following is from The Watford Observer [Hertfordshire, UK]:

Rudolf Steiner School 

in Kings Langley 

could close in July

[by] Nathan Louis

A troubled school has revealed to parents for the first time that the school could close this summer.

Parents at Rudolf Steiner School in Kings Langley [RSSKL] were sent an email at the end of last week which stated that the school could be forced to shut in July if new insurers are not found.

The email also comes off the the back of news that the private school has failed another Ofsted inspection.

Inspectors visited the school in Langley Hill on May 10 this month but key findings revealed that safeguarding of pupils and quality of teaching remain not met....

The letter written on behalf of the school's trustees, said: "The school’s insurers have indicated that they will not be in a position to insure the school after the current period expires at the end of July. Alternative insurance options are being sought as a matter of urgency. A school cannot operate without insurance so this may prove the decisive factor. If new insurance is not found, this will render the tribunal process irrelevant and the school will have to close...."

The trustees are calling an emergency general meeting of the RSSKL Association which will be held on June 5 at 6.30pm....

[5/30/2018    http://www.watfordobserver.co.uk/news/16258780.Private_school_could_shut_in_July/]

Waldorf Watch Response:

Rudolf Steiner School Kings Langley — one of the leading Steiner schools in the UK — has been fighting hard to stay alive. It has retained top-flight legal counsel and it has instituted various other measures. But today, apparently, it is staring into the abyss.

We might expect that, with its survival at stake, the school would take advantage of failed inspections to make needed changes — in reality or at least in appearance. But evidently it has not yet succeeded in doing so. Perhaps this will change.

The school's inability to get insurance is a new, ominous wrinkle. If insurers decide the school is an unacceptable risk (as apparently they have now done), the end may indeed be near, no matter what other steps the school takes.

For previous coverage of events at RSSKL, see Waldorf Watch news items dated May 9,  May 2, April 28, April 19, and April 14, 2018. 

I will report further developments as they occur.

— R.R.

May 31, 2018

NEARING THE END?  

(CONTINUED)

The travails of the Rudolf Steiner School in Kings Langley, UK, have be developing for months. Yesterday we looked at a report from The Watford Observer. Here are excerpts from an article in The Hemel Gazette [Johnson Publishing, UK]. This article provides some additional information — and perhaps some corrections — to what we saw yesterday.

I have added some footnotes that may be informative.

Controversial Rudolf Steiner School 

set to close this summer?

by Ben Raza

A troubled school has admitted to parents for the first time that it could close before the start of the next school year. Rudolf Steiner School in Kings Langley has emailed parents after suffering a double blow, with another failed Ofsted [1] inspection plus the school’s struggles to find insurance after July....

Problems at Rudolf Steiner School date back to March 2016, leading to government threats to close the school. [2] But while school leaders are appealing against those moves they have long claimed to be confident that the school would remain open. This is the most explicit admission that Rudolf Steiner could be forced to close imminently.... 

[The] latest Ofsted inspection took place on May 10 and was the sixth visit over the last 18 months. [3] The report says the school has failed to meet the necessary standards for safeguarding, handling of complaints, and quality of leadership. [4]

And it says that the school’s leaders have “potentially put pupils at risk” with their recruitment policies. 

Criticisms include: “The lack of rigour and inaccurate recording amount to more than administrative errors. 

“They are indicative of leaders’ continuing failure to take their responsibilities seriously. 

“Despite intensive training and previous inspection findings over a long period, staff continue to make the same mistakes....” [5]

Last week the Gazette exclusively reported Rudolf Steiner’s problems getting insurance for 2018-19. 

Now the school have told parents that this may prove to be the “decisive factor....” [6]

[5/31/2018    https://www.hemeltoday.co.uk/news/controversial-rudolf-steiner-school-set-to-close-this-summer-1-8514635    This story originally appeared on May 29.]

Waldorf Watch Footnotes:

[1]  This is the UK government's Office for Standards in Education. The office describes itself this way: 

"Ofsted is the Office for Standards in Education, Children’s Services and Skills. We inspect and regulate services that care for children and young people, and services providing education and skills for learners of all ages." [See https://www.gov.uk/government/organisations/ofsted/about.]

[2] See, e.g., Waldorf Watch news items dated May 9,  May 2, April 28, April 19, and April 14, 2018.

[3] The article in The Watford Observer indicated that there had been four inspections since December, 2016. [See the Waldorf Watch news item for May 30, 2018.]

[4] Although Steiner/Waldorf schools generally attempt to provide a safe environment for students, several factors may militate against achieving this objective. [See, e.g., "Slaps" and "Extremity".] According to the Steiner/Waldorf belief system, students need to be free to enact their karmas. Moreover, there is a belief that guardian angels usually provide all the protection children need. Beliefs of this sort may lead to laxity on the part of Steiner/Waldorf faculty. [See the entries for "karma" and "guardian angels" in The Brief Waldorf / Steiner Encyclopedia.]

Leadership in Steiner/Waldorf schools may likewise be complicated by the schools' belief system. Often, Steiner/Waldorf schools attempt to operate collegially, with little or no clear lines of authority or leadership. Organizational confusion can result. [See, e.g., "My Life Among the Anthroposophists - Part 2".] Moreover, the chief criterion for hiring of facutly and staff is often allegiance to Anthroposophy (the Steiner/Waldorf belief system), not proven competence to fill a specific position. Teachers are often hired principally because they embrace Rudolf Steiner's doctrines. 

"Waldorf teachers must be anthroposophists first and teachers second." — Waldorf teacher Gilbert Childs, STEINER EDUCATION IN THEORY AND PRACTICE (Floris Books, 1991), p. 166. 

[See, e.g., "Here's the Answer".] 

If a school is run by a disorganized group of teachers whose primary qualification is that they are Anthroposophists, leadership problems may become inevitable.

Even when a Steiner/Waldorf school adopts a conventional organizational structure, difficulties may arise if the "leaders" have their eyes primarily on the spirit realm (as conceived in Anthroposophy), not on the requirements of the present world or the society in which a school exists. Faculty and staff at Steiner/Waldorf schools often feel that they serve a higher purpose and higher laws, so they may operate as if ordinary rules and regulations do not apply to them. The consequences for the educational success of a Steiner/Waldorf school may be severe. [See, e.g., "Academic Standards at Waldorf".] 

“Waldorf education is a form of practical anthroposophy ... The first Waldorf School had formidable growing pains and internal dissensions, and Steiner died while it was still in the midst of them ... Learning about all the good things that may be expected to happen in a Waldorf School is a relatively easy task. Coping with the way things actually turn out is more difficult.” — Waldorf teacher Keith Francis, THE EDUCATION OF A WALDORF TEACHER (iUniverse, 2004), pp. xii-xiii. [See "His Education".]

[5] Steiner/Waldorf teachers often find themselves in a bind. Their practices derive principally from Rudolf Steiner and his teachings, and as such these practices are deemed virtually sacrosanct. They cannot be changed — or any changes must be slight. However, as judged by outside authorities, Steiner/Waldorf practices may often be judged as errors. When Steiner/Waldorf teachers persist in these "errors," they may seem obdurate, even perversely resistant to correction. But from a Steiner/Waldorf perspective, these teachers may be simply upholding established, and honored, traditions.

Thus, in at least some cases, Steiner/Waldorf teachers may fail to learn from inspectors because they fundamentally disagree with the inspectors. Of course, in other cases, Steiner/Waldorf teachers — like most human beings — may simply be stuck in their habits and within the limits of their capacities.

[6] To operate legally in the UK, a school must have insurance. If the school in Kings Langley loses its insurance and is unable to secure new coverage, it will be required to shut down.

— R.R.

June 6, 2018

MANY PROBLEMS; 

CONSISTENT FAILINGS 

From The Hemel Gazette [Johnson Publishing, UK]: Here's the latest on the travails at the Rudolf Steiner School in Kings Langley. The UK's Office for Standards in Education has ordered the school to close following a series of failed inspections.

Rudolf Steiner School meeting: 

Parents told “Hope for the best 

but prepare for the worst”

By Ben Raza

Parents were told there are “lots and lots of problems” at an emotional meeting [sic] on Monday night at Rudolf Steiner School Kings Langley. 

At the special meeting parents were given an update on the £9,857-a-year school which could be forced to close. 

Around 150 people were at the meeting, where trustees discussed the government’s moves to close to school as well as the possibility that it will be forced to close if it cannot get insurance for the next school year. 

Chair of the trustees, Peter Harrington, told the meeting there was no single issue or member of staff which was to blame for the school’s plight, but that it was “consistent failings across a range of issues”. 

He said...“There are lots and lots of problems at the school.”

Trustees said that the school is “close to completion” on a corporate loan to secure the school’s medium-term future....

Parent trustee Laurence Chester...struck one of the most downbeat notes of the evening, telling parents to “hope for the best but prepare for the worst.” 

After admitting that school bosses had been “divided” he said: “We have a responsibility to be very clear about the extremely high level of risk that we feel the school to be at. To give any other impression would be to mislead you....”

[6/6/2018 https://www.hemeltoday.co.uk/news/rudolf-steiner-school-meeting-parents-told-hope-for-the-best-but-prepare-for-the-worst-1-8522873 This story originally appeared on June 5.]

For previous coverage of the situation at the Rudolf Steiner School Kings Langley, see Waldorf Watch news items dated May 31, May 30, May 9, May 2, April 28, April 19, and April 14, 2018.

— R.R.

June 19, 2018

CONCLUSION IN   

KINGS LANGLEY   

The story of the Rudolf Steiner School Kings Langley, in the UK, appears to be coming to an end. Here are two new reports:

From The Hemel Gazette [Johnson Publishing, UK]:

Rudolf Steiner School 

Kings Langley 

set to close

By Ben Raza

A troubled private school is set to close this summer. 

The Rudolf Steiner School in Kings Langley, which charges up to £9,857 a year, made the announcement to students on Saturday.

In an email sent to parents, the trustees wrote: “…[The school’s] Association has completed its extraordinary general meeting … A decision was taken to move towards a managed voluntary closure … [T]he school is likely to be closed at the end of this summer term. The trustees...are currently reviewing options for education alternatives in September … [T]he school will be closing….”

…The trustees say that the decision “balances the interest of pupils, parents and staff within the existing financial means of the school”.

[6/19/2018   https://www.hemeltoday.co.uk/news/exclusive-rudolf-steiner-school-kings-langley-set-to-close-1-8536995   This story originally appeared on June 18.]

From the The Watford Observer [Hertfordshire, UK]:

Rudolf Steiner School 

in Kings Langley 

to shut

A troubled private school is closing down.

Rudolf Steiner in Kings Langley failed its safeguarding inspection last year after it was found that stuff "put pupils at risk." 

Terry Douris, cabinet member for education, said: “Hertfordshire County Council is sorry to learn that Rudolf Steiner School in Kings Langley will be closing and we appreciate that this must be an anxious time for all families. 

"To this end, we have provided the school with a letter for all parents and carers to offer assistance in finding an alternative state funded school place in Hertfordshire for all those who require one. 

“We have assured them that there are currently sufficient school places in the locality to ensure a place for every child....”

The [school's] Trustees sent an e-mail to parents informing them of the closure.

It said it made the decision after its extraordinary meeting this morning.

"A decision was taken to move towards a managed voluntary closure of the current educational setting,” it said.....

[6/19/2018 http://www.watfordobserver.co.uk/news/16297156.Troubled_private_school_to_shut/   This story originally appeared on June 18.]

Waldorf Watch Response:

A long struggle seems to be finally ending. 

Following a series of mostly failed inspections, the Rudolf Steiner School Kings Langley had been ordered to close. The order came from the government's Office for Standards in Education (Ofsted).

The school fought to stay alive, hiring several law firms to protect its interests. But the effort came to little. Families began withdrawing their children from the school, there was turmoil and turnover among faculty and staff, a new Ofsted inspection confirmed earlier adverse findings, and eventually insurance companies refused to underwrite the school's continued functioning. The "managed voluntary closure" — hardly, in truth, voluntary — is the upshot.

The email message sent to parents indicates that the school's trustees hope to hold the local Steiner community together, and it raises the possibility that some new form of Steiner education may arise in the area. But all of this is, at present, nebulous.

For previous coverage of the situation at the Rudolf Steiner School Kings Langley, see Waldorf Watch news items dated June 6, May 31, May 30, May 9, May 2, April 28, April 19, and April 14, 2018.

June 20, 2018

RAMIFICATIONS OF 

FAILURE

The Hemel Gazette [Johnson Publishing, UK] has several stories today dealing with the collapse of the Rudolf Steiner School Kings Langley (RSSKL).

