The Rudolf Steiner Archive

18. Address at the Third Regular General Meeting of the “Freie Waldorfschule” Association

[ 1 ] Ladies and gentlemen, dear friends! It is my privilege to hereby open the third regular general meeting of the Association for a Free School System, the Waldorf School Association. It gives me deep satisfaction to welcome you most warmly on this occasion on behalf of the Executive Board, and I would also like to express my delight that you wish to join us in discussing the future of the Waldorf School Association. Before we proceed to the official agenda, please allow me—as a sort of introduction to the report of the Executive Board—to say a few words about the progress of the Waldorf school movement as a whole and about the affairs of the Waldorf School, insofar as you are involved in this progress.

[ 2 ] We have just recently concluded the educational and artistic conference, which was an extraordinary success; it so vividly presented to all of you here—and to many other interested parties—exactly what the Waldorf school movement strives for, and what can be strived for at all by an educational movement that meets the demands of the present and the near future, was presented in such a vivid way to all of you here and to many other interested parties. So, when discussing the current state of the Waldorf school movement, it is really only necessary to point out what has just come to light at this educational-artistic conference.

[ 3 ] I would, however, like to take the liberty of emphasizing a few points today that may be particularly important as a guiding principle for this gathering. After all, our last gathering here took place at a time when I was able to point out how the aspirations of our Waldorf school movement had proven their worth and spread—as evidenced by the fact that I myself had been invited at that time to speak about the nature of this Waldorf school movement on the occasion of the Shakespeare Festival in Stratford in 1922. And I was able to point out at that time that it was, in fact, a result of the fact that the Waldorf school movement had become known in England by then, and that this led to the invitation for the Oxford summer course in the summer of 1922, which enabled me to speak at length in England about what the Waldorf school actually aims to achieve. And one result of these Oxford lectures was, of course, the founding of an English school association that aims, first of all, to transform Kings Langley School into a kind of Waldorf school and, more generally, to work toward the spread of the Waldorf school ideal in England. This has clearly demonstrated that the ideas and impulses underlying the Waldorf school movement are capturing the interest of the present day in a very intense way. And once again, one could see here for oneself just how strongly this interest has taken hold in England, as evidenced by the fact that a number of English teachers attended the Waldorf School for an extended period at the beginning of this year.

[ 4 ] Another consequence of the spread of the Waldorf school philosophy is, of course, the course that I myself had to teach just a short while ago in Dornach to a group of Swiss teachers—educators who had initially organized the course. In addition to the Swiss teachers, seventeen Czech teachers participated in this course. And it was precisely during this course that it became clear just how natural it actually seems to the hearts of educational professionals that something like what our school movement is attempting should take place. From everything that was said at this course held in Dornach, one could truly see how a deep longing exists, especially among professional educators, to introduce into the art of education something that intensively aims, on the one hand, at spiritualization and, on the other hand, at making the art of education truly practical.

[ 5 ] And it is, after all, quite understandable that a very specific sentiment, a very specific feeling, has been expressed—particularly by figures in the field of education—in connection with this most recent Swiss course. The point is that it is precisely those for whom the aims of such a course are deeply important who are, in a certain sense, dismayed by it. I am merely recounting what was said: Someone said during the Dornach course—speaking for many of those gathered at the time—that the serious-minded participants were particularly dismayed by the realization of how little they were able to process with their own souls all the necessary pedagogical impulses that came flooding at them over the course of just a few days.

[ 6 ] Well, you see, I was then compelled to respond to this objection, which seemed entirely justified to me. Such a thought very clearly expresses what many people today are feeling. Many people today know full well: something truly radical and transformative must happen if our school system is to meet its social demands and emerge from the conditions into which it has fallen. People really don’t often stop to consider how necessary a radical reform of educational impulses is. But when one reflects on it, one finds among parents and teachers, deep in the core of their souls, a half-conscious or fully conscious conviction that such radical impulses must be introduced into the educational system. Then people hear what we have to say, and the fact is that many at the artistic-pedagogical conference felt this way; they said: “Is all of this supposed to be done now?” How are we even supposed to manage all this? In just a few days, such a flood of demands pours over us—yes, forgive me for putting it this way, but it’s a sentiment I’ve often heard—we come here with the best of intentions, and leave like a poodle completely drenched in “ideal water,” which, yes, at first wants to shake off what has been poured over it.

