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Remembering Else Göttgens

October 21, 2013

Born in 1921 in Indonesia to a successful Dutch commercial lawyer and his flamboyant wife, Else’ first trips across the world began at the age of one, aboard the great steam-powered ocean-liners of the time. Largely raised by nannies and having not lived in one place for longer than two years until the age of 24, she first encountered Anthroposophy during the chance visit of a Waldorf school in Den Haag (NL) in 1939. She immediately and passionately espoused the education and took on her first class at the Zeist Steiner School in 1941. This began her remarkable 41-year vocation as class teacher at a number of schools in the Netherlands and the UK. In 1972, and while on this journey, she pioneered the Eindhoven Steiner School in Holland, a thriving school to this day. She spent her last four years there as a foreign language and remedial teacher before "retiring"… At 61, Else launched her new career as a full-time mentor and traveling "Master Teacher." For the next twenty years, she spent eight months a year "on the road," visiting schools on a regular circuit which included the UK, Hawaii, the US west coast (spring), the US east coast (fall) as well as schools closer to home in the Netherlands. As mentor to dozens of teachers, new and old, Else actively observed children of all ages in the classroom; she advised individual teachers as well as faculties and parent groups, offering on-going counseling and countless courses, lectures and workshops every year. A bit of a rebel at heart and always reluctant to take anything on authority, Else laughingly admitted that what helped her most in her mentoring work was the fact that she herself had made so many of the mistakes she saw along the way. More »