The impending closure of RSSKL will initially have its greatest impact in the local region of Hertfordshire. But larger ramifications will likely follow. RSSKL has been one of the leading Steiner schools in the UK. The failure of this school may have significant consequences for the Steiner movement generally.

Here are some excerpts from today's reports in The Hemel Gazette:

Three main factors have caused the closure of the school, although [the school's] bosses have not said which was decisive.

The school was appealing against moves by the government to close it, following a series of critical inspections which highlighted various failings, including leadership and safeguarding.

In addition the school had been unable to secure insurance for the next school year. 

Finally, the school was under significant financial pressures. Falling student numbers threatened the school’s viability, and there was also a six-figure pension deficit.… 

This week the school refused to say how many parents had paid their fees early, or made loans and donations, or how much money was offered by other organisations. 

The school also declined to say what would now be done with this money....

[https://www.hemeltoday.co.uk/news/rudolf-steiner-school-kings-langley-is-closing-the-full-story-1-8539979]

The SIS [School Inspection Service] visited in March 2015 and found that safeguarding requirements were “fully met”, although some other areas such as leadership, management, and health and safety did require improvements. 

An unannounced inspection by the SIS in November 2015 found that some of these issues had been tackled — but not the key issues of leadership, management, and health and safety. 

RSSKL was then told to create an action plan to deal with these issues, which was sent to the government. But the government rejected this plan, and then a second revised plan too.

[https://www.hemeltoday.co.uk/news/rudolf-steiner-school-kings-langley-is-closing-why-weren-t-the-school-s-issues-discovered-earlier-1-8540098]

Herts County Council say that there are “sufficient” school places “in the locality” that all 330 RSSKL students will be able to go to a Hertfordshire school next year. 

Unfortunately the very late closure, and a lack of places, mean that students may not be able to go to their nearest school or their preferred school.…

[https://www.hemeltoday.co.uk/news/rudolf-steiner-school-kings-langley-is-closing-what-next-for-the-school-s-students-1-8540089]

It is believed that the current school site will not see new homes built on it — but the school did not confirm whether there is a covenant placed on the grounds. 

In an email to parents the school has raised several possibilities, including “an early years Waldorf centre, possible home schooling, or a new school”. 

However, when asked by the Gazette the school neither confirmed nor denied whether a covenant or other legal restriction was in place.…

[https://www.hemeltoday.co.uk/news/rudolf-steiner-school-kings-langley-is-closing-what-will-happen-to-the-school-s-grounds-1-8540093]

A former RSSKL student told the Gazette of his sadness at the school’s fate.

Tome Morrissy-Swan, who works as a journalist for the Daily Telegraph, was at the school until 2011. His mother also works at the school....

He said: “What I liked most at the school, particularly when I was younger, was that I wasn’t force-fed academic subjects from a young age....

“I’d learned to read before I went to school, but I imagine that other students would have liked that experience to play a lot more...."

[https://www.hemeltoday.co.uk/news/rudolf-steiner-school-kings-langley-is-closing-former-student-praises-his-time-at-the-school-1-8540066]

One parent of a present RSSKL student, who asked not to be named, said there were many unanswered questions which had left her furious. 

She told the Gazette: “Why were parents not warned at an earlier stage about the potential insurance problem? This would have been especially important for all those who are now in the middle of their GCSE or A levels! 

“Why were parents discouraged from discussing the issue of law firms being employed by the school? And why were parents told that the school’s leadership was prepared for a tribunal when they did not have the resources to pay for it? 

“I feel betrayed and I am afraid that the school was NOT open and honest with parents....”

[https://www.hemeltoday.co.uk/news/rudolf-steiner-school-kings-langley-is-closing-parent-speaks-of-betrayal-and-unanswered-questions-1-8540102]

June 23, 2018

◊ EDITORIAL ◊

KINGS LANGLEY'S 

KARMA

What can we learn from the failure of the Rudolf Steiner School Kings Langley (RSSKL)? What does the RSSKL story mean for other Steiner or Waldorf schools?

Proponents of Steiner education will doubtless contend that the authorities mistreated RSSKL. They will say that the government's judgments about the school were unfair and uninformed. They will say the school was not guilty of all the shortcomings and faults attributed to it. They will say that the school did not deserve most of the censure it received.

Then again, if any proponents concede that there may have been a few real problems at RSSKL, they will argue that these problems were confined to RSSKL itself. They will say that no larger conclusions should be drawn about Steiner or Waldorf education generally.

The truth, however, appears to be different. The guidelines upheld by the UK government's Office for Standards in Education (Ofsted) appear to be both sensible and fair. [1] Like all bureaucracies, Ofsted surely is imperfect, and its procedures — like those of most bureaucracies — may sometimes be maddening. [2] But virtually any well-run school should be able to satisfy Ofsted's requirements, which are by no means excessively prescriptive or onerous. Indeed, the UK government has gone out of its way to be accommodating to Steiner education, welcoming Steiner schools and Steiner initiatives into the "free schools" program. [3]

The problems found or alleged at RSSKL in fact reflect conditions that seem to be systemic throughout Steiner or Waldorf education.

The allegation against RSSKL that has received the most publicity is that the school failed to adequately assure the safety of its students. [4] This allegation must, at first glance, seem extraordinary. Steiner schools are known for their apparently warm and nurturing atmosphere; the students would seem to be secure within a protective embrace. And yet, over the years, there have been many reports of abusive and unsafe practices in Steiner schools. [5] Often, such practices result from a belief in karma — individuals must be permitted to enact their karmas, even if this means engaging in, or condoning, dangerous activities. [6] 

RSSKL has also been charged with mismanagement and faulty governance. This, too, appears to reflect systemic faults found throughout the Steiner or Waldorf movement. [7] The organizational principles laid down by Rudolf Steiner often result in various degrees of disorganization. [8]

To the extent that RSSKL may be considered academically deficient, this problem has often been alleged concerning other Steiner or Waldorf schools. [9] Steiner schools are not, in fact, primarily concerned with educating children in any ordinary sense; they do not principally endeavor to convey knowledge to children. The Steiner focus is directed elsewhere. [10]

There have been allegations that RSSKL has been secretive and deceptive. Again, such allegations have often been leveled at other Steiner or Waldorf schools. [11] Steiner education is based on Anthroposophy, the occult spiritual system developed by Rudolf Steiner. "Occult," in the sense Steiner used this term, means hidden or secret. [12] Anthroposophists believe that they possess deep spiritual wisdom that most other people cannot comprehend; indeed, they think they possess wisdom that must be kept hidden from the uninitiated. [13] Secrecy and deception are thus fundamental to the way Steiner's followers — including many teachers in Steiner schools — deal with outsiders.

Steiner's followers believe they are on a messianic mission. [14] Thus, for instance, Rudolf Steiner said the following to teachers at the first Waldorf school: 

“Among the faculty, we must certainly carry within us the knowledge that we are not here for our own sakes, but to carry out the divine cosmic plan. We should always remember that when we do something, we are actually carrying out the intentions of the gods, that we are, in a certain sense, the means by which that streaming down from above will go out into the world.” — Rudolf Steiner, FACULTY MEETINGS WITH RUDOLF STEINER (Anthroposophic Press, 1998), p. 55.

Because they conceive their task in such lofty terms, Steiner's followers are inclined to think that ordinary rules and regulations should not apply to them. They are above such things; they are on a holy mission. This sense of exceptionalism may easily lead to clashes or at least disagreements between Steiner representatives and outside authorities.

The collapse of the Rudolf Steiner School Kings Langley may pass without major consequences elsewhere. In retrospect, it may come to be seen as a minor blip in the history of Steiner education. But, on the other hand, the problems are RSSKL may shine a light into the dark recesses of many other Steiner and Waldorf schools. Anyone wanting to assess these schools — and any parents thinking of sending their children to these schools — would do well to learn the lessons provided by the demise of RSSKL.

[1] See, e.g., https://www.gov.uk/government/organisations/ofsted/about#our-priorities and https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/school-inspection-handbook.

[2] See, e.g., "How Would you improve Ofsted?"

[3] See, e.g., the discussion of free schools in "Coming Undone". 

Free schools are educational institutions that, in the USA, would be called charter schools.

[4] See Ofsted's description of its "safeguarding policy".

[5] See, e.g., "Slaps", "Extremity", and "Mistreating Kids Lovingly".

[6] See "Karma".

[7] See, e.g., "His Education" and "Coming Undone".

[8] For an introduction to these principles, see "Threefolding" and "Faculty Meetings".

[9] See, e.g. "Academic Standards at Waldorf".

[10] See, e.g., "Here's the Answer" and "Spiritual Agenda".

[11] See, e.g., "Secrets" and "Our Experience".

[12] See "Occultism".

[13] See, e.g., "Inside Scoop".

[14] See, e.g., the entry for "messianism" in The Brief Waldorf / Steiner Encyclopedia.

— R.R.

June 25, 2018

WALDORF GROWTH, 

WALDORF DECLINE 

Spokespeople for Waldorf schools often claim that theirs is the fastest growing independent school movement in the world. It is certainly true that new Waldorf schools are frequently opened here and there, in one form or another, in this country and in that.

On the other hand, some Waldorf schools collapse. They fall on hard times, they face tribulations, and they close their doors. The recently announced closure of the Rudolf Steiner School Kings Langley (RSSKL) is only one instance. Here are a few more, occurring in recent years, here and there, in this country and in that.

(Bear a few points in mind. Leaders of RSSKL have indicated that they hope to resurrect Steiner education in their community somehow, in some form, sometime. This is typical. Some Steiner or Waldorf schools die, while others only undergo near-death experiences. Sometimes a Waldorf school comes to the brink of extinction, but then it revives. At least some of the schools mentioned in the following list may have been reincarnated or otherwise saved, in some form. Bear in mind, too, that the following list is by no means a complete wrap-up. I am providing only examples that happened to come to my attention. Nonetheless, the following list indicates the turmoil that sometimes roils the placid-seeming Waldorf waters.)

The Canterbury Steiner School is to close

July 11, 2017

A cash-strapped Kent school has announced its closure citing financial difficulties.

The Canterbury Steiner School in Chartham, which had for long faced the possibility of closure, is due to close at the end of the year.

A spokesman for the independent day school, which admits pupils from three and up, said the news would be met by shock and sadness by all concerned.…

Thanking parents, teachers, ex-pupils, families and friends for supporting the school over the past 41 years, it added it would continue to provide a "nourishing and inspiring education" for the remaining year….

[http://www.kentlive.news/cash-strapped-kent-school-announces-shock-closure/story-30434719-detail/story.html]

Norwalk school closes abruptly 

due to lack of enrollment

September 2, 2016

Plagued by inadequate enrollment and financial difficulties, officials from the Clover Hill School in Norwalk announced Friday morning that the early childhood center will shut down by the end of the year.

Officials said classes would not resume in September as they proceed to shutter the center, which currently serves students from two months to six years of age.…

The school opened its doors in Norwalk in 2004 by a group dedicated to the Waldorf Education method of learning, which encompasses a play-based educational philosophy.

It was not immediately clear how many students were enrolled at the time of the announcement.

Clover Hill officials did not return calls made to the school…..

[http://www.thehour.com/news/article/Norwalk-school-closes-abruptly-due-to-lack-of-9200673.php]

Citing long list of violations, Northwestern Lehigh 

moves to close Circle of Seasons Charter School

May 5, 2016

The Northwestern Lehigh School District has started the process of shutting down Circle of Seasons Charter School, alleging a long list of violations including discouraging special education students from attending and failing to do mandated background checks on all staff.

Circle of Seasons, a school for students in kindergarten to fourth grade in Weisenberg Township, was seeking to renew its charter for five years, but the school board voted 6-3 last month to start the non-renewal process.

After a comprehensive review, the board said Circle of Seasons, which opened in 2013, violated a host of state and federal laws….

Circle of Seasons follows a Waldorf educational philosophy....

[http://www.mcall.com/news/local/northwestern/mc-northwestern-lehigh-circle-of-seasons-renewal-20160505-story.html   Note: Circle of Seasons fought off the closure order.]

Where's Waldorf? Goulbourn Street School 

Could Find New Life as Music Academy

April 11, 2016

Tucked away to the side of the Trans Canada Trail and currently unoccupied, it’s a school many residents may not even be aware ever existed. It’s been almost two years since any classes were held at the old Ottawa Waldorf School on Goulbourn Street….

More than 30 years after it first opened, the Waldorf School shut down in June of 2014 because of financial difficulties. An archived school newsletter indicated it was running deficits and was unable to pay its teachers. Another newsletter said the board had decided to close the school after years of declining enrolment….