[ 7 ] As I said, this was in fact expressed many times at the most recent Dornach conference. And I replied: Yes, that is certainly understandable, but it is necessary to consider the following. People take a long time to get used to the educational practices of today—the ones carried out in schools everywhere. It’s something you can grow into gradually. — Because people can only devote the few days they have available to receiving impulses for progress to us, we are compelled to convey what we have to say to them within those few days. It is quite understandable that people feel overwhelmed in this way. But if what is nevertheless necessary were to come to pass—that through the inspiration that is, after all, always being provided, ever wider and wider circles were won over to generate interest in the matter at hand—then we would also be in a position to convey what we have to say at a slower pace. Then people would not need to feel overwhelmed.

[ 8 ] This is proof that we would have to work very intensively in order to give us the opportunity—not, I would say, to burden people with our ideas in the blink of an eye, but rather to actually be able to maintain the pace that seems necessary for most people to grasp these ideas. So I must point out: If this insight were taken as a starting point, then we would be given the opportunity to express ourselves more precisely, to speak more slowly. It all depends, then, on a genuine interest in our cause developing in ever-wider and wider circles. For it is, after all, quite remarkable how things actually stand.

[ 9 ] You see, one must take a look at the internal development of the Waldorf school movement over the past four years, since the movement was founded. Of course, the facts must be evaluated correctly. Today we have about seven hundred students at the Waldorf school and about forty teachers. Yes, years ago we started out with fewer teachers and fewer than two hundred fifty students. Well, these two figures—the one from back then, two hundred or two hundred fifty students, and the current one, seven hundred students—these two figures, however, signify something internally that is extraordinarily characteristic of the Waldorf school movement. You see, they signify—not in a pedagogical or didactic sense, but in a cultural and social sense—a complete reversal of the Waldorf school movement, a true reversal. A—well, depending on one’s perspective, one might say: putting it back on its feet or turning it upside down; that makes no difference to me. What I mean is this: When the Waldorf School was founded, the idea among our friends was initially a social one. The aim was to establish a kind of unified school—a school that corresponded to the prevailing social impulses of the time, which, in 1919, had indeed come to the surface of people’s social thinking and social sensibilities. Such a school was to be founded. The idea of the Waldorf School was conceived out of the social conditions of the time. And this may now be a bold hypothesis, but neither Mr. Molt nor you will take offense if I say—of course, this is to be taken with a grain of salt—if I describe, in a way that can be clearly expressed, how this reversal took place.

[ 10 ] Suppose Mr. Molt had not been an anthroposophist back then, but—since he wasn’t, we can say this—a philanthropic factory director, as there were many at that time; he, too, would have conceived the idea of founding a school based on social conditions. But the Waldorf School as it exists today would certainly not have come into being. The Waldorf School as it exists today came into being solely because it was born out of anthroposophy—that is, because it was not merely a philanthropic factory owner but Mr. Emil Molt, the anthroposophist, who conceived the idea, and because he drew upon anthroposophy for its methodology and didactics.

[ 11 ] So, now we have what we actually need to cite as the cultural-historical and social aspect. We have the fact that a concept of time has been realized with the help of anthroposophy, which was intended to provide the methodology and didactics.

[ 12 ] Now you see, over time, a reversal has taken place: the large number of students we have today—that is, the spread of the Waldorf school ideal within the Waldorf school itself—has come about solely because of the pedagogy and didactics cultivated in the Waldorf school. So the original idea has been turned on its head. The original idea drew upon the pedagogy and didactics practiced here. But the Waldorf School has become—as was indeed right—what it is today precisely through this pedagogy and didactics. And today, parents who have enrolled their children at a later stage essentially seek out the Waldorf school precisely because of this pedagogy and didactics. Thus, over the course of these four years, this important development has taken place: within the Waldorf school, the pedagogy and didactics born of anthroposophy have come to the fore.

