Day School

What is the school about?

Nomadic School is learning, personal development and community building guided by a profound love for perennial wisdom and mother nature.

Who is the school for?

The school is intended for children, adolescents, adults, and the elderly. We are seeking to build community that is inter-generational, multicultural, and multilingual. This school is for all those who share Nomadic School’s values (see further below for our values)

How will the school work?

1. The school will run 2 to 5 days a week depending on funding as well as the number of adults involved.
2. Courses and curriculum that facilitate a holistic understanding of self, nature, and the world will be organized and proposed by the adults involved at the school. Participation from the children and the teens will be optional. 
3. Children and teens are free to organize courses, projects, and activities that interest them.
4. Activities which help build a sense of community are to be organized and proposed by all those involved at the school, which include the children and teens.
5. Activities which foster a sense of oneness with mother nature, as well as projects and learning which help one to take care of the integrity and biodiversity of our ecological environment will be discussed and organized by all those involved at the school, which include the children and teens.
6. Service oriented activities will be discussed and organized by all those involved at the school, which include the children and teens. Compassion, kindness, gratitude are the qualities we aim to foster through service oriented activities.
7. Age mixing will be the norm in all of the activities and projects we organize together as a group.
8. All school related matters and issues are to be discussed and decided through weekly School Meetings. Everyone, children and teens included, are invited to join. We will explore various group decision-making models to see which ones work best.

What is the school’s admission process?

We ask all those who are interested in joining Nomadic School to take the time to understand its aims, values, and philosophy. It is important that everyone in this school are aligned on these. We invite you to try out this school for several weeks and ground your understanding through lived experience.

What is the school’s leave process?

Those who need or want to leave the school for any reason at any time are always free to do so. We only ask that if you have committed to certain roles or activities that you do your best to honor these commitments and transfer your role to the next designated person.

Nomadic School’s philosophy on learning & growth

1. For everyone and anyone, learning can happen anywhere anytime. 
2. A healthy environment is essential for healthy learning and growth. This environment is the community around us and nature herself.
3. Learning happens when a person is engaged with something wholeheartedly.
4. Wholehearted learning leads to development and growth.
5. Development and growth are directed by an intelligence intrinsic to each person. Each person develops and grows at her own rhythm and timing.
6. A person’s motivation for learning comes from honoring the life force within, which often express itself through a person’s instincts, impulses, and imaginations.
7. Artificial and extrinsic sources of motivations for learning are often counterproductive in the long run.
8. When not interfered with and encouraged and supported, everyone and anyone knows what to learn, when to learn, and how to learn.

What does Nomadic School value?

1. Nomadic School values personal development.
2. Nomadic School values the whole person: thoughts, feelings, desires, impulses, imagination, the physical, intuition, and self as center of pure self-awareness.
3. Nomadic School values community building: mixed age, inter-generational, multicultural, multilingual. 
4. Nomadic School values regenerative culture, which develops naturally from taking care of vulnerability, cultivating personhood, building beloved community, learning from mother earth, and love and serve others.
5. Nomadic School values mother nature and our relationship with her.
6. Nomadic School values all life on earth.
7. Nomadic School values perennial wisdom, which is always at the service of oneness and wholeness.
8. Nomadic School values taking care of ecological integrity and biodiversity.
9. Nomadic School values the transpersonal and the transcendent, which impels the individual as well as the collective towards Self-realization.

What is Nomadic School’s sources of inspiration and related movements?

Nomadic School’s Curriculum

The curriculum will be developmentally oriented but not necessarily age-constrained. For example, children between the ages of 3 to 10 may be keen to explore the natural world, but adolescents are welcome to join in on such themed activities too.

The curriculum will be holistic and integrated. We aim to design courses that combine multiple subject matters which are interrelated in a meaningful way. For example, learning about designing a house (aesthetics, architecture), city planning (how to design the processing of waste, the sharing of electricity and internet), and the science of the building material.

More to come soon…

Where will the school be located?

I want to experiment with weaving together a learning community that is both local and global. I reside in Belgium, so the local aspect of the school will be in Belgium.

The global aspect will depend on the creative solutions we come up with together in order for homeschooling and unschooling families to be able to meet with each other in person on a regular basis. My intention is for families with children of various ages to come together and be with adults who are passionate about sharing their life experience and expertise as a thriving community around the values, mission, and vision of Nomadic School.

For Belgium specifically: I intend for learners and adults to meet in places that are relevant for what we plan to do as a group, whether it is observing wildlife in the forest, learning about recycling at a waste management center, or talking to engineers at sustainability related technology companies. We may also have a fixed location where we can just hang out and enjoy each other’s company and let learning and relationship building happen naturally.

How much will tuition cost?

Tuition will vary depending on how many adults are involved and the curriculum we run for the quarter.

How will the school be paid for?

The school’s budget will be transparent and shared with the participating families. Based on this fact, families will pay (1) full tuition = full school budget divided by the number of students, or (2) another amount to be decided at the discretion of the family. We will also seek donations and grants that allow for us to remain independent in what we do.