[http://stittsvillecentral.ca/goulbourn-street-zida-academy-waldorf-school/]

Taos Waldorf School to close next year

December 28, 2015

The Taos Waldorf School will shut down after the end of the 2015-16 school year.…

The school has been through rough and unsustainable financial troubles in recent years.

According to publicly available tax filings from 2011-2013, it is clear Taos Waldorf School suffered dramatic swings in funding and ended up short on cash more than once….

Teacher salaries also fluctuated over the years….

No one from Taos Waldorf School could be reached for comment.

[https://taosnews.com/stories/taos-waldorf-school-to-close-next-year,27968]

Independent Aberdeen Waldorf School to close

April 2, 2014

An independent Aberdeen school which has been at the centre of an investigation is to close this summer.

The Waldorf School, in Craigton Road, was founded in 1977.

Last month, the Care Inspectorate said it had received complaints about "staffing and the care of children" at the Waldorf School Kindergarten.

The school council said the "very difficult" closure decision came after reviewing the school's financial position.…

[http://www.bbc.com/news/uk-scotland-north-east-orkney-shetland-26842547]

Waldorf School Closes

August 24, 2013

The financially struggling Wellspring Waldorf School has informed parents it will not reopen for the coming school year.

The school’s Board of Trustees made the decision Friday evening following an “emotional” closed door meeting….

At the end of last school year, Wellspring had an enrollment of about 60 students, down significantly from prior years….

[http://www.vnews.com/news/8188101-95/waldorf-school-closes]

Vacant Spaces: Waldorf School to Close 

Green Meadow Branch in Tarrytown

April 3, 2012

After one quiet but enriching school year here, the Green Meadow Waldorf School Early Childhood Center at Tappan Hill School….will not sign on for another year here.

“It is with regret, but also with much gratitude and appreciation for your support, that we share the news that we are closing the Green Meadow Waldorf School Early Childhood Center at Tappan Hill School in Tarrytown on June 9, 2012,” said the letter that came from Administrator Tari Steinrueck to parents and staff.

“The governing bodies of our school made the difficult decision to close the Tarrytown school after a great deal of deliberation, because we do not believe, given the extensive analysis we have done over the past 10 months, that it can fulfill its mission as a significant source of applicants to our first grade," Steinrueck wrote….

[http://patch.com/new-york/tarrytown/waldorf-school-to-close-green-meadow-branch-in-tarrytown]

The music stops for Singing Winds School

October 27, 2009

A small private school that offered a radically different approach to education has shut its doors this year the victim of a poor economy and a small enrollment. The Singing Winds School, a Waldorf school that had been renting space in the United Methodist Church of Riverside for the past two years, did not open its doors this fall and has closed….

With an enrollment of only about 30 kids in a program that went from early childhood education through eighth grade the school could not afford to pay the $3,000 monthly rent to the church and to pay its four teachers….

[http://www.rblandmark.com/News/Articles/10-27-2009/The-music-stops-for-Singing-Winds-School/]

Overall, the total number of Waldorf or Steiner schools worldwide has apparently been increasing during recent years. In this sense, the Waldorf movement is indeed growing. But the process has not been nearly as fast, nor nearly as inexorable, as Waldorf spokesfolks like to say. 

It remains to be seen whether the events at RSSKL will affect the rate of Waldorf openings — and closings — in the coming months and years.

[For more on the phenomenon of Waldorf failures, see "Failure".]

— R.R.

June 26, 2018

CONTINUED COVERAGE: 

FAILURE AT RSSKL 

From The Telegraph [United Kingdom]:

‘Rotten to the core’ flagship Steiner school 

to close, as it emerges concerned parents 

were sent gagging letters

By Camilla Turner, education editor 

A flagship Steiner school is to close amid fears over child safety, after it emerged that parents who tried to raise the alarm about safeguarding lapses had been sent gagging letters. 

The Rudolf Steiner School Kings Langley (RSSKL) has told parents that it will shut down at the end of this term, following a string of damning Ofsted reports [i.e., reports from the government's Office for Standards in Education].…

Parents have accused the school of attempting to "cover up" the full extent of its failings by trying to intimidate those who sought to voice their unease about the goings-on at the school.

When parents tried to raise concerns about the behaviour of Denis McCarthy, a teacher at the school, they were sent threatening legal letters.

In a letter from solicitors in 2014, the parents were told that they must agree to sign up to a series conditions and failure to do so would result in their child being removed from the school….

A parent told The Daily Telegraph that the school’s management presided over a “culture of secrecy” that was “rotten to the core”….

Another parent added: "The failures of the school has put children at risk and made our lives hell”.

The school’s most recent Ofsted report [i.e., a report from the government's Office for Standards in Education] noted that “the culture for safeguarding pupils at the school is not strong enough” and that leaders have “underestimated and downplayed these inadequacies”….

RSSKL was ordered by the Department for Education to close last year and had said it would fight the order at a tribunal. However, this week trustees wrote to parents to inform them that they the school will close at the end of term….

Georgina Halford-Hall, CEO of Whistleblowers UK, said: “This case exposes an alarming pattern of behaviour across education where the first reaction of the school is to deny all concerns. When parents rightfully pursued matters, they [i.e., the school] sent threatening solicitors letters.”

[6/26/2018   https://www.telegraph.co.uk/education/2018/06/24/rotten-core-flagship-steiner-school-close-emerges-concerned/    This story originally appeared on June 24.]

Waldorf Watch Response:

Although other accounts have indicated that RSSKL suffered from several important deficiencies (including poor teaching and poor management), the Telegraph account places special emphasis on the actions of Denis McCarthy and the school's protectiveness toward him. 

Here are further excerpts from The Telegraph's article:

When parents tried to raise concerns about the behaviour of Denis McCarthy, a teacher at the school, they were sent threatening legal letters....

Parents were warned not to make any further “unfounded allegations” about Mr McCarthy, with lawyers adding that if they did, their child would be asked to leave....

[Eventually] Mr McCarthy was dismissed for gross misconduct in January 2017 following a series of concerns about safeguarding, but the school did not inform parents of this until August. 

In the intervening months, Mr McCarthy continued to meet up with a group of RSSKL children outside of school….

A parent told how the school community were “left in the dark” about the reason Mr McCarthy left the school....

“Although he had actually nominally been sacked, parents were not told that, and many took their children to have lessons with him in his house, and some hosted his lessons in their own homes"....

The issue of student safety has been paramount, but inspectors found several other problems at RSSKL. The following is from a report in The Hemel Gazette on April 27, 2018:

Two weeks ago the Gazette reported on the latest visit from the school inspection body, which took place in February. At the time that report was not publicly available, but it was believed that only safeguarding was criticised.

However, it is now clear that Ofsted [the Office for Standards in Education] also stated standards were not met in ‘Quality of education’, and in ‘Quality of leadership in and management of schools’.

About quality of education, the report says: “Not all teachers planned lessons in line with leaders’ expectations. For example, they did not consider carefully enough the needs of pupils who have additional learning needs. 

“Work was frequently unchallenging and teachers’ assessment of the progress made by pupils was still in its infancy.”

[https://www.hemeltoday.co.uk/news/750k-shortfall-3-sets-of-lawyers-and-a-wall-of-silence-from-rudolf-steiner-school-in-kings-langley-1-8478872]

For previous Waldorf Watch coverage of events at RSSKL, see, e.g., items dated June 25, June 23, June 20, June 19, June 6, May 31, May 30, May 9, May 2, April 28, April 19, and April 14, 2018. 

— R.R.

June 29, 2018

FAILURE AT RSSKL 

(CONTINUED)  

From the The Watford Observer [Hertfordshire, UK]:

Rudolf Steiner School in Kings Langley 

to shut before new year

A private school facing closure has issued a statement saying it will still be open for the autumn term but that parents may have to “develop longer term options” by next year.

The Rudolf Steiner School in Kings Langley announced its plans to close earlier this month having failed a safeguarding inspection last year that found staff “put pupils at risk”....

A spokesperson for the Langley Hill-based school said today that the “intention” is for the school to remain open in September for the duration of the term until the end of December, but that parents may have to look elsewhere in January 2019.

He added...“There are still some details to be agreed this week before we can confirm this timing, including insurance, enrolment and tuition cost. The trustees are continuing to progress these issues and we will provide further detail later this week...."

[6/29/2018   http://www.watfordobserver.co.uk/news/16321686.rudolf-steiner-school-in-kings-langley-to-shut-before-new-year/    This story originally appeared on June 28.]

Waldorf Watch Response

Actually, inspectors found many problems at Rudolf Steiner School Kings Langley (RSSKL). Safeguarding was an important area of concern, but inspectors also found deficiencies in the quality of teaching and in the management of the school.

An article in The Hemel Gazette at the end of May included this:

The [inspectors'] report says the school has failed to meet the necessary standards for safeguarding, handling of complaints, and quality of leadership.

And it says that the school’s leaders have “potentially put pupils at risk” with their recruitment policies. 

Criticisms include: “The lack of rigour and inaccurate recording amount to more than administrative errors. 

“They are indicative of leaders’ continuing failure to take their responsibilities seriously. 

“Despite intensive training and previous inspection findings over a long period, staff continue to make the same mistakes....” [https://www.hemeltoday.co.uk/news/controversial-rudolf-steiner-school-set-to-close-this-summer-850364]

An article in the same newspaper at the end of April included the following:

Ofsted [the Office for Standards in Education]...stated standards were not met in ‘Quality of education’, and in ‘Quality of leadership in and management of schools’.

About quality of education, the report says: “Not all teachers planned lessons in line with leaders’ expectations....

“Work was frequently unchallenging and teachers’ assessment of the progress made by pupils was still in its infancy.”

The section about ‘Welfare, health and safety of pupils’ adds: “Leaders have failed to ensure that all new employees have been thoroughly vetted prior to taking up their post. 

“They have accepted applications that fall far short of a professional standard and have not taken up appropriate references. 

“Once again, leaders have potentially put pupils at risk by not assuring themselves of the suitability of the staff they employ.” 

Finally, the leadership section said that the school was getting worse in some respects. It said: “Crucially, leaders have failed to sustain the improvements to safer recruitment practice.... " [https://www.hemeltoday.co.uk/news/aps750k-shortfall-3-sets-of-lawyers-and-a-wall-of-silence-from-rudolf-steiner-school-in-kings-langley-1322244]

For previous Waldorf Watch coverage of events at RSSKL, see, e.g., items dated June 26, June 25, June 23, June 20, June 19, June 6, May 31, May 30, May 9, May 2, April 28, April 19, and April 14, 2018. 

July 2, 2018

GROOMING, NICKNAMING,    

ENLISTING  

A new controversy about Steiner schools has erupted in the UK. (To understand the allegations being made, you should know that in current British argot, "grooming" often indicates efforts by adults to lure youngsters into illicit sexual relations. I will argue that although sexual encounters between Waldorf teachers and students do sometimes occur, the "grooming" that occurs in Waldorf schools generally has a different purpose.)

The following is from The Times:

Steiner book raises grooming concerns

by Anna Behrmann

A Steiner school handbook that suggested teachers visit children at home and give them chocolate has raised concerns about the potential for grooming.

The handbook, published and endorsed by the Steiner Waldorf Schools Fellowship, tells teachers that parents’ evenings should be followed by “home visits”, where the teacher can spend time with the pupil....

In the handbook, which combines supposedly lighthearted musings with advice, teachers are told that “class pet names can be enjoyable”. It adds: “Rewards, for example chocolates (especially if the school rule is no chocolate), should be awarded to indicate how pleased you are with the individual.”

The handbook goes on to recommend that teachers “cultivate the strongest leaders in the class so that they see you as their special ally, the only adult who understands them”.

Another section advises: “Tell the class that they are a very special group (they must be to have you as a teacher) and let them know implicitly and explicitly that you are the only person able to teach them. Alongside this, it helps to hint that no one else could handle them as you do.” Its author, Kevin Avison, an executive officer and adviser of the fellowship...describes the handbook as a “humorous exploration” of Steiner teaching but adds that all the points have “something positive.”

Mike Tomlinson, former chief inspector of schools, told The Sunday Telegraph that the handbook “raises serious questions about the philosophy of the schools and the way in which they choose to see the teacher’s role”. He added: “I suspect that this may well be a call to arms to the Department for Education and Ofsted [the Office for Standards in Education]...."

[7/2/2018    https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/steiner-book-raises-grooming-concerns-dz9zlndws]

An article in The Daily Mail provides some further information:

Steiner school handbook 

raises grooming concerns 

after it suggests teachers 

visit children at home 

and give them chocolates

by Zoie O'Brien

Steiner schools should be investigated for telling teachers to give children chocolates, visit them in their homes and make pet names for their favourite students, a former schools inspector said....