[ 13 ] And it was precisely this pedagogy and didactics that sparked interest in England, led to the course in Dornach, and so on. It is a specifically pedagogical concept that is realized through the Waldorf School, and that is also what I have had to emphasize more and more in recent times. So the seven hundred students—and the overall growth of the Waldorf School—have been brought about by the pedagogy and didactics cultivated there. And the efforts we often see today to establish schools modeled after the Waldorf School also prove this.

[ 14 ] You see, for me, of course, what came to pass there was, from the very beginning, what was valid. From the very beginning, I understood the mission of the Waldorf school to be purely pedagogical and didactic, and over time it has become quite clear that wherever people took an interest in the Waldorf school concept, it was because of this pedagogy and didactics.

[ 15 ] Now, the various courses have certainly demonstrated that there is interest among teachers and educators, but I would like to say that it is also evident in the aspirations of parents. You see, just the day before yesterday, a number of parents in Berlin came to see me again and said: “Well, what are we to do? We’ve formed small school groups, taught classes, and tried to apply the Waldorf school principles. But now the government is stepping in and won’t allow it; we have to send our children to the public elementary school.” Couldn’t we perhaps create a way to provide information by establishing a branch of the Waldorf School here?—People thought that since this is still possible at the Waldorf School—where the government doesn’t intervene and a more liberal approach is in place—it might also work in Berlin if a branch of the Waldorf School were established.

[ 16 ] I said: Of course, that won’t work, and this example shows that the Waldorf school concept cannot be implemented at all without the idea taking hold on a very broad scale—a recognition of what, deep down, thousands upon thousands, indeed far more than thousands upon thousands, unconsciously desire. People, after all, essentially want what is being sought here; they just don’t dare admit that they want it. And I still maintain that it was right for me to call for the World School Association, now that a model exists; that it is not our task to engage in all sorts of other experiments, which actually pop up everywhere like—I might say—quackery in the field of medicine—not real quackery, of course, but quackery that has been labeled as such; that it is more important, rather than pursuing that matter, to continue spreading—further and further—an understanding, a genuine, real understanding of Waldorf school pedagogy. It must be spread further and further. Then the rest will follow.

[ 17 ] For you see, the very essence of the Waldorf School’s mission lies in the development of education itself and in the relationship between that development and the great cultural and social ideas. You see, perhaps you will find it of some interest if I draw your attention over a longer period of time to the shift in human sensibilities that ideas have not yet caught up with.

[ 18 ] In March 1792, there was a Chancellor of the Empire in Central Europe who summarized the task of public education in just the following words: “It is, of course, the responsibility of governments to disseminate the riches of the mind, and governments must establish a kind of state police for this dissemination of the riches of the mind, just as they do for the enjoyment of other social affairs of the people.” These words were spoken from the perspective of a mind concerned with educational matters at the end of the 18th century—a time when it was believed that people must receive directives from above regarding all aspects of social, communal, and human affairs, and above all, directives for the conduct of educational and didactic matters.

[ 19 ] And in the 19th century, there was a young man named Fröbel who, even as a twenty-three-year-old, said: “To me, all attempts in the field of education—even Pestalozzi’s, without exception”—so said Fröbel—“seem crude and merely empirical. For it would be necessary to arrive at exact principles of teaching, just as the natural sciences have exact principles.” That is what Fröbel said.

[ 20 ] These two things—the statement by Imperial Chancellor Rottenhahn in 1792 and the passage from a letter written by the young Fröbel to his friend Krause—give a rough idea of what was prevalent at that time and what must be overcome today. For the prevailing view—and it still prevails in many quarters and must be overcome—was this: Yes, one does not concern oneself further with matters such as those of pedagogy and didactics; it goes without saying that one leaves these to the state. And the other idea is this: The natural sciences are supreme. Whoever studies them, whoever proceeds from them, must also find the correct pedagogy.

