Waldorf News

Adult Community Education Helps Combat Cultural Crisis

Adult Community Education Helps Combat Cultural Crisis

By Courtney H. Diener-Stokes

Schools are always abuzz during the day with educational programming for children, but after hours, there’s a private school in Chester County, Kimberton Waldorf School, that’s taking advantage of its campus in the evenings when it typically sits quiet.

Kimberton Waldorf School’s library, active during the daytime for various uses, serves as the location for the lectures that mostly take place in the evenings and occasionally on weekends. (Courtney Diener-Stokes)

The school is offering community education to adults —  all free of charge and open to the public.

After the school day, Kimberton Waldorf School welcomes adults to partake in a lecture series in their aim to cultivate community. (Kimberton Waldorf School)

Intended to focus on important and timely topics for all parents and educators, the series of public lectures are led by KWS’s Head of School, Dr. Brad Kershner. Each event, held in the school’s high school library, will include time for questions and discussion.

Cultivating community

Earlier this month, the first lecture to kick off the series centered on “Cultivating Community: Overcoming Cultural Fragmentation in a Polarized World.”

In the context of an upcoming presidential election, they explored ways to understand our cultural and political predicament from a developmental, growth-oriented perspective, with an emphasis on recognizing some of the most prevalent patterns and dysfunctions that inhibit the health of diverse communities.

“The evening was also a time to lay some groundwork and plant some seeds for big ideas and themes that will run through these and other gatherings, and to begin to build a robust educational community where adults are actually struggling with big ideas and striving to deepen their understanding about what is happening and what needs to happen in the world today,” Kershner said.

“We want adults in this community to understand the nature of the crises we are facing as a society, and to see themselves as the answer to those crises, because ultimately, building educational communities is the best answer to cultural crises that we can have.”

Co-creating an educational community

Offering lectures is a natural extension of Kershner’s ongoing mission and intention to serve humanity by leading and co-creating an educational community that is at the leading edge of human culture.

Brad Kershner, Kimberton Waldorf School’s head of school. (Courtney Diener-Stokes)

“I’ve gotten positive feedback from earlier talks and gatherings, and I was looking for the next logical step to take to move the conversation forward as a school,” he said.

In recent years, the school has had guest speakers come, but this year Kershner decided it was best for him to lead the topics of discussion because there were many that he had been thinking about.

“It felt that it would be helpful to our community to have these topics brought forward in a coherent and consilient way,” he said, “meaning not only are all these topics relevant and interesting for many reasons, but we as a school want to have and articulate an overarching worldview that is able to address and respond to each of these topics in a consistent, coherent, and comprehensive way — and the only way to do that is for there to be actual thought leadership within the school to form and shape that vision.”

Insights and information

Each lecture aims to bring together insights and information from multiple books and perspectives that will enable those attending to continue their education beyond his lecture series.

“At each talk, I will bring a collection of books related to the topic that I recommend and that people will be able to browse,” he said.

The next lecture on Oct. 28 at 6:30 p.m. will be centered on the topic of “Mental Health in a Changing World: Raising Children in a Digital Society.”

“This lecture will summarize recent research and insights related to mental health, the impacts of digital technology, and how some cultural trends are exacerbating the problems our children must learn to resolve,” Kershner said.

On Jan. 14, 2025, at 7:30 p.m., the topic will be ‘Artificial & Natural Intelligence.”

“Amidst the hysteria of hype about AI, and the elusive and perilous promise of AGI, there are fundamental and important distinctions between AI and humans that are not being well communicated or understood,” he said.

“This talk will try to summarize some important insights and distinctions related to AI and humans, to clarify what we should be concerned about and how we can shape and respond to the evolution of technology.”

Relationship to the natural and social world

On Feb. 22 at 10 a.m., the lecture topic will be “As Within, So Without: Understanding the Hemispheric Brain and the Genius of Waldorf Education.”

“This lecture will explore the ways in which our individual and collective experience is filtered through and shaped by our hemispheric brains, and the ways in which Waldorf education offers an integrated and balanced approach to learning that enables holistic understanding of and relationship to the natural and social world,” he said.

Pre-registration for lectures is not required and all are welcome to attend.

Free adult education lecture series

Each event is open to the public and includes time for questions and discussion. Learn more here: www.kimberton.org/lecture-series.

Location: Kimberton Waldorf School, high school library, 410 W. Seven Stars Road, East Vincent Township, Chester County