A source close to Stenier schools told The Sunday Telegraph the 'advice' is concerning.

They said: 'Steiner teachers really get to know the child and there is a massive opportunity for grooming by teachers with an inclination to do so.

'I am appalled that the advice is there, even ironically....'

Former chief inspector of school Mike Tomlinson [said the handbook] 'raises serious questions about the philosophy of the schools and the way they choose to see the teacher's role'....

[Steiner] schools have recently been criticised by Oftsed.

The Rudolf Steiner School, in Kings Langley, Hertfordshire, will close down after failing to make improvements since the education watchdog's last visit in December, when it stopped any new pupils from coming aboard.

Inspectors said in a damning report that data protection had been breached, pupils were able to wander off-site during lunch breaks and that there were no 'professional boundaries' between students and teachers, with some meeting up outside school.

'Leaders have underplayed and misrepresented the school's safeguarding failings to parents,' it said....

...Crucially, leaders do not base their decisions, at all times, on what is in the best interests of the child. This is the core principle of good safeguarding practice and a statutory requirement for all schools.'

[7/2/2018   http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-5908493/Steiner-school-handbook-raises-grooming-concerns-suggests-teachers-visit-children-home.html]

Waldorf Watch Response:

This controversy may strike some readers as very strange. We might almost think that Steiner schools are being accused of treating students kindly — giving them candy, befriending them, making sure things are ok at home.

But in fact the implications of the cited practices are potentially dire. [See "Mistreating Kids Lovingly".]

Waldorf teachers often think of themselves as "priests" who oversee the spiritual development of their students. [See "Schools as Churches".] They generally do not place primary importance on educating children in any ordinary sense. Instead, their chief aim, often, is luring students and their families toward Rudolf Steiner's spiritual belief system, Anthroposophy. [See "Here's the Answer" and "Spiritual Agenda".] Ultimately, Waldorf teachers are often guilty of indoctrinating their students in Steiner's occult beliefs — they "groom" their students with this clandestine objective. [See "Sneaking It In" and "Indoctrination".] Sometimes there is also a sexual or romantic component in their behavior with at least some of their students. [See, e.g., "Extremity".]

Within Waldorf communities, the line between home and school — or between personal and professional spheres — may become blurred, with teachers seeking to supplant parents as the most important adults in students' lives. The Waldorf movement is quite prepared to direct and control students' families in virtually all spheres of life. Thus, there are Waldorf publications on how to make Waldorf-approved soups, and how to make Waldorf-approved bread, and how to make Waldorf-approved dolls, and how to be a Waldorf-approved housewife, and — overall — how to raise children in the Waldorf-approved way. [See "Discussions".]

Here are a few statements made by Rudolf Steiner, directing Waldorf teachers to consider themselves apostles of Anthroposophy who have a broad mandate:

◊ "[W]e [Waldorf teachers] wish to begin our preparation by first reflecting upon how we connect with the spiritual powers [i.e., gods] in whose service and in whose name each one of us must work.” — Rudolf Steiner, THE FOUNDATIONS OF HUMAN EXPERIENCE (Anthroposophic Press, 1996), p. 33. 

◊ "The position of teacher becomes a kind of priestly office, a ritual performed at the altar of universal human life." — Rudolf Steiner, THE ESSENTIALS OF EDUCATION (Anthroposophic Press, 1997), p. 23. 

◊ "You [Waldorf teachers] will have to take over children for their education and instruction — children who will have received already (as you must remember) the education, or mis-education given them by their parents ... [W]hen we receive the children into the school we shall still be able to make up for many things which have been done wrongly, or left undone [by parents and others], in the first years of the child's life." — Rudolf Steiner, STUDY OF MAN (Rudolf Steiner Press, 2004), p. 16.

 ◊ "Given the difficult, disorderly, and chaotic conditions of our time, it might almost be preferable from a moral viewpoint if children could be taken into one’s care soon after birth.” — Rudolf Steiner, WALDORF EDUCATION AND ANTHROPOSOPHY, Vol. 2, Foundations of Waldorf Education (Anthroposophic Press, 1996), p. 69.

The purpose of all this, ultimately, is to spread Anthroposophy: 

“One of the most important facts about the background of the Waldorf School is that we were in a position to make the anthroposophical movement a relatively large one. The anthroposophical movement has become a large one.” — Rudolf Steiner, RUDOLF STEINER IN THE WALDORF SCHOOL (Anthroposophic Press, 1996), p.156.

Waldorf or Steiner schools are integral parts of the Anthroposophical movement. But this fact must be disguised:

“[W]e have to remember that an institution like the Independent Waldorf School with its anthroposophical character, has goals that, of course, coincide with anthroposophical desires. At the moment, though, if that connection were made official, people would break the Waldorf School’s neck." — Rudolf Steiner, FACULTY MEETINGS WITH RUDOLF STEINER (Anthroposophic Press, 1998), p. 705.

.

When the "grooming" of students goes beyond Anthroposophical proselytizing — and, specifically, when it leads to illicit liaisons between teachers and students — enormous additional problems can result. The harm inflicted on students then may extend far beyond the confusions that result from being lured into occultism. [See, e.g., “Mistreating Kids Lovingly”.] It would appear that sexual/romantic liaisons may have occurred at the Rudolf Steiner School Kings Langley. Wether or not that is the case, any such conduct by teachers at any Waldorf school would, of course, be deplorable. This is a subject we will return to in a coming editorial.

.

Having reviewed these matters to this point, we should consider whether the handbook referred to in the news articles, above, has been misinterpreted. Are the objectionable passages in fact humorous or ironic?

The publication at issue is A HANDBOOK FOR WALDORF CLASS TEACHERS, compiled by Kevin Avison and published by the Steiner Waldorf Schools Fellowship (2004; reprinted several times, most recently in 2016).  I will quote from the 2011 edition. The objectionable passages arise principally in the final section of the handbook: Appendix M.

There is, indeed, a tongue-in-cheek quality to this appendix, which Avison subtitles "How to make it difficult for anyone else to teach your class — ever!" (He uses the word "class," here, in the standard Waldorf way: It refers to a group of children who proceed together, as a group, from one grade level to the next, generally under the primary tutelage of a single "class teacher.")

Here is a survey of some of the guidance given in Appendix M:

"Always refer to the class as 'my class'....

"Tell the class frequently that they are a very special group ... [I]t helps to hint frequently that no-one can or could handle them as you do....

"Fill every space on the blackboard with your artistry...preventing any [other] teacher from erasing even last week's reminder....

"Class 'pet names' can be useful. Rewards, for example chocolates (especially if the school rule is no chocolate), should be awarded....

"Make a special point of cultivating the strongest leaders in the class so that they see you as their special ally....

"Form cliques with chosen colleagues....

"Occasionally, but with powerful emotion, use your 'veto' [in faculty meetings] on the grounds that you alone are speaking for 'the children'...."

A HANDBOOK FOR WALDORF CLASS TEACHERS, pp. 90-91.

Much of this is clearly meant to be over the top and therefore amusing. But we should note that the humor here (like much comedy anywhere) depends on a shock of recognition. Most people who are acquainted with Waldorf schools know that many of the teachers there behave as Avison describes.This is how Waldorf teachers often conduct themselves. It is behavior that arises from excessive devotion to the vision Rudolf Steiner propounded. [See the quotations, above.] Avison's point is that Waldorf teachers, while engaged in their mission, should try to rein in their more extreme habits.

But, to repeat, the conduct Avison lampoons is indeed typical of the way many Waldorf teachers act, and it is closely bound up with Waldorf teachers' genuine conception of their job. If we dial back the humor in Avison's satire, we are left with statements that could very well be understood to contain serious recommendations for teachers in the Steiner/Waldorf system. [To consider some comedy-free descriptions of Waldorf teachers in action, see, e.g., "Ex-Teacher 2", "Ex-Teacher 5", and "His Education".]

— R.R.

July 6, 2018

AUTUMN TERM CANCELLED — 

STEINER SCHOOL CLOSING 

From the The Watford Observer [Hertfordshire, UK]:

Rudolf Steiner School in 

Kings Langley 

to close next week

[by] Nathan Louis

A private school will close next week after insurers were not found to keep the school open.

Rudolf Steiner School in Kings Langley hoped to remain open for the new term [next autumn] but in a letter today, trustees of the school announced this would not be possible.

The school had been threatened with closure for more than a year after a number of Ofsted [Office for Standards in Education] inspections found pupils were “at risk”....

In a letter to parents, the school said it was not "viable" to self-insure after potential insurers for the school stepped back. Consequently the school decided it was "untenable" to prepare for an autumn term and as such have voted to close the school on completion of the summer term next week.

It was in December 2016 that Rudolf Steiner School Kings Langley (RSSKL) was first told by Ofsted inspectors that it had serious problems with safeguarding of students.

The body [i.e., Ofsted] have since visited the school four times, failing in a number of categories on three occasions [i.e., the school failed three of four inspections]. The school was also threatened with closure by the government.

[6/6/2018    http://www.watfordobserver.co.uk/news/16336099.rudolf-steiner-school-in-kings-langley-to-close-next-week/    This story originally appeared on July 5.]

Waldorf Watch Response:

This, presumably, truly is the end of the road for one of Britain's premier Steiner schools. The drama has been long and arduous, but now the school seems to have run out of options.

Of course, supporters of Steiner education may seek to replace RSSKL, in whole or in part, with other Steiner initiatives in the same geographic area. But this remains to be seen.

The effect for Steiner education generally, in Britain and beyond, also remains to be seen. The failure of RSSKL is surely a setback for the Steiner movement, but the extent of the setback will not be known for some time. It will largely depend on whether the problems at RSSKL are understood to reflect systemic problems in Steiner schools generally. I have argued that the RSSKL saga certainly should be understood in this way. [See my editorial dated June 23, 2018.]

We should note that inspectors found RSSKL deficient by several measures. Inadequate safeguarding of students topped the list, but the school was also faulted for the poor quality of the teaching it offered, and for the poor quality of the school's management. In other words, there were problems in virtually all parts of the school.

So the problems at RSSKL were numerous and deep. The following is from a news account published on June 5 in The Hemel Gazette dealing with an emergency meeting for parents and others at the school:

Chair of the trustees, Peter Harrington, told the meeting there was no single issue or member of staff which was to blame for the school’s plight, but that it was “consistent failings across a range of issues”. 

He said...“There are lots and lots of problems at the school.”

[https://www.hemeltoday.co.uk/news/rudolf-steiner-school-meeting-parents-told-hope-for-the-best-but-prepare-for-the-worst-1-8522873]

For previous Waldorf Watch coverage of events at RSSKL, see, e.g., items dated June 29, June 26, June 25, June 23, June 20, June 19, June 6, May 31, May 30, May 9, May 2, April 28, April 19, and April 14, 2018. A report on July 2 also referred to the situation at RSSKL.

— R.R.

July 7, 2018

REMEMBERING RSSKL — 

THE FAULTS FOUND

As of today, visitors to the website of the Rudolf Steiner School Kings Langley would find no indication that the school has collapsed. The site's home page still paints a glowing portrait of the school and its claims:

The Rudolf Steiner School provides a comprehensive and well-rounded inter-disciplinary Steiner Waldorf education — Pre-school to A levels — that is permeated with sciences, arts, music and foreign languages. Our pupils develop creative, flexible, independent thinking, thereby preparing themselves for university and successful careers.

For 69 years we have been successfully preparing young people to live fulfilling and rewarding lives. Our spacious 10-acre campus is on the site of a 13th-century royal palace and priory and includes sports fields, a gymnasium, a large theatre, arts and crafts block, pottery and photography lab.

[7/7/2018   http://rsskl.org]

Undoubtedly the website will soon be revised or simply closed down, reflecting the closure of the school itself. [See the item dated July 6, 2018, below.]

In the meantime, it might be helpful to review the problems that led to the collapse of the school, which had been one of the foremost Steiner schools in the United Kingdom. Inspectors faulted the school for shortcomings on several fronts. Here are excerpts from news accounts that explain some of the reasons UK education authorities ordered the school to shut down.

The Hemel Gazette, May 29, 2018:

The [inspectors'] report says the school has failed to meet the necessary standards for safeguarding, handling of complaints, and quality of leadership.

And it says that the school’s leaders have “potentially put pupils at risk” with their recruitment policies. 

Criticisms include: “The lack of rigour and inaccurate recording amount to more than administrative errors. 

“They are indicative of leaders’ continuing failure to take their responsibilities seriously”.... 

