Friday. April it. um

i. .

340, the usual supply of emergency ad-
dresses and telephone numbers and one
week. The class split into small groups
to travel beyond Houston, some taking
a week to get to Mexico City and some
going directly. Several students hitch
hiked, and the rest took buses. Students
such as myself who rode in buses be
came well impressed with the necessity
of learning Spanish for efficient sur-
vival in Mexico. Crossing the border on
foot with backpacks and then getting
proper bus connections to Mexico City
required some fancy dictionary-page
flipping for “nnn»Spanish speakers"
such as myself.

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Everyone I: oq uaf
lillllllilllllllllllllilllllllllliillllllllllilllllllillllillllllillllllilllllllllllllllllllllllllllllililllilli

The concept of each roll class as
I community is strongly stressed, This
is not only an efficient necessity since
each class is independent of other
classes, truly living as an independent
unit for four years, but it is a mnnue
mental learning experience of itself.
How can one expect to work toward a
world community until one has learned
to truly act out of love towards one’s
neighbor? As much as possible in a
given cultural context, our class at-
tempts to regulate itself as a social
entity. We've spent more time in "com-
munity meetings" than in any other
collective activity. For many this has
been the most significant experience
thus far. Following someone else's rules
without considering their foundations
is the easy way out A FWi community
meeting is carried out “after the man-
ner of Friends." Every one is equal;
everyone has a voice The issue is dis—
cussed. REALLY discussed. until the
“sense" of the meeting is achieved.
True communication is almost like
magic it eliminates the need for ever
voting on an issue. After honest dis-
cussion the decision, if one is required,
is obvious to everyone. Someone may
well disagree with a decision arrived
at in a meeting but they'll recognize
through the discussion why their opinion
cannot and should not he accepted by
the rest oi the meeting. Needless to
say, these meetings are often long and
difficult, but they're rewarding.

After leaving Cuernavaca in the next
few days my class will divide into two
separate groups, going to two different
Imali and relatively obscure Mexican
villages We will assist with work pr0<
)ects already begun in these villages
under local leadership. in the case of
my village, this will mean building a
road which means carrying crushed
rock from a nearby quarry and spread-
ing it on the roadbed. My village will

'iho Gtinmii REPORTER

have no electricity, 3 minimum of
water, and a population of about 1.500,
the majority of whom have never been
exposed to North Americans in any
form. We'll be living in adobe huts and
cooking our own meals.'For six weeks
we’ll have direct and inescapable ex-
posure to the subsistence level of living
shared by twothirds of the population
at the world. We will be teaching classes
of art and English in the local school
and, in general, having an experience
not unlike the Peace Corp. Because my
special interest is in photography I look
forward to this village experience as a
unique change to intimately portray in
photographs as much as possible, the
essence of peasant culture in Mexico.

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Camping In
New Hampshire

IllillllliilllililllliilllliilllliiIllliiiilllliilllliilllliilllllillllliillllliIlllliiIilliiIlllliiillliillliii

During the first semester at FWI my
class spent a week camping out in New
Hampshire just when the leaves were
turning. This was a quiet and beautiful
trip as well as an educational one; it
culminated a series of seminars back
at Mitchel Gardens on Man and Nature
and intelligent useol natural resources.
on this “New England Study Trip" we
camped near an experimental forestry
station and attended seminars concerned
specifically with forestry conservation,
This was a restful time with lots of
copies of Walden available, singing
around the fire at night and lots of
free time for individual meditation. It
was an experience on many levels; I
watched beavers working on a dam and
learned how to prune a tree; i learned
how valuable beavers are and the ne-
cessity uf pruning for proper forest con-
servation and most important or all,
1 learned that forest production over
most of the world could be doubled
and consistent production in the future
guaranteed by the mere application of
already understood techniques of forest-
ry conservation. We run into that kind
of thing quite often at FWl, an aware
ness that in any number of contexts
the sacrifice of an extra bit of effort
combined with a proper bit of knowl-
edge can provide ior the future welfare
of mankind rather than lGNORiNG it.
perhaps atter four years at FWI all
that l'll really be aware of for sure
is that two thirds of the population of
the world is barely surviving from one
day to the next simply because of
hunger, and disease, while the other
third of the world has the means of
both helping to correct this situation
and of literally destroying the whole
world. But of course. , .everyone knows
that. . . . in its upplied philosophy of

A COMMUN-
ITY MEETING
or swarms
AND FACULTY
during the

school's visit to
Florida. Friends
World insti.
into, it n i i it e
Grinnell, makes
a serious at-
tempt to cre-
ate a real com-
munity or all
ihose arsoeiai.
ed with the
fell-col: rocial
"reguidii o n r“
a i. d academic
planning at.
considered to
be vital com-
munity con-
cerns.

Photo by
John Phillips

education, however, FW! makes an in-
teresting distinction between knowledge
and awareness; KNOWLEDGE is what
you have when you’ve mastered facts
and theories while AWARENESS is what
has happened when an individual is
somehow motivated to act on his knowl-
edge in a rational and human way.
Awareness has an extra and almost
mysterious element: you might call it
emotion, or even love. i . FWI is
dedicated, as an educational institution,
to the increased awareness of its stu-
dents to the very real problems which
presently face mankind. At the same
time, FWI hopes that its students will
become motivated to achieve in what-
ever way they are able, the hard facts
required for the execution of the spe-
cific discipline through which they want
to express their “awareness." This is
openly recognized as one of HIV:
major problems at present. While the
“freedom” from requirements is con-
sidered a necessity for a student's
growth to be correctly motivated and
for him to learn to TRULY think for
himself= this freedom demand: of the

“l

' Page Fiv:

student the maturity to develop self»
discipline with regard to his field of
special interest. in light of this lt’o
anticipated that a more formal education
may often follow the FWI experience
The beauty of this, however, is thai
such graduate study will be geared to
specific ends and motivated by individ-
ualistic and humanistic ideals rathel
than being executed out of habit as an
aimless extentlon of a formalized under-
graduate patiern which has often been
motivated by little more than a desire
to achieve an arbitrary social antler
financial status defined by parents and
contemporaries FWI believes that one.
takes a real chance to promise himself
