School Renewal: A Spiritual Journey for Change Book

As a result of today's crisis in education, people are beginning to realize that schools involve far more than providing children with knowledge and skills. Schools are communities and, like all communities, may be healthy or unhealthy.

School Renewal addresses the problems and challenges of a school community. Through the use of fairy tales, myths, and the personal experience of Waldorf education, Torin Finser describes how both teachers and parents can come to grips with common problems such as burnout, interpersonal conflicts, and the traps of routine. Most important, the author stresses that an educational community must come to terms with the many unseen dimensions of each individual. He shows how these little-understood aspects of the mind can be cultivated and nourished to keep the school and education alive.

School Renewal does not offer formulas and slapdash solutions. Rather, it encourages a whole new way of thinking about education and personal growth -for children and for the adults who care about them.

About the Author:
Torin M. Finser, Ph.D., is director of the Waldorf Teacher Training Program at Antioch New England in Keene, New Hampshire. He has been a Waldorf teacher for over twenty-five years and over the last few years has worked as a consultant to schools throughout the country.

Library Journal

Director of the Waldorf Teacher Training Program at Antioch New England, Finser persuasively addresses the problems and challenges of developing healthy schools. His first book, School as Journey, described his 25-year career as a classroom teacher and how curriculum unfolds in a school. Here, he focuses on the issues that arise outside the classroom. These issues include school leadership, community development, working together as adults, and burnout. For Finser, school renewal is about self-development, for only a community of self-aware individuals can take the steps necessary to engender health. His book, based on both experience and research, demonstrates how the educational community can contribute to a student's sense of inner certainty and decisiveness. While not always immediately applicable, the suggestions offered here contribute to new ways of thinking about education and personal growth. Highly recommended for school administrators, teachers, community groups, and parents. Leroy Hommerding, Fort Myers Beach Lib. Dist., FL Copyright 2001 Cahners Business Information.