The Hemel Gazette, April 27, 2018:

Ofsted [the Office for Standards in Education]...stated standards were not met in ‘Quality of education’, and in ‘Quality of leadership in and management of schools’.

About quality of education, the report says “Work was frequently unchallenging and teachers’ assessment of the progress made by pupils was still in its infancy”....

The section about ‘Welfare, health and safety of pupils’ adds: “Leaders have failed to ensure that all new employees have been thoroughly vetted prior to taking up their post. 

“They have accepted applications that fall far short of a professional standard and have not taken up appropriate references. 

“Once again, leaders have potentially put pupils at risk by not assuring themselves of the suitability of the staff they employ.”

The Daily Telegraph, June 24, 2018:

A flagship Steiner school is to close amid fears over child safety, after it emerged that parents who tried to raise the alarm about safeguarding lapses had been sent gagging letters [i.e., letters telling them to keep quiet].…

The school’s most recent Ofsted report noted that “the culture for safeguarding pupils at the school is not strong enough” and that leaders have “underestimated and downplayed these inadequacies”.

Inspectors said that the process for addressing historic safeguarding complaints has “stalled”, and that “resolution is no longer in sight”....

The Daily Mail, September 3, 2017:

A top £10,000 a year school has been ordered to close following a damning report from Ofsted that flagged up serious fears of child safety….

[T]he school has been ordered to close down for good, with inspectors saying data protection had been breached, pupils were able to wander off-site during lunch breaks and that there were no 'professional boundaries' between students and teachers, with some meeting up outside school.…

[L]ead inspector Philippa Darley and her team found that, in many respects, teachers were far behind the necessary standards, with some even casually meeting children outside class.

The report said: 'Professional boundaries between staff, parents and pupils are not maintained ... Parents arrange for pupils to see their teachers, and former teachers, off the school site. This culture is unchanged, despite known serious safeguarding failings.

The report also slammed the school for lying to parents about the severity of some of the issues, and for failing to keep data secure.

'Leaders have underplayed and misrepresented the school's safeguarding failings to parents,' it said....

'They have also stated that "no transgressions or wrongdoings were found to have taken place" and have implied that former parents who expressed concerns have misrepresented the position. These messages are not supported by the inspection evidence....

'Crucially, leaders do not base their decisions, at all times, on what is in the best interests of the child. This is the core principle of good safeguarding practice and a statutory requirement for all schools.'

The Telegraph News, September 2, 2017:

Britain's flagship Steiner school has been ordered to close amid fears over child safety....

The Rudolf Steiner School Kings Langley had already been banned by the Department for Education (DfE) from admitting any new pupils, following a series of damning Ofsted inspections which uncovered a raft of safeguarding failings.

It comes after Denis McCarthy, a senior staff member who was also a leading figure in the UK’s Steiner school movement, was sacked from the school for gross misconduct.…

The school has issued a public apology to children and their families for “real and serious failings going back several years”, acknowledging that it failed to act on “repeated concerns raised by parents” over safeguarding.

The Watford Observer, April 14, 2016:

An emergency inspection at a school has revealed procedures for safeguarding its pupils are not being met.

The Department for Education ordered the inspection of Kings Langley Steiner School following concerns raised about pupils’ safety and the management of the school….

Inspector Jane Cooper from the Schools Inspection Service said in her report that a number of changes at the school have had a negative impact on the management of safeguarding.

She said three teachers who held the key posts of education facilitator, designated safeguarding lead (DSL) and deputy DSL have recently given up their roles, which has highlighted the “ineffectiveness” of the current structure.

Children are at risk due to leaders not being clear enough about the interpretation of safeguarding requirements.…

Five months ago the school was visited by the education watchdog following complaints from parents.

During that inspection, inspectors found many of the risk assessments were out of date and that some were no longer applicable.

The school's failure to adequately safeguard students is surely the most dramatic of the issues raised by inspectors, and it has received the most coverage in the press.

We should note, however, that the school was also found to have serious deficiencies in other areas, including the quality of the instruction offered, the overall management of the school, recruitment practices, relationships with students' parents, and responsiveness to outside authorities. Taken altogether, the inspection reports indicate that the school failed in almost every way a school possibly could fail.

Another comment may be in order. Rudolf Steiner School Kings Langley was not just any Steiner school. It was old and venerable; it was one of the leading Steiner schools in Britain. The crash of this institution, caused by such a wide array of deficiencies, has potentially devastating implications for Steiner or Waldorf education generally. To the extent that other Steiner or Waldorf schools have failings like those at RSSKL, the entire Steiner/Waldorf movement may be called into question.

— R.R.

July 8, 2018

◊ EDITORIAL ◊

APPENDIX X  

AND GROOMING THE KIDS

In discussing the concerns that have arisen due to the “grooming” of students in Steiner schools, I quoted from the book that gave rise to these concerns: A HANDBOOK FOR WALDORF CLASS TEACHERS, compiled by Steiner teacher Kevin Avison (Steiner Waldorf Schools Fellowship, 2004; reprinted 2011). I pointed out that the final appendix of the book — Appendix M — is ironic. Avison does not seriously advise Steiner teachers to follow the recommendations given in Appendix M: bribing the kids with chocolates, giving the kids pet names, cultivating certain students as allies, and so forth.

A new edition of the handbook makes Avison's ironic intention plainer. The dubious appendix has now been recast as Appendix X. And, crucially, it now begins with the following disclaimer:

"Warning Note    Anyone who believes this is ‘advice’ should think again. This page should be read with caution as a humorous exploration of what perhaps shouldn’t be done in the classroom." — A HANDBOOK FOR WALDORF CLASS TEACHERS (Floris Books, in association with the Steiner Waldorf Schools Fellowship, 2016), p. 146.

This warning note is reassuring (despite the ambiguous “perhaps” that Avison tosses in). But we shouldn’t drop the matter altogether. The sort of practices listed in Appendix M/X do occur in at least some Steiner schools. Steiner teachers often try to bond with their students to an uncommon extent. The ultimate aim is luring students into accepting the teachers’ Anthroposophical belief system. [See “Grooming, Nicknaming, Enlisting”, posted here on July 2, 2018.]

Consider the problems that have caused the Rudolf Steiner School Kings Langley to collapse. The foremost problem was the failure of the school to ensure the safety of the students. And this failure largely involved the creation of unhealthy, personal contact between teachers and students:

"[T]he school has been ordered to close down for good, with inspectors saying…there were no 'professional boundaries' between students and teachers, with some meeting up outside school … [T]eachers were far behind the necessary standards, with some even casually meeting children outside class. The [inspectors’] report said: 'Professional boundaries between staff, parents and pupils are not maintained ... Parents arrange for pupils to see their teachers, and former teachers, off the school site. This culture is unchanged, despite known serious safeguarding failings.’" — The Daily Mail, September 3, 2017. [See the Waldorf Watch item "Remembering RSSKL — The Faults Found", July 7, 2018.]

This report comes to us from the Daily Mail, a tabloid — not the most reliable source. But we have other, more credible sources of information about Steiner/Waldorf schools. For instance, former Waldorf teacher Grégoire Perra has written the following about life in a Waldorf school where he taught:

"[A]ll lines of separation are erased. Very soon, our colleagues become a kind of family … Students become for us both our children and our friends and associates.  There reigns a sort of permanent 'incestuous' atmosphere that can go haywire very quickly for everyone … [There is] total confusion of identities … Nobody there knows who he is or what exactly his role is … [T]his nebulous dissolution of personalities and responsibilities gives rise to accounts of illicit relations between teachers and students. It is what often happens." — Grégoire Perra, “The Anthroposophical Indoctrination of Students in Steiner-Waldorf Schools”. [See “He Went to Waldorf”.]

Other accounts by other authors paint a similar picture of life within at least some Steiner/Waldorf schools. Incestuous involvements of all sorts tend to develop. Lines are erased, confusions proliferate, and the welfare of students is jeopardized. [See, e.g., “Extremity”.] 

And what is the reason for all this? Aside from satisfying the sexual/romantic desires of some errant teachers, it lies in the very purpose of Waldorf education, which is to spread Anthroposophy. In a word, the purpose is indoctrination — enticing, leading, and sometimes dragging children toward embracing Anthroposophy. Perra recounts multiple ways that Steiner/Waldorf teachers seek to infuse their students’ minds, hearts, and psyches with Anthroposophical beliefs. [See “Indoctrination.” Also see, e.g., “Sneaking It In”.]

In another of his essays, Perra gives a simple example of the problematic relationships between Steiner teachers and students. He writes about the practice of Steiner teachers writing personalized poems for their students.

"It is extremely gratifying when someone takes the trouble to write a poem about you … Who normally writes such poems, except distraught lovers?  … [T]he teachers in these schools do not only ask the students to physically strip down, as they do in kindergarten, but they ask for psychological nakedness as well. They ask the students to reveal their most private thoughts … [T]his unveiling process leads some parents to quickly and easily hand complete authority to the teachers and the school. The psychological effect includes the entire family." — Grégoire Perra, “Nearly Undetectable Influence and Indoctrination”. [See “Mistreating Kids Lovingly”.]

The implications of such developments help explain what the inspectors found so alarming at Rudolf Steiner School Kings Langely, and they suggest why there is now public concern about the “grooming” of students by faculty in Steiner/Waldorf schools. The lovely surface presented to the world by Steiner/Waldorf schools can be seriously misleading. In these schools, students may be harmed in many ways, ranging from the carnal to the spiritual. Young lives may be seriously damaged — perhaps, in some cases, irreparably. 

— R.R.

July 21, 2018

DEAD STEINER SCHOOL 

WILL ATTEMPT REINCARNATION

From The Hemel Gazette [Johnson Publishing, UK]:

Rudolf Steiner School 

announces plans to ‘re-open’ - 

just weeks after confirming 

it would close

by Ben Raza

A private school which announced it was set to close this summer after years of criticism over its leadership and safeguarding of children could re-open in September — potentially with the same staff, management and students. 

Rudolf Steiner School Kings Langley [RSSKL] appeared to have finally lost its 12-month battle to remain open…. 

But parents have now been contacted to say that Alpha Schools WILL run a school on the site … And they say that it will be “learning as usual”, with former RSSKL staff, and the same curriculum. 

Both Rudolf Steiner School Kings Langley and Alpha Schools refused to answer questions from the Gazette this week. 

And they refused to explain: 

Whether either organisation has been in touch with either Ofsted [the Office for Standards in Education], the Department For Education, Herts [i.e., Hertfordshire] County Council, or the Charity Commission about this move; 

What has happened to the £750,000 corporate loan that RSSKL took out;

What will happen to the assets and liabilities of RSSKL; 

Or what assurances they could offer that the ‘new’ school will not suffer the same difficulties as RSSKL.…

It is also unclear:

What the ‘new’ school will be called; 

Who the new principal would be; 

If the new school has secured insurance — something which RSSKL had been unable to achieve for the next academic year.… 

[7/21/2018    https://www.hemeltoday.co.uk/news/rudolf-steiner-school-announces-plans-to-re-open-just-weeks-after-confirming-it-would-close-1-8574440    This story originally appeared on July 20.]

Waldorf Watch Response:

It is not surprising that the Steiner movement is unprepared to let their school in Hertfordshire, England, give up the ghost. Rudolf Steiner School Kings Langley has been one of the leading Steiner schools in the UK. The fight to preserve the school has been long and fierce. Indeed, the future of Steiner education in the UK might be said to hang in the balance. As Andy Lewis wrote months ago at the Quackometer blog: "[T]his is a fight the Anthroposophical movement cannot afford to lose."

Ben Raza, writing in The Hemel Gazette, is surely correct that numerous questions hang over the plan to resuscitate RSSKL (or to replace it with a "new" school that is essentially identical to the old school). The UK's Department for Education had ordered RSSKL to close after a series of failed inspections. The problems found at the school were numerous and serious — and the school failed to correct them, despite a lengthy vetting process that provided ample opportunity for the school to right itself. [See, e.g., the Waldorf Watch summary posted on July 7, 2018: "Remembering RSSKL - The Faults Found".]

At least one key member of the RSSKL community acknowledged the severity of the problems at the school. A report in The Hemel Gazette included this:

Chair of the trustees, Peter Harrington, [said] there was no single issue or member of staff which was to blame for the school’s plight, but that it was “consistent failings across a range of issues”. 

He said...“There are lots and lots of problems at the school.”

[https://www.hemeltoday.co.uk/news/rudolf-steiner-school-meeting-parents-told-hope-for-the-best-but-prepare-for-the-worst-1-8522873]

The chief question now would appear to be whether the Department for Education will accept the reopening of a school it had ordered to shut down. Reopening the school under a new name while retaining the old curriculum and faculty would seem to be a nonstarter.

