quaker values & community
The traditions that inform a Friends education are centuries old, yet they provide a powerful education for 21st-century engagement, success, and fulfillment.
Friends graduates presume that learning requires perseverance, that they can accomplish more together than they can alone, that a diversity of perspectives enriches learning, that the habit of reflection and self-assessment leads to refined understanding, and that they are flexible and resourceful problem solvers. Beyond these academic advantages, they are primed to move through life with optimism, purpose, and joy.
... they are primed to move through life with optimism, purpose, and joy.
Two religious Quaker beliefs underlie a Friends education: every person has a unique Inner Light, and truth seeking is a process of continuing revelation in a gathered community. In our Quaker school, this means that each student enters the classroom with her particular responsibility to dig into the shared work of learning. As long time Quaker educator Parker Palmer points out, the common element between a Friends meeting for worship and a Quaker classroom is that both are collective searches for truth, with the expectation that “if we give it space and time, truth will come to us.”
Built on the foundation of Quaker philosophy, a Friends education is:
- Inquiry based, honoring questioning, deep study and process
- Highly participatory, requiring nuanced communication
- Intellectually challenging, stimulating curiosity and rewarding effort
- Reflective, taking time for complexity
- Purposeful, action oriented, in and of the world
- Respectful and inclusive of all
Learn more about our Quaker philosophy in Introduction to Quaker Testimonies