[ 21 ] Within both schools of thought—the paternalistic and the scientific—it has become evident, particularly in the field of education, that we have reached a dead end. Of course, the intention was to do what was best when it was suggested that a kind of state police force should be established in the field of education as well; of course, the intention was to do what was best, but what has emerged is precisely what people feel must be changed.

[ 22 ] Educators sigh with frustration: We don’t really know how to treat people; we believed that through a—how shall I put it? I mustn’t say “hodgepodge,” since even the adherents of the exact natural sciences wouldn’t have put it that way—let’s say, a synthesis—to use a different word—through a synthesis of anthropology, psychology, ethnology, and, more recently, even psychiatry, we could bring together what constitutes the art of dealing with people. Time has shown that such an approach doesn’t work, as Fröbel intended out of a deep pedagogical conviction. And today people find themselves in this situation—this has become evident among all those who attended the courses, and it’s evident from a desire such as the call for a branch of the Waldorf School in Berlin—people find themselves in a position where they say: We know for certain that something must come. But when people from the Waldorf School talk to us about these things, we’re like a poodle doused with ideal water. It doesn’t sink into our heads in a few days, but we know something has to happen.

[ 23 ] This is what we must keep very clearly in mind: Our efforts reflect the longings of thousands upon thousands of people, and we must do everything in our power to make the Waldorf school ideal, with all its impulses, more and more popular, so that it becomes something that people see as a necessity of our time. To achieve this, all that is needed is for many people to find the courage to embrace what they have long felt, in an indefinite way, in the depths of their souls. - This is precisely what I would like to continue instilling anew in the hearts and minds of the friends of the Waldorf school ideal who attend such gatherings. For this is, after all, the most important thing we need: to spread interest and to promote efforts to popularize the Waldorf school. That is what we need.

[ 24 ] And you see, something similar is also necessary with regard to the inner development of our method. When we founded the Waldorf School four years ago, with eight classes, yes, it was quite clear to us: the curriculum and educational goals must be created out of what people like Fröbel and others unconsciously strove for; they must be created out of a genuine understanding of the human being—everything based on a genuine understanding of the human being, as it arises solely on the foundation of anthroposophy. That is how one creates a truly universal school—not a school based on a particular worldview, not a sectarian school, but truly a universal school.

[ 25 ] What everyone had envisioned as the ideal for decades was clear to us back then: One can only try—because one must take other circumstances into account—to push the compromise so far that one says: for the first three years of school, things must proceed in such a way that the only guiding principle for educational goals and the curriculum is what human nature teaches. By the end of the sixth grade (age twelve) and the end of the eighth grade (age fourteen), we wanted the children to have reached a level where they could also transfer to another school. We wanted to create the possibility, on the one hand, of realizing the Waldorf school philosophy for as long as possible, while still offering the children the opportunity to transfer.

[ 26 ] This is something that is actually easier to implement for the eight grades of elementary school than for that expansion—which has also proven to be a necessity—namely, the expansion resulting from the ninth, tenth, eleventh, and twelfth grades, where gymnasium and Realschule education builds upon elementary and Bürgerschule education. After all, it is now said that young ladies and young gentlemen must be brought to the point where they can take their high school graduation exams and gain admission to a university. Even if some individuals have shown a willingness to establish a university, these are still, for the time being, mere illusions; the endeavors we pursue should always be grounded in reality.

[ 27 ] Well, the difficulties, of course, lie in the fact that we are already compelled to allow the young ladies and gentlemen to graduate so that they can take the Abitur exam and then attend a university, from which they will receive qualifications for what is today called “practical life,” in order to be able to enter that life. In these upper grades, it immediately becomes apparent how much more difficult it is to reconcile the ideal Waldorf School requirement—to derive the curriculum and educational goals from human nature—with the arbitrary curricula that lack everything that human nature actually demands.

[ 28 ] Once students reach the ages of fourteen, fifteen, or sixteen, they should be introduced to real, practical life—that is, they should gain an understanding of what actually happens in real, practical life. Instead, the Latin and Greek teacher comes along and throws it in your face: when you want to address the real demands of understanding human nature, when there are school lessons in chemistry and technology, in weaving, in spinning—in short, things one should know in life—then the Latin teacher comes and says: “Then I only have so many Latin classes that I can’t prepare anything for the Abitur.”