A secondary question is whether any insurer will offer the "new" school an insurance policy. Without such insurance, a school cannot operate legally in the UK. RSSKL's collapse was so severe, insurers fled. [See, e.g., “Rudolf Steiner School in Kings Langley to close next week:”  http://www.watfordobserver.co.uk/news/16336099.rudolf-steiner-school-in-kings-langley-to-close-next-week/]

Alpha Schools is a private limited company, headquartered in High Wycombe, Buckinghamshire. Its chief business is running private primary schools.

The July 20 article in the Hemel Gazette, excerpted above, includes this:

Alpha Schools Ltd was founded eight years ago and is believed to currently own eight schools across the UK, with fees ranging from £1,860 to £4,114.85 per year. 

The company made a gross annual profit of £4,536,962 according to its most recent accounts.

For previous Waldorf Watch coverage of events at RSSKL, see, e.g., items dated July 7, July 6, June 29, June 26, June 25, June 23, June 20, June 19, June 6, May 31, May 30, May 9, May 2, April 28, April 19, and April 14, 2018. An editorial on July 8 also referred to the situation at RSSKL, as did a report on July 2.

— R.R.

July 24, 2018

◊ EDITORIAL ◊

SETTING COMPROMISES  

ASIDE

When Waldorf or Steiner schools fail, the causes can often be found in the very factors that, in other instances, help these schools to thrive: steadfastness and faith.

Rudolf Steiner told Waldorf teachers to be uncompromising in their devotion to their spiritual mission:

“As teachers in the Waldorf School, you will need to find your way more deeply into the insight of the spirit and to find a way of putting all compromises aside.” — Rudolf Steiner, FACULTY MEETINGS WITH RUDOLF STEINER (Anthroposophic Press, 1998), p. 118.

Among other things, Steiner said, rejecting compromises means disregarding what people from outside the school say. Waldorf teachers — knowing that they are right and outsiders are often wrong — should disregard both criticism and praise from outsiders. Indeed, if outside authorities actually affirm anything about Waldorf education, this should be seen as a bad sign:

“It will be impossible for us to avoid all kinds of people from outside the school who want to have a voice in school matters … [But] any concurrence from other pedagogical streams [i.e., other forms of education] concerning what happens in the Waldorf School will cause us to be sad rather than happy. When those working in modern pedagogy praise us, we must think there is something wrong with what we are doing.” — Rudolf Steiner, ibid., p. 118.

By this logic, if a Waldorf school is criticized by educational experts, the school must be doing something right.

To ensure that Waldorf schools do things right, Steiner indicated, Waldorf teachers should be uncompromisingly devoted to their creed, Anthroposophy:

“As Waldorf teachers, we must be true anthroposophists in the deepest sense of the word in our innermost feeling.” — Rudolf Steiner, ibid., p. 118.

In practice, not all Waldorf teachers are deeply committed, uncompromising Anthroposophists. But many are. And Steiner said they all should be.

The recent collapse of the Rudolf Steiner School Kings Langley, and the new effort to bring that school back to life, may very well stem from the uncompromising steadfastness of the teachers and staff at the school. Knowing that they are right, they have stuck to their guns. They have refused to alter their practices and methods, even as cold-eyed outsiders pressed them harder and harder. They refused to compromise as their school went down to ruin, and now they refuse to accept the demise of their school.

The attitude exemplified by many Waldorf teachers is, to put the matter blunting, arrogant. They believe they know best. They believe they are superior to outsiders who do not grasp the wondrous Waldorf faith.

Here is a revealing statement by a Waldorf teacher who, for a number of years, was the head of the Rudolf Steiner School in New York City:

"Anthroposophists generally practise what they preach...but only up to a point. We certainly have no difficulty in rejecting most of the world's recognized authorities, along with the orthodoxies of politics, economics, medicine, science, art, agriculture and education that they represent — except when they just happen to fit in with something that we are pushing. As a group we believe that we have access to knowledge that puts us in a superior position, and the tendency to let this feeling of superiority show is one of the most off-putting features of the anthroposophical personality." — Keith Francis, THE EDUCATION OF A WALDORF TEACHER (iUniverse, 2004), pp. 60-61.

The Waldorf sense of superiority is rooted in the belief that Waldorf education serves the gods. Some Waldorf teachers embrace this fundamentally religious belief more intensely than their colleagues do, but the belief can be found near the core of most Waldorf schools. Here is Kieth Francis describing the central committee of his Steiner school, a committee that — as in most Waldorf or Steiner schools — was called the “college of teachers”:

“The College of Teachers of which I was privileged to be a member for many years had a strong tendency to oscillate between two extremes and I have seen similar tendencies in my travels as a visiting teacher [at other Waldorf schools]. One extreme is the position that the College should concern itself with purely spiritual matters and leave the nuts and bolts to other groups or individuals. The other is that the College should take the responsibility for everything, right down to the shape of the bathroom doorknob. Proponents of the first view say that it is the task of the College to maintain the lines of communication with the spiritual beings [i.e., gods] who hover over the school, and if the College doesn’t do it perhaps no one will. The school is a spiritual organism and there must be an organ to receive and cherish what flows in from the spirit [realm]. Those who take the second view say that decisions about nut and bolts are spiritual matters.” — Keith Francis, ibid., p. 184.

Rudolf Steiner claimed that Anthroposophy is a science, not a religion. This claim is false, but it need not detain us for the moment. The point to recognize is that a zeal that certainly seems religious burns in the breasts of many Waldorf teachers. Sometimes, if most of the teachers at a particular Waldorf school share this zeal and see eye-to-eye on most issues, then that school gains unity and strength. In other instances, however, discord can arise — factions and cliques may form, dividing Anthroposophists from non-Anthroposophists, or even dividing Anthroposophists from one another. The specific issues that trigger discord on a Waldorf faculty may seem trivial to outsiders, but because Waldorf disputants tend to have uncompromising, reverent certainty about their opinions, these small issues may produce mighty strife. Here is Keith Francis describing struggles in the New York Steiner school:

◊ “I remember several occasions when the work of the College [of Teachers] ground to a halt for weeks or even months because of implacable bees in the bonnets of one or two members. I remember other occasions when good people left the school because they couldn’t stand it any more.” — Keith Francis, ibid., p. 103.

◊ “[S]everal teachers had...become excessively, in fact obsessively, preoccupied with the development of the instrumental program [i.e., the creation of a student orchestra]. The program certainly needed developing, but the zeal and fervor with which the ideas were put forward would have been somewhat more appropriate for a religious revival." — Ibid., p. 109.

◊ “Are such goings on the inevitable result when anthroposophy interacts with human nature? Perhaps it isn't just anthroposophy but anything that makes people think that they know better than everyone else." — Ibid., p. 110.

◊ “Between them the school's managers and their protégés had turned the Rudolf Steiner School into a place where I didn't want to be ... I got myself a job at the [non-Steiner] Lenox School ... My work at Lenox was rather trying, since the students were much nastier than the ones at the Rudolf Steiner School and this was only partly compensated for by the fact that the teachers were considerably easier to get on with." — Ibid., p. 115. [See "His Education".]

Although Steiner taught that Anthroposophists are free to make their own discoveries about the spirit realm, in practice most Anthroposophists take most of their beliefs from Steiner's books and lectures. Steiner’s word is, for them, very nearly sacrosanct. In practice if not in theory, the religion of Anthroposophy frequently boils down to the uncompromising embrace of Steiner’s teachings.

Here is a report from a teacher who, at least briefly, worked in a Waldorf school. Inclined to favor Waldorf education, she became a member of a Waldorf faculty, and she shared a house with a devoted Waldorf veteran. In her new home, she gained experience of life among Anthroposophists:

“...As I was walking in with my first box of things my new housemate confronted me about my belongings. She was upset that I had so many books and made it clear that I had to keep them locked away in my bedroom! After that first encounter everything I did seemed to be horrible in her eyes. She didn’t like the medicine I took; it was made in a lab. I needed to go to anthroposophical doctor and use only natural medicines. She didn’t like the clothes that I wore; they weren’t all cotton and dyed with natural dyes. She didn’t like me talking on the phone even though it was in the kitchen and belonged to the house; the phone was a tool of [the demon] Ahriman....

"...[T]here were [Waldorf] teacher gatherings and study groups at our house often ... [A]ll the teachers were passionate and really believed in what they were doing. It soon became obvious to me that...what I had hoped was a misinterpretation of Steiner’s philosophy was in actuality the perfect implementation of it. As far as the outright distortion of scientific or historical facts in the Waldorf curriculum, I was asked, ‘Whose facts are they? How sure are you that yours are true?’ ... For many of the teachers, the only science or history they knew were what they learned in their Waldorf teacher training courses. Then came the statement that clarified all their misinformation for me. I was told, ‘Steiner had exceptional powers, he saw the future, he knew the truth. If you truly need to learn, you need to study and follow Steiner. Steiner is all anyone ever needs to know.’” [See "My Experiences with Waldorf" and “Ex-Teacher 5”.]

A Waldorf faculty’s steadfastness and faith may strengthen the group, enabling their school to overcome many challenges and tribulations. On the other hand, these very qualities may produce turmoil within the faculty. And in extreme cases, these qualities may contribute to a Waldorf schools’s collapse.

— R.R.

July 29, 2018

PROBLEMS AT ANOTHER

U.K. STEINER SCHOOL 

From the Waldorf Critics discussion site (with a modest amendment): 

The Steiner Academy Exeter is yet another UK Steiner school with safeguarding issues, among other problems. On July 16, two 6-year-old boys wandered away from the school. Fortunately, no harm came to them and they were found by the police.

Six-year-old boys wander out of school - and no one noticed [DevonLive, July 24]

The article also mentions that this school was rated by Ofsted in 2015 as requiring improvement, prompting some parents at that time "to raise fears of bullying problems, a failure to deliver 'quality education', and complaints not being dealt with properly …" A later inspection report published in June stated that further improvements were still needed and that "Areas highlighted were to improve the quality of teaching, leadership and pupil attendance."

According to a March 26, 2018 article, this same school was on a list of 10 schools in Devon with the worst records for unauthorized absences in 2016/17.

The Devon schools with the worst unauthorised absence rates [DevonLive, March 26]

I think parents should always be wary of putting their children in the care of people who believe that whatever happens is due to karma. Children need to be in the care of adults who take full responsibility for their safety.

— Margaret Sachs [https://groups.yahoo.com/neo/groups/waldorf-critics/conversations/messages/31857]

August 2, 2018

ONE WAY TO 

DEAL WITH OFSTED

From The Hemel Gazette [Johnson Publishing, UK]:

Inspectors ‘whipped’ in school play 

about Ofsted at 

Rudolf Steiner School Kings Langley

By Ben Raza

Ofsted inspectors [i.e., school inspectors sent by the Office for Standards in Education] were ‘whipped to death’ by students in a play devised by a teacher at a £10,000-a-year private school, a senior insider has claimed.

‘Ofsted The Musical’ was performed by students at Rudolf Steiner School Kings Langley (RSSKL), which was forced to close last month after a succession of problems lasting several years.…

RSSKL said the claim about the play was not accurate.

The whipping was among a series of claims made by Jeremy Smith … Over 10 years Jeremy Smith was successively the school’s communications officer, chair of trustees, and education facilitator.

And he has made a series of extraordinary revelations about the school, including:

* An upper school teacher wrote a play called ‘Ofsted - The Musical’ which ended with “an Ofsted inspector being done to death with copper rods”….

* Staff openly snubbed Ofsted inspectors, with experienced teachers suggesting the school simply refuse to let them enter the building….

Mr Smith wrote: “I am very sad that a school which provided a good education to my own daughter and to so many other children over the last 70 years, has had to close because of the weakness, cowardice and malice of teachers and parents who were unable to see what the consequences of their own behaviour would be for the school….

“…RSSKL has now tarnished the name of Steiner Waldorf education far and wide.”

[8/2/2018  https://www.hemeltoday.co.uk/news/inspectors-whipped-in-school-play-about-ofsted-at-rudolf-steiner-school-kings-langley-1-8587555] This story originally appeared on August 1.]

Waldorf Watch Response:

Recriminations and finger-pointing are only to be expected when an institution crashes as spectacularly as RSSKL has done. We should be cautious about accepting any accounts advanced by those who have been caught up in the turmoil and strife.

A few additional points should be made: 

A RSSKL spokesperson has denied most of Jeremy Smith’s allegations. 

