In 2008, in Bali (Indonesia), The Green School was inaugurated, a school that defined itself as “international and progressive” and whose mission was to educate people who were going to lead the change to make the world more sustainable. “A school without walls, that ignites the natural curiosity of children, a place where innovation, creativity and learning flourish. A community that comes from all corners of the planet to share experiences. A place of happiness”, as the center’s website says.
This message, together with a spectacular bamboo building, and the attractions of one of the most beautiful islands in the world, attracted families from several continents. Professionals with the ability to settle in Bali (there is no boarding school at the school), to create a school community with “sustainable ethics”, as described by the center’s marketing department.
The idea worked. Today The Green School has half a thousand students, of 48 nationalities. New schools have been opened in South Africa and New Zealand and another is planned in Tulum (Mexico). In its wake, similar schools have appeared, with perhaps less spectacular facilities, but which propose an alternative form of education, in which contact with nature and ecology are the axis. In tune with new times, emotional education, mindfulness and, of course, school menus with organic ingredients or those grown in their own gardens are also offered.
And more and more families are choosing to change countries so that their children can go to schools of this type. The phenomenon of world-schooling is on the rise, to the point that the Financial Times dedicated an extensive article to it this summer. The report, therefore, was published in its Real Estate section: these schools attract people with a comfortable economic level and the family’s move to Bali, Sintra, Piedmont or New Zealand often implies an investment in the area, which usually translates into an increase in prices.
In Spain, the Times cited three centers of this type: The Learning Project and Universal Mandala, both in Ibiza, and The Alma Forest School, in Sotogrande (Cádiz). This latest school, which opened its doors in 2019, is the project of South African Sharyn McFarlane. It all started, she explains via e-mail, when she became a mother and began looking for schools for her son: “I was surprised, first, by the enormous academic emphasis that was placed on them from a very young age and, second, by the fact that the children “They shouldn’t play outdoors and get dirty, which is what I remember doing as a child.”
McFarlane was concerned about the idea that his children would not have the opportunity to live a more adventurous childhood with play as the central axis, so he began to document himself, took a course to learn everything about the so-called forest schools (which follow a outdoor education model) and opened his own center in Spain: “I have always been surprised that a country like yours, with its climatic and geographical characteristics, there were not a lot of schools of this type,” he says.
What attracts families? I ask. “While there are children sitting at their desks, ours, by agreeing how to build a dam on the beach or a cabin in the woods, are learning collaboration, resilience, teamwork, communication and other important skills.” ”McFarlane explains.
One could argue that these skills are also learned in traditional school or playing in the park, but McFarlane believes that schools like his are the future. “Many centers like this are appearing globally, although there are still a few years left before this style of learning becomes widespread: it is something that I believe everyone should have access to.”
At the moment at The Alma Forest School there are few: almost a hundred students, ages between three and fourteen years old. Mostly English, German and Dutch. The costs range from €6,000 to almost €10,000 per year. Tuition at The Green School in Bali runs about double that.
McFarlane describes the parents of his students as “educated and progressive people, who have read material very similar to what I read before setting up the school and are aware of the benefits of this educational approach.” Families, he says, whose main reason for moving to Spain is their school. One center adds: “That it has a lot of tribe.”
Belonging to a school community is another of the attractions of global schooling: “We are families who think alike and spend a lot of time outdoors, together, without technology, exploring towns, climbing, walking, camping… At the same time , we focus on how we are living and what impact we have on the environment,” McFarlne illustrates.
In the aforementioned Financial Times report, parents who opt for global schooling were described as professionals with a “corporate background” or “entrepreneurs who can work from anywhere in the world.” Digital nomads who are not convinced by the traditional schooling model and have the means to look for a school somewhere else, even if it is on the other side of the planet. Sometimes, especially for families from the United States, this option is even cheaper.
In addition to contact with nature, the premises of centers of this type are the classic ones of pedagogical renewal movements: the focus is on the interests of the student (“We value discovery more than teaching,” they say in Alma Forest) , which is something that characterizes the Waldorf and Montessori methods. Observation and manual work are encouraged and screens are moderated.
However, the difference here is the location: these global schools are located in places with beautiful, in some cases, spectacular nature. The Green School in New Zealand, for example, is in the vicinity of Mount Taranaki, a dormant volcano on the North Island. In South Africa, its campus is made up of eight hectares among beautiful mountains, surrounded by orchards and vineyards. The Hypha Learning Hub in Portugal borders the Sintra National Park, while The Alma Forest is on a beautiful estate just outside Sotogrande.
This environment is key, because the enjoyment of nature and environmental awareness are the key to this global education. The children of these schools are practically destined to save us from the ecological crisis that the planet is suffering. But: Is it fair to hold them responsible for solving something that their elders have created? “I believe that this work has to start from the families, we cannot preach without setting an example,” responds Sharyn McFarlane.
“We have to be consistent, we cannot tell them to save the planet and we do it so poorly,” adds Heike Freire, teacher and pioneer of Green Pedagogy in Spain.
To this last expert, author of books like Educar en Verde, I add another question: Is setting an example crossing half the world by plane to take your child to a private school? Is this educational model really progressive? For Freire, it is not a black and white question: “It is true that The Green School, for example, is an elitist international school. But not all of them are like that,” she points out.
Freire knows families who have opted for this type of centers: “And they are not people who are acting against anyone, they are people with a vision who want certain things and cannot find them in the traditional sector, which is outdated. They are families that have means and want other things for their children, and I don’t think that can be criticized.”
However, what he does find “disappointing” and reprehensible “is that for more than twenty years we have been talking about the psychological and cognitive benefits of contact with nature in childhood and that, at a social and political level, very little has been done.” to take it to everyone.” The result, he warns, “is that nature is being privatized, all over the world, by leaps and bounds. And nature is not a product: it is a right for all boys and girls.”
And this right, says Freire, is not given. What is serious: “Because children who come from disadvantaged families and perhaps do not have access to a park or in their families there is no culture about the benefits of nature, they are harmed. It seems to me to be irresponsible on the part of the public powers, those responsible for redistributing the inequalities generated by capitalism.”
The natural, Heike Freire insists, is becoming a privilege of the elites, which is also a mistake. This popularizer describes as “naivety” the idea that, if we want an ecological life, we go to the other side of the world so that our family is safe: “I cannot save my family if, on the other hand, I am polluting, because The biosphere is a whole: either we are all saved or none of us are saved. And in education, the same. “You don’t educate a child: either we educate them all or we don’t educate any.”
