Scholé News – March 2023

For a long time, the call for educational freedom drifted through the educational landscape like a gentle breeze

Now it is gradually swelling into a gale. On 28 March 2023, a letter on legalising the free choice of education (see below!), jointly signed by numerous initiatives, was handed to the education authorities. In total, these groups represent around ONE HUNDRED THOUSAND people – the authorities will have to take note of that! Unschoolers, homeschoolers, alternative learning communities and other initiatives are appearing united for the first time. Representatives of business have also been brought on board, who would like creative, self-confident employees instead of demotivated school leavers. All signatories are aware that freedom can only be won for EVERYONE. Continuing to grant special rights to one particular form of education is profoundly undemocratic.

So far, the authorities have privileged “normal” citizens who hand over their parental rights and duties to institutions such as crèches, nurseries or schools. These include parents who are satisfied with the education system as well as dissatisfied parents who would rather complain than take the initiative themselves. Teachers, psychologists, social workers and all kinds of support and funding are available to them free of charge, i.e. financed from tax revenue. Wealthy families who choose private schools with public status have to pay part of the education costs themselves. Families who cannot or do not want to afford this and who take responsibility for developing their children’s potential into their own hands receive no state support whatsoever. Even if their children are undeniably doing well, they have to reckon with arbitrary official action, heavy fines, imprisonment and even the withdrawal of custody.

The fact that the population has accepted this unjust and utterly undemocratic state of affairs for so long can only be explained by the fact that, over many generations, people have been disempowered, directed downwards by instruction and kept down by entertainment. Just last week a client gave me a brand-new example of this: her son is in year 1 of a state primary school. Between two lessons the little ones have SITTING BREAKS there, during which they are not allowed to leave their seats and have to watch Mini-ZIB (the children’s news) so that the teacher can have some peace:

Our free, independent media, the seven-year-olds learn in child-friendly language on the public broadcaster’s news programme, are endangered by “Querdenker” (lateral thinkers) waving placards criticising the media at demonstrations. Or: Zelensky, the hero of our time, is fighting at the head of his brave people against the embodiment of evil. This is regularly followed by a report on threatening climate change, which will soon make the Earth uninhabitable. How this mix of information – combined with a ban on movement – affects sensitive children’s souls can easily be seen from the typical stress reactions: freezing in fear, aggression and/or escape into virtual worlds. This lays the foundation for a traumatised society that can be steered at will through fear and scaremongering, as we have seen all too clearly over the past 3 years…

The rising pressure has set in motion a counter-movement that is now finally gathering pace. The realisation that we have to start with children’s education if we want to escape the systematic re-traumatisation of society is increasingly being put into practice. Despite all the difficulties, a variety of alternatives to school lessons have sprung up in many places. The pioneers of self-directed learning pass on their experience to interested parents through courses, books, seminars and online congresses. More has been said about self-directed learning in the last 12 months than in the decades before!

Please join the peaceful educational revolution from below and spread our open letter among your friends and acquaintances. You can still sign it via the website www.freie-bildungswege.at (German). Every single person who begins to believe in a self-determined future brings us one step closer to this goal!

Warmest regards, Alexandra

Download the open letter (German)

2nd edition of “Lernen ist wie Atmen” (Learning is like breathing)

The 2nd edition of our book meets a completely changed readership.

In 2017, the idea that learning outside school was possible at all was considered the eccentric notion of a few outsiders. Since then, all parents, whether they wanted to or not, have had to deal with forms of learning outside school.

The number of children withdrawn from school has exploded since then, and alternative learning projects are springing up like mushrooms.

Buy the book (2nd ed., German)

Download eBook (1st ed., German)

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