At least some faculty and staff at the school have said they plan to establish a new school that will follow essentially the same curriculum as RSSKL. They have indicated the new school may possibly be established in RSSKL’s old building. So far, however, these intentions remain unfulfilled. 

Jeremy Smith’s credentials go beyond his employment in senior positions at RSSKL. Ben Raza reports that Smith has experience “as a member of the executive group of the Steiner Waldorf Schools Fellowship [the umbrella organization for Steiner schools in the UK] and as a lay inspector for Ofsted inspections of Steiner schools.” 

The play Smith describes may or may not have been performed. At his blog, where his allegations appear, Smith says this:

“I remember one upper school teacher devising a show for pupils to perform, which he called: ‘Ofsted – the musical.’” 

Devising or writing a play is one thing; staging it is another. The play was evidently written "for pupils to perform," but whether the kids actually did so is unclear. Strangely, the RSSKL spokesperson leaves things murky when challenging only the ending of the play:

"[W]e do not recognise the ending as alleged to a musical written by a teacher who left the school at least five years ago.”

For the spokesperson's denials, see the Hemel Gazette article [https://www.hemeltoday.co.uk/news/inspectors-whipped-in-school-play-about-ofsted-at-rudolf-steiner-school-kings-langley-850654].

Finally, we should note that Smith is an advocate for Steiner education. He argues that RSSKL did a grave disservice to a form of education he cherishes. Thus, at his blog, Smith writes: 

“Not the least of RSSKL’s disasters is that it makes it far less likely that any government will wish to allow any more publicly-funded Steiner academy schools to be created.”

Smith’s blog is at https://anthropopper.wordpress.com/author/jeremysmith33/. 

— R.R.

August 5, 2018

AN EX-STEINER TEACHER 

ON AN EX-STEINER SCHOOL 

Former Steiner teacher Grégoire Perra has posted a brief report on the collapse of Rudolf Steiner School Kings Langley. He has written in response to Jeremy Smith, who was present to witness firsthand the turmoil that gripped the school in Kings Langley. [See the Waldorf Watch coverage of August 2.]

Here is a rough, computer-based translation of a portion of Perra's commentary:

The death of a Steiner-Waldorf school 

seen from the inside

https://wp.me/p4X4gt-C7

The link, above, will take you to the testimony of Jeremy Smith, a parent of a student at Rudolf Steiner School Kings Langley School, where the administrators recently closed the school's doors due to serious failings. Like many of the parents involved at that school who held positions of responsibility in the Steiner-Waldorf movement, Smith was exposed to numerous internal dysfunctions at Kings Langley. But like most of those other parents, he is unable to see that these dysfunctions were not the result of the weaknesses of a particular teaching team at a particular school, but are inextricable from Steiner-Waldorf pedagogy overall, a pedagogy that is tied to Anthroposophy.

Smith therefore naïvely continues to believe, at the end of his essay, that these problems could be corrected, for example by abandoning the collegial mode of management. But, for Anthroposophists, questioning Rudolf Steiner's directives on this or on other points would amount to violating the revelations of the Master and — through him — the intentions of the Gods of the Cosmos.

Nevertheless, the detailed descriptions that Smith's account gives us about the dysfunctions within one Steiner-Waldorf school are quite simply edifying:

• irresponsibility of the teaching team;

• unresponsiveness to the laws and authorities of society;

• financial fraud;

• improper behaviour of many teachers towards students;

• incessant internal quarrels between teachers, due to their immaturity and dishonesty;

• and so on....

— Grégoire Perra [8/5/2018   https://veritesteiner.wordpress.com/2018/08/05/la-mort-dune-ecole-steiner-waldorf-vue-de-linterieur/   Translated with aid of www.DeepL.com/Translator, editing and revisions by Roger Rawlings.]

Perra ends his report with a recommendation that Waldorf schools be outlawed in France and, indeed, in all countries around the globe. He makes this recommendation because, he says, Waldorf schools alienate people from themselves, luring them into the snares of Anthroposophy.

"The testimony of this pupil's parent [i.e., Jeremy Smith] is therefore valuable, not for his conclusions, but because it should lead to the institutional decision in Europe — and, if it were possible, worldwide — that Steiner-Waldorf schools should be prohibited by law, since they are not basically educational institutions, but places where individuals are led to falsify themselves in order to become servants of Anthroposophy." — Grégoire Perra

Perra’s recommendation is extreme. He goes farther than I would go. But Perra possesses uncommon authority on this subject; his words should certainly be heeded and carefully considered. Perra was educated in Waldorf schools. He became a Waldorf teacher. He acquired wide experience in various Anthroposophical undertakings. He rose to a position of prominence in Anthroposophical circles. He has studied Anthroposophy deeply, and he has written extensively about his findings. [See "My Life Among the Anthroposophists", "He Went to Waldorf" ("The Anthroposophical Indoctrination of Students in Steiner-Walsorf Schools"), and "Mistreating Kids Lovingly" ("Nearly Undetectable Influence and Indoctrination").] For such an individual to call now for a worldwide ban on Waldorf schools is, in and of itself, significant.

— R.R.

August 11, 2018

TO REINCARNATE 

OR NOT TO REINCARNATE 

http://rsskl.org

.

Early in July of this year, the leaders of Rudolf Steiner School Kings Langley (RSSKL) — in Hertfordshire, England — seemed to bow to the inevitable. UK education authorities had ordered the school closed after a series of inspections found multiple, serious problems in the school's operations. The government order led to a tumultuous period for RSSKL, a period that saw a decline in student enrollment, the departure of some prominent faculty members, and the refusal of insurers to extend continuing coverage to the school. RSSKL fought to stay open, appealing the government's order and hiring high-priced legal representation to plead the school's case. But it was all evidently in vain. Ultimately, the school announced that, indeed, it was closing.

But only a few weeks later, remaining leaders of the RSSKL community announced that they would attempt to bring the school back to life in some unspecified form. They indicated their intentions (somewhat vaguely) on the school's website, where they put this message:

Rudolf Steiner School Kings Langley

The Trustees of the school are very sad to announce that RSSKL has now closed and we are currently planning for a new future.

Please do check back for the latest developments. We will be providing updates as soon as we can.

Yours sincerely, The Trustees

Contact Information

Telephone: 01923 262505

Email: info@rsskl.org

Address: Langley Hill, Kings Langley, Herts WD4 9HG

For staff hub login go to: goo.gl/MGXqHj

[8/11/2018   http://rsskl.org   The same message has been on the site at least since 7/21/2018, perhaps earlier.]

Nothing seems to have changed since then. The message still appears on the school's website — indeed, the message now constitutes the entire publicly-accessible contents of the website.

The proposition that the school could circumvent the closure order was implausible from the start, and apparently RSSKL remains defunct. But perhaps Steiner education will come back to life, somehow, in Hertfordshire. We should keep an eye of developments. Rudolf Steiner School Kings Langley was one of the leading Steiner schools in the UK. The Steiner movement can hardly remain passive in the face of the school's catastrophic collapse.

— R.R.

August 11, 2018

CLOSED STEINER SCHOOL 

TO STAY CLOSED - FOR NOW  

From  The Watford Observer [Hertfordshire, UK]:

School won't open on 

Rudolf Steiner site 

in Kings Langley

By Nathan Louis

A new school will not open on the Rudolf Steiner School (RSSKL) site.

The private school, which announced in June that it would be closing, had been in negotiations with Alpha [i.e., Alpha Schools Ltd.] to open a new school on the same Kings Langley site in September, for the new school term.

But following discussion between RSSKL and Alpha, RSSKL has revealed that a new school will not go ahead, at this time….

RSSKL has been threatened with closure for months after a series of Ofsted [i.e., Office for Standards in Education] inspections found that pupils were “at risk”.

It was announced in June that the school was to close, and despite attempts to keep it open, they were unable to find any insurers to keep the school operating from September.

[8/24/2018      http://www.watfordobserver.co.uk/news/16594812.school-wont-open-on-rudolf-steiner-site-in-kings-langley/   This story originally appeared on August 23.]

Waldorf Watch Response:

The travails of Rudolf Steiner School Kings Langley have been long and complex. One of Britain's leading Steiner schools, RSSKL has struggled hard to remain open. The collapse of this school would potentially be a severe blow to the Steiner education movement generally. But despite concerted efforts to overturn or evade the government's closure order, RSSKL seems to be done for.

Seems to. Backers of Steiner education generally, and supporters of RSSKL in particular, are not yet surrendering. Although the plan to reconstitute RSSKL in a modified form on its old site now seem finished (seem finished), efforts are still afoot to return Steiner education — somehow, in some incarnation — to Hertfordshire.

A spokesman for RSSKL, quoted in The Watford Observer, had this to say: 

“[RSSKL's] trustees have worked incredibly hard to explore whether Alpha would operate a school on our premises but unfortunately this will not proceed at this time ... We are considering alternative RSSKL and community projects ... We will embrace these new opportunities to develop a strong and vibrant Steiner-Waldorf offering in a new form.” [The Watford Observer, August 23, 2018.]

Note that the "new form" may yet boil down to reopening RSSKL, or a variant, on the old RSSKL site. The spokesman said that such a possibility "will not proceed at this time" [emphasis added]. At least some RSSKL backers evidently still hope that they may resume Steiner education on the old site at some future time.

Devoted Steiner adherents rarely give up the good fight (as they understand it). They rarely compromise. In this, they follow the admonition Rudolf Steiner gave to teachers at the first Steiner or Waldorf school:

“As teachers in the Waldorf School, you will need to find your way more deeply into the insight of the spirit and to find a way of putting all compromises aside.” — Rudolf Steiner, FACULTY MEETINGS WITH RUDOLF STEINER (Anthroposophic Press, 1998), p. 118.

— R.R.

August 26, 2018

CONTEMPLATING RSSK

FROM STOCKHOLM

The following item is from The Ethereal Kiosk [Stockholm, Sweden]. The author, Alicia Hamberg, is a former Waldorf student who has written blog posts in both Swedish and English. The item below consists of excerpts from her most recent English-language post. 

Alicia recollects a time, years ago, when she posted a number of blunt criticisms of Waldorf education. The response she received from the Waldorf community was decidedly hostile. Alicia was subjected to acerbic personal attacks. Understandably, she came out of that experience feeling emotionally and psychologically bruised. 

Now, years later, events at the Rudolf Steiner School Kings Langley (RSSKL) have vindicated much of what Alicia wrote. The British government ordered RSSKL to close, citing numerous faults in the operations of the school. After fighting the order, the school ultimately succumbed. Supporters are currently attempting to revive the school in some form, but for now RSSKL is no more. 

Considering the circumstances, Alicia is generous in her response to RSSKL’s demise. She resists the temptation to gloat. Instead, she points out that she and other Waldorf critics seem to have been correct in at least some of their criticisms. And, she comments, these criticisms may apply to many Waldorf schools that are still in operation today. 

[I have done a little light editing to the following, aiming for consistency with the Waldorf Watch format. And, full disclosure: Although we have never met, I consider Alicia a friend. We are both Waldorf survivors.] 

On the Demise of 

Kings Langley Steiner School

I hesitate to write about this, like I hesitate to write about anything these days. But the fact that Kings Langley Steiner School was finally closed following several inspections and the school administration’s failure to come to terms with — and to rectify — the previously identified deficiencies, means that it’s not just a question of accusations thrown around by angry parents, or the like, anymore; there’s the fact of an actual closure. There have been numerous reports in the media about it over the last year, but I haven’t collected them….

In any case, [some news accounts] had little to do with the particular failings of Kings Langley, which, it appears, has been governed badly over a number of years, with a college of teachers [i.e., central committee] and staff that has failed to meet any sort of external standards, actively resisted school inspections, and ignored all the warnings that things were not going well…. 

I’m not sure whether to find it ironic or just amusing, but the criticism now delivered by Jeremy Smith, former information officer of the Steiner Waldorf School Fellowship and formerly an eager soldier in the fight against criticism of Waldorf schools, basically targets Waldorf schools on similar grounds that the rest of us were trying to do when he (and some others) tried to combat us almost a decade ago. It may not always look that way…but I think many of the failings that critics were then pointing at had similar origins to the failings that Jeremy Smith reports [now]. What people were seeing, when comparing their experiences, was that behind individual failings were…systematic failings that were in some interesting ways universal [among Waldorf schools] all over the world…. 

To the credit of Jeremy Smith, he has since amended his view of those unwanted criticisms of Waldorf schools. He now writes: 

…I became increasingly aware of the criticisms of Rudolf Steiner and Steiner Waldorf schools that were at that time starting to be widely disseminated online. I was upset by many of these criticisms, which did not accord with my understanding of Steiner or my experience of Waldorf schools. The sheer viciousness of the many misrepresentations I saw online led me to engage with some of these critics, in what with hindsight I now regard as naïve and well-meaning attempts to increase understanding and put the record straight. Today I would claim to have a more nuanced view of these criticisms, some of which were undoubtedly justified. 

