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To Make a Social Difference

From Astrid Bjønness, teacher in Tønsberg, Norway

From the very beginning the Waldorf School was meant to be influential in the local community. It is almost 100 years ago, when the world was smaller (or bigger if you want), when your whole world was the village or the community you lived in, that the first Waldorf school opened its doors. The first schools influenced of course the families connected to them, but also the close surroundings with their plays, markets and fundraising events. Perhaps some pedagogically interested people also found some new ideas for teaching.Then from the 70’s there came a new generation. Here in Norway we had a boom from 1973 to 1995. By the beginning of the new century we suddenly found ourselves with almost 1000 schools around the world, representing all continents and cultures. It was a completely different picture from 50 years before.

Globalization
Already from the middle of the 80’s we could start feeling the globalization that really came upon us in the 90’s. When Gorbachev came to power in 1985 and started to meet the American president with new ideas, when Bob Geldof managed to organize the concert Live Aid directly aired on both sides of the Atlantic reaching 2 billion people in 1984, when Michael Jackson and Lionel Richie wrote We are the world, recorded it with 45 of the biggest musicians in USA, sold more than 20 million copies and raised more than $63 million for humanitarian aid in Africa, it maybe dawned upon some people that we were approaching a new era.The first Waldorf schools in Eastern Europe were founded in the beginning of the 90’s, and a couple of years later there was a number of schools in need of help, pedagogical, financial and organizational help. What could the “old” schools in Europe do to help the friends in other countries ? The Waldorf pedagogy was wanted in countries with no tradition for free initiatives.At the same time initiatives started to grow in other parts of the world, in Africa and South-America and later on in Asia. It was not only in the richer parts of the big cities, but also in villages, in favellas, in townships, and it created a new challenge. How could we help them to have an education?For some of us this became a pressing question. What could we do?

To make a global social difference
The old tradition of influencing your community had suddenly become a much larger issue with an enormous challenge to all of us.I felt we had to do something.What about making a solidarity action for all the pupils in Europe? That could create a lot of new awareness and some money for some of these poor areas.We have had the action Operasjon Dagsverk (Operation Give one day) in the Scandinavian state schools since the 60’s, and I thought the Waldorf schools should also contribute in this way.The idea was introduced in the European Council for Steiner Waldorf Education in 1993, and everybody agreed.With the help of contacts that Freunde der Erziehungskunst had built up over years we could find some good projects. Helmut Loebell from Austria/Colombia came up with the first project. As he had helped building up the first SOS children village in Colombia and lived in the country part of the time, he suggested one project in Sierra Morena in Bogota, the capitol of the country. This became our first project and has stayed with us ever since.WOW-Day was born. Waldorf One world had its small start in 1994.

WOW-Day: fundraising and awareness
The WOW-Day has been done in many different ways. Sometimes it is only one class making a lottery or working one day giving the money to the general account, sometimes there are two or more classes making an event to raise money for one special project and sometimes it is the whole upper school doing one day’s work.In Norway some schools have a tradition to make a so called International week or International days to create awareness for the country or the area of the project and follow it for many years. It makes the pupils connect to the project and wanting to have news also at other times of the year.In my school, the Steiner School in Vestfold in the south of Norway, we have had some fantastic international days the last years, and I will tell you about the ones we had this autumn 2010.

