September 11th revisited: The call for Montessori partnerships with civil society

Montessori Life, Spring 2003 by Coe, Besty, Jankowski, Tom, McFarland, Sonnie, Yonka, Patricia

Outside the church, a 10-ft. aluminum peace pole was temporarily erected. People were encouraged to write peace thoughts and prayer contributions and place them inside the peace pole through opening slots.

Peace Abbey

Aside from the busy conference schedule, two members of our AMS group arranged fora dinner presentation from Lewis Randa, who is the director of the Life Experience School, Sherborn, MA, outside of Boston. Randa shared his work in a brief slide presentation after dinner. Adjacent to his school campus is the Peace Abbey, which serves as a retreat and training center and is managed by the same organization. On the grounds of the Peace Abbey, which serves as the National Registry for Conscientious Objection, are several monuments to peacemakers, including the Pacifist Memorial and the Monument to the Unknown Civilian Killed in War. The abbey acts as a conference and retreat for groups committed to social change through nonviolence.

The Pacifist Memorial consists of a 9-- ft. tall statue of Gandhi at the center of nine brick walls, each extending out from the center like rays of the sun. It is dedicated to men and women who have spent their lives working for nonviolent social change. On the brick walls are cast-iron plaques commemorating 60 of the world's peacemakers, such as Martin Luther King, Margaret Mead, John Lennon, Cesar Chavez. This year a 61st plaque was added to the memorial-that of Maria Montessoft. Montessori's plaque is inscribed: "MariaMontessori: Philosopher, Humanitarian, Educator, Italy's first Woman Physician. `It is the spirit of the child that can determine the course of human progress and lead it perhaps to a higher form of civilization.'" The ceremony was held on United Nations Day, October 24th. For further information, the Life Experience School and Peace Abbey maintain a web page at www.peaceabbey.org.

Furthering a Science of Peace

After the workshop on September 9th, we spoke with Betty Burkes and Meg Gardinier about establishing a partnership between AMS and the Hague Appeal for Peace. To further this, Betsy Coe, Sonnie McFarland, and Patti Yonka joined with the Hague Appeal for Peace and its Advisory Committee in New York from November 22-24,2002, to collaborate on peace education curriculum at a conference entitled, Integrating Peace Education into Curricula & Communities Worldwide. We are the ambassadors of the moment and we call on ALL MONTESSORIANS to form partnerships to further Montessori's education for peace! With the statistic that over 80p of the children being born today are born into poverty, it is the least and the most we can do for our children.

By Betsy Coe, Tom Jankowski, Sonnie McFarland, and Patricia Yonka

DR. BETSY COE, chair of the AMS teacher education committee, board member, and a past president of AMS, supervises the secondary program at School of the Woods, Houston, TX.

TOM JANKOWSKI teaches an elemen

tary class at Villa Montessori, Phoenix, AZ.

SONNIE McFARLAND, AMS board member, is head of education, Montessori School of Denver, CO.