While I don’t believe — I really don’t — that every criticism is worth taking seriously…I think that many things that were said by critics back then would have been rather good (if I dare say so) for the Steiner Waldorf movement to reflect upon rather than to brush aside or even to try to silence or to shut down. Back then, I don’t think any one of us actually thought that, ten years along the line, one of the most prestigious and oldest Steiner schools in Britain would be forced to close. I’m certain it would have been seen as a victory by the most “vicious” of critics — but also utopian. Interestingly, the school’s downfall was entirely its own fault, and came at a time when external criticism (or “vicious” writings of former parents or students)…had dwindled to almost nothing. And it will, I believe, have an impact on the Steiner movement, at least in Britain, though considering the role of the college of teachers [at Kings Langley] and the traditional but often dysfunctional arrangement for governing Waldorf schools, perhaps [Waldorf] schools in other parts of the world should take heed too.

—  Alicia Hamberg   [8/26/2018    https://zooey.wordpress.com/2018/08/22/on-the-demise-of-kings-langley-steiner-school/    This blog post originally appeared on August 22.]

September 1, 2018

DEAD AGAIN:

REVIVAL EFFORTS FAIL

From The Hemel Gazette [Johnson Publishing, UK]:

School’s out forever, as 

Rudolf Steiner School Kings Langley 

sees ‘takeover’ deal collapse

By Ben Raza

Parents at a scandal-riven school were told it will not re-open after all — less than one month before the start of term. 

Rudolf Steiner School Kings Langley (RSSKL) was forced to close in June, after a series of problems with safeguarding, leadership, and inability to get insurance. 

Just weeks later trustees announced plans to re-open a ‘new’ school on the same site on September 24, with the same staff, curriculum and students. 

But they have now had to admit defeat. 

In an email to parents the trustees said: “It was a very difficult decision to terminate negotiations [with Alpha Group] having put so much time and effort into them and having, we believed, come so close to reaching a deal....” 

The re-opened school would have been part of the Alpha Schools group, an organisation based in High Wycombe. 

The Alpha Group’s chief executive Ali Khan was unimpressed by RSSKL’s version of events, saying there were a number of inaccuracies in the email sent to parents. 

And he accused the £9,857-a-year school of either having “a complete lack of understanding” or “deliberately misleading” parents….

…Alpha chief executive Ali Khan…said: “Before writing to parents on July 12, we had agreed to the terms set out by the [RSSKL] trustees themselves…to run a Waldolf curriculum on the site as part of the provision. 

“The trustees then decided to add even more requirements, which included monitoring committees, annual reporting, and affiliation with the Steiner Fellowship [i.e., the Steiner Waldorf Schools Fellowship].…”

[9/1/2018   https://www.hemeltoday.co.uk/news/school-s-out-forever-as-rudolf-steiner-school-kings-langley-sees-takeover-deal-collapse-1-8621139   This story originally appeared on August 31.]

Waldorf Watch Response:

Is this, then, the absolute, final, definitive end for the Rudolf Steiner School Kings Langley? Is the headline, above, "School's Out Forever", the sure and certain conclusion to this sad story?

It seems unlikely.

RSSKL has been one of the leading Steiner schools in Britain. The Steiner movement will almost certainly continue trying to revive the school in some form.

But certainly the prospects look bleak. RSSKL ran afoul of the government, which ordered the school to close. And now RSSKL has crossed metaphorical swords with the private educational firm that has seemed to offer the school salvation.

Many problems contributed to RSSKL's collapse. [See, e.g., "Remembering RSSKL - The Faults Found" — July 7, 2018.] Perhaps the greatest problem was the evident inability of RSSKL faculty and staff to work cooperatively with any outside, non-Steiner authorities or organizations. RSSKL fought the government, and now it has fought with the private enterprise that extended a lifeline to it.

The unswerving determination of RSSKL's leaders to remain true to Steiner education, as they conceive it, has made compromise with outsiders all but impossible. But, of course, this same determination is also a source of strength. 

RSSKL has suffered numerous setbacks, now, but the true-believing Anthroposophists at the core of the school may well continue their struggle, somehow, in some fashion. From an idealistic, romantic perspective — which true-belieiving Anthroposophists often embrace — lost causes are the only causes truly worth fighting for.

So the struggle may continue, somehow.

As of today — September 1, 2018 — the RSSKL website continues to display the following message:

The Trustees of the school are very sad to announce that RSSKL has now closed and we are currently planning for a new future.

Please do check back for the latest developments. We will be providing updates as soon as we can.

[9/1/2018   http://rsskl.org.]

Perhaps this message tells us a lot. Or perhaps not. At some point, perhaps, RSSKL's sad story may really and truly, finally and completely, end. 

But the school may not have reached that point — or it may not have accepted that it has reached that point — quite yet.

Alpha Schools is a private limited company, headquartered in High Wycombe, Buckinghamshire. Its chief business is running private primary schools. At present, it is reported to operate about eight such schools.

The Steiner Waldorf Schools Fellowship (SWSF) is the "the membership organisation for all the Steiner schools and independent Steiner Early Years settings in the UK and Ireland." [See https://www.steinerwaldorf.org.]

The Alpha Group's leader said RSSKL may have intentionally deceived students' parents. There has long been a tendency among Steiner and/or Waldorf schools to deceive and dissemble on numerous issues. This has, indeed, been a central cause for complaints lodged against the schools. [See, e.g., "Our Experience", "Coming Undone", and "Secrets".] 

— R.R.

September 11, 2018

UNDEAD AGAIN? 

RSSKL TRIES TO RISE, AGAIN  

From the website of Rudolf Steiner School Kings Langley:

The Kindergartens are opening for the Autumn Term!

We are very pleased to announce the opening of two of our Kindergartens. Uriel and Michael Kindergartens will be open from the 17th of September and we are now taking applications for the Autumn Term.

Please ring 01923 262505 for more information about applying.

Yours sincerely, The Trustees

[9/11/2018    http://rsskl.org]

Waldorf Watch Response:

Rudolf Steiner School Kings Langley (RSSKL) is making yet another effort to return from the grave. The school had been ordered shut by the government. Then, more recently, an effort by RSSKL to form an alliance with Alpha Schools Ltd. came to naught. [1] 

But, as had seemed likely, the fervent Anthroposophists behind RSSKL refuse to give up. They are now evidently attempting to restart their school in the form of two kindergartens.

Whether this attempt has a prayer remains to be seen. The response of the UK government remains to be seen. The response of parents looking for schools for their children remains to be seen. (One of the chief problems inspectors found as RSSKL was a failure to safeguard the students. [2]) The response of insurance companies remains to be seen. (As things went from bad to worse at RSSKL, insurers eventually refused to extend coverage to the school. [3])

Almost everything remains to be seen. We will watch future developments with great interest.

Steiner or Waldorf schools often begin as very small operations, usually in the form of play groups or kindergartens. As the children enrolled in these operations age — and as new, older students transfer in — successively higher grades are added to accommodate them: a first grade is added, then a second grade, and so on. Thus does a full-fledged K-12 Steiner / Waldorf school eventually develop.

This would seem to be the plan for reconstituting Rudolf Steiner School Kings Langley. The old K-12 school is gone, but a new school — with the same name — may be be brought to life, following the usual Steiner / Waldorf strategy.

Here a screenshot of the home page at the RSSKL website as of this morning:

Still "Rudolf Steiner School Kings Langley"

[rsskl.org, September 11, 2018].

.

.While the new school may retain the old name, the two newly announced kindergartens are to be called "Uriel" and "Michael." They will be named, in other words, for two Archangels revered in Anthroposophy. According to Rudolf Steiner, there are nine ranks of gods. The beings often designated as Archangels are in fact gods of the second rank, Steiner taught. Uriel (or Oriphiel) is the Archangel of Saturn; Michael is the Archangel of the Sun. [4] An alternative designation for gods of the second rank, according to Steiner, is "Fire Spirits." [5]

The plans for the Uriel and Michael kindergartens may be somewhat unsettled. Although the home page at the RSSKL site says "we are now taking applications" for the kindergartens, a different page at the site — "Vacancies" — carries the following, less encouraging message: "There are no vacancies in the Kindergartens at the moment." [http://rsskl.org/vacancies/] Perhaps Uriel and Michael are already full? Or perhaps they currently exist only on the etheric level?

We will watch future developments with great interest.

[1] For coverage of the woes at Rudolf Steiner School Kings Langley, and for indications of the effort to reconstitute the school somehow, see "RSSKL".

[2] See, e.g., "Hertfordshire Private School Fails Ofsted Safeguarding Test - Again" [https://www.hemeltoday.co.uk/news/hertfordshire-private-school-fails-ofsted-safeguarding-test-again-706760].

[3] See, e.g., "Closed Steiner School to Stay Closed - For Now", August 24, 2018.

[4] See "Oriphiel" and "Michael". Also see the entries for "Uriel" and "Michael" in The Brief Waldorf / Steiner Encyclopedia.

[5] See "Polytheism".

— R.R.

September 13, 2018

CURIOUSER AND CURIOUSER - 

RETURN TO THE PRIOR

Here is a screenshot of the home page of the website of Rudolf Steiner School Kings Langley (RSSKL) as it appears today:

[9/13/2018    http://rsskl.org]

.

The message appearing on-screen today is the prior message, the message that had appeared before things suddenly seemed to change a day or so ago. Here is the old/new message:

Rudolf Steiner School Kings Langley

The Trustees of the school are very sad to announce that RSSKL has now closed and we are currently planning for a new future.

Please do check back for the latest developments. We will be providing updates as soon as we can.

Yours sincerely, The Trustees

Contact Information

Telephone: 01923 262505

Email: info@rsskl.org

Address: Langley Hill, Kings Langley, Herts WD4 9HG

For staff hub login go to: goo.gl/MGXqHj

Waldorf Watch Response:

What's up? 

A day or so ago, RSSKL seemed to announce the formation of two new kindergartens, which would evidently constitute the first stages of a new incarnation for RSSKL. [See "Undead Again? RSSKL Tries to Rise, Again", September 11, 2018.] But that announcement has now vanished from the RSSKL website, at least for the moment.

A Google search for "Rudolf Steiner School Kings Langley", at this moment, produces the following statement (among others):

"We are doing some maintenance on our site. Please come back later." — RSSKL

So perhaps all will be revealed soon.

We'll see.

The questions hanging over all this remain the same as they have been for quite a while, now. What future do the RSSKL trustees and their allies imagine? What plans are they making? Will these plans be lawful? Will they be practical? Will they stand a chance of success? How will the UK government respond? (The government had ordered RSSKL to close.) How will parents of school-age children respond? (Inspectors had found RSSKL to be a dangerous place for children.) How will insurers respond? (Insurance companies had withdrawn coverage for RSSKL.)

In brief: What will happen?

Stay tuned.

There's also this to mull over. Is some hoaxing (intentional or otherwise) going on? Are trolls (self-aware or not) laying traps for us (and perhaps for themselves)?

The Steiner-education movement (aka the Waldorf-education movement) exists in a fog a deception and self-deception. Rudolf Steiner encouraged his followers to mislead and deceive outsiders. [See "Secrets".] And, in order to believe the bizarre doctrines of Anthroposophy (Steiner's new religion, an offshoot of Theosophy), Steiner's followers must deceive themselves. [See "Inside Scoop", "Why? Oh Why?" and "Fooling (Ourselves)".]

Statements and indications and hints emanating from within Anthroposophy are notoriously unreliable. We must pick our way cautiously as we try to ferret out the truth.

RSSKL had been one of the leading Steiner schools in the United Kingdom. The school's collapse is potentially a severe blow to the Steiner movement generally. The core of the Steiner movement is populated by devout followers of Rudolf Steiner — devout Anthroposophists. They were never likely to accept the loss of RSSKL. They fought hard to keep the school running, and they seem to be working hard now to rebuild the school in some form.

To review the recent history of RSSKL as it has been reported here, see "RSSKL". For background on the Steiner/Waldorf movement, see such entries as these in The Brief Waldorf / Steiner Encyclopedia: "Anthroposophy", "Steiner, Rudolf", "Waldorf education: goals", and "Waldorf schools".

— R.R.

.

.

.

.

.

.

For further coverage of the RSSKL story,

see "RSSKL - 2".

.

.

.

.

.

.

[R.R.]

.

.

.

.

.

.