[ 29 ] And so these irresolvable conflicts arise because, on the one hand, we are always striving to realize the Waldorf school ideal in the purest, most beautiful way, while on the other hand, we are forced to compromise it through all sorts of concessions that naturally arise from the fact that we simply cannot tear young people away from—forgive me—so-called practical life. Isn’t that right? We do place them in life exactly as they should be placed, but so-called practical life then pushes them back, and they become bohemians. —I also used that word recently at the Swiss course and had to apologize right away because there were people from Bohemia present. - But it is certainly true that we must thoroughly recognize that we are not striving toward the ideal of bohemianism, but toward a truly practical life—toward a form of education and instruction that truly places people within practical life. But first, there must be a comprehensive understanding of what human nature actually entails and demands.

[ 30 ] And so the Waldorf school philosophy will not gain popularity unless we resolve to make clear what I alluded to today. The Waldorf school philosophy will not gain widespread acceptance if one speaks only in abstract terms—that children are taught in a comfortable way, that learning takes place through play, and so on. If one comes forward with all these trivial ideas—the same ones everyone else uses—and fails to address the concrete matters that truly lie unconsciously in people’s hearts, then one will not make the Waldorf school philosophy popular.

[ 31 ] And today we face the difficult task of being compelled to do something so that, in the future, we do not have to live hand-to-mouth when it comes to the Waldorf School’s finances. Based on the available funds, one can never be sure whether the Waldorf School will be able to stay open for three to four months; one is constantly forced to manage finances into the unknown. Now, certainly, the Waldorf school ideal is something one can stand so firmly behind that one can even muster the enthusiasm to venture into the unknown. But on the other hand, responsibilities come to light, and in fact the hiring of every new teacher is such a responsibility that it must be stated plainly: The entire financing of the Waldorf School—as the starting point of the Waldorf School movement, as the first pedagogical example of how to educate and teach using this method—must be based on a financial foundation that guarantees a certain degree of stability.

[ 32 ] This is what I would like to add—I would say—as a necessary consequence of what I have just explained. This esteemed assembly must do everything in its power to reach decisions that will stabilize Waldorf school funding in such a way that we know for certain: We can shoulder the responsibility; it cannot come to the point where the whole thing falls apart after a few months. We can see where the factors lie that aim to bring this endeavor to fruition financially. Then the external framework would also be in place. For I can assure you of this, my esteemed attendees and dear friends: The experiences we have in the courses that are held—in my Oxford course and my Swiss course—and what we perceive as the longings of both teachers and parents—all of this shows that the Waldorf school movement is something deeply rooted in the development of our civilization as a necessity. This has been practically demonstrated today by everything that has taken place. On the other hand, the way work is carried out in the Waldorf school—how there is indeed something inherent in the Waldorf school’s teaching staff, something from which the entire Waldorf school impulse radiates—shows how, out of the purest enthusiasm, a strong will nevertheless takes root in the world; this may have become most evident to you at the recent artistic-pedagogical conference. With these two aspects in mind, I would say the matter stands on a sound foundation. Please forgive me for asking you to discuss how to reconcile these two columns—which I wanted to highlight in particular—namely, the first column: the demands placed on our time by parents and teachers, and on the other hand, that which lives in the Waldorf School as a sacred, appropriate, and professional enthusiasm—I would like to ask for your advice on how a third column might be added: the stabilization of the financial foundation.

[ 33 ] It is indeed sad that we even have to talk about this. But that is simply the way things are today: everything requires money—a lot of money. And it is certain that if we find ways to foster understanding for the Waldorf school movement, then we will also secure the necessary financial resources. It is therefore true that one must find the path from the first part of what I have just explained to what I—in all modesty, as it must be called in this case—set forth as a demand at the end of these discussions.

[ 34 ] This was followed by business negotiations.