Planning the International days
The international days were planned for the third week in October. From the beginning of the school year we chose a working group with two representatives from each of the four upper classes. Together with me as the teacher representative we met once a week to discuss the organization.First of all we chose the project for this year. As we had the Sierra Leone and the India project for two years, and we knew that the classes from 6-9 would have Colombia, we chose the Educare Center in Cape Town. We have a Norwegian woman, Eldbjørg Paulsen, who goes to Cape Town for some weeks every year and we hoped she would give a lecture.We looked at the days and found that we wanted Tuesday 19th after main lesson and the whole Wednesday 20th before we had one working day on Thursday 21st .We had to ask the college of uppers school teachers, so we wrote a letter. I presented it to the teachers and explained why we needed two days. After some discussion the teachers agreed to give us those two days.Then we could start making the program. It turned out that Eldbjørg was not able to come, so we had to find a new way of presenting the township in Cape Town.We had heard about the two African boys in Globe Africa touring schools with African music, singing and dancing, and we contacted them. It turned out that one of them, Kabelo Diale, was in Norway ready to come to our school doing a work shop in gumboot dancing.Then we started to make the program for the two days. We wanted to start with a small lecture about South-Africa and the project in Cape Town. Kabelo was ready to tell about his country and I took on the task to tell about the project.Then we would have different working groups and decided on painting, poster design on computer, writing, juggling, cooking and dancing. Everybody in the organization group had a task to find out something and after a few days everything was ready.We decided to see the film Invictus, which gives a wonderful picture of how Nelson Mandela helped the rugby team to win the World Championship which took place in South-Africa in 1995.We also asked a former pupil who had done her year project on Nelson Mandela and the ubuntu, to give a speech on the theme.Now we had a program.

The International Days
We were very excited on 19th October. After main lesson all the pupils and some teachers gathered in the hall. Kabelo started by singing the national hymn of South-Africa. His voice was beautiful and we were all amazed from the very beginning. He told about himself, where he grew up, the apartheid and the new times for his country. Everybody listened carefully.After that I told about the project in the township of Cape Town and we were ready to go to the working groups. For one hour we worked in groups. The painting group was led by the painting teacher, and they made big pictures of African children. The juggling group was led by one pupil from the 12th class. They were all over the place trying to make a small performance for us the next day. The design group was led by a pupil from the 12th class and was in the computer room. They should make posters for the market on Thursday. The cooking group was in the kitchen cooking for all of us. It was a mix of teachers and pupils leading. And the dancing group with Kabelo was a big one having fun from the very beginning learning about the gumboot dance in the mines of South-Africa and dancing and sweating.At 12 o’clock it was time for lunch and the cooking group served all of us. As we have no tradition with a warm meal in school in Norway this is very nice for us creating a good atmosphere. It was of course some exotic food to remind us that we were doing international days.After lunch the groups kept on working and we ended the day with everybody in the hall looking back at what we had done. It was a very good atmosphere.The next day we went on with the groups and before lunch we saw the film Invictus which made a deep impression on us all.Our former pupil gave a fine speech on Ubuntu and told about her visit to the kindergartens in the township. We were ready for the last session of working groups!The last hour was the performance, all the groups should show what they had done. We invited 7th and 8th classes to the show.The paintings were on the walls, wonderful pictures of beautiful African children’s faces. The posters were on the wall, with pictures and maps of South-Africa, appeals and poetry mixed together in a way that few of us grownups know how to do. The cooking group told about their work in the kitchen. The juggling group stepped forward and showed us what they had learnt. And then it all ended with a great performance of the dancing group coming up the stairs singing and shouting. What they showed us was a small miracle! In the end we were all invited on to the stage dancing with Kabelo. There was so much energy in the room so much enthusiasm that we were all convinced we would do a great work the next day.And we did. Everybody worked one day and gave the money to the project. Some of us made a small market day in the town square, pupils form 5th class together with upper school pupils.We (the classes 5-12) collected 49.000 NOK (about 6000 euros) which is our main goal for the week, but we also got a lot of knowledge about South-Africa, we made friends with a beautiful young African who influenced our picture of Africa immensely and we had had a very good time! Can one wish for more?As some of the pupils put it: “This was the best International Week Ever.”I heard the same words the year before, so I was very happy.

Epilogue
We have gone from being a small initiative of a few schools in Europe which wanted to give a new cultural and social impulse to the local community to being a global movement with schools all over the world. At the same time the world has become one where we listen to the same music, dress in the same clothes, watch the same films and TV channels and communicate through social networks.We, teachers, pupils and parents in the Waldorf schools have to take part in this “One World”. WOW-day is one way of doing this. We can make a difference!We know that we are just a small part of this world, but we also know that what happens in one part of the world can influence us immediately.When we look into the world, as we do every morning, we can understand what Michael Jackson meant when he said: “You’re just another part of me”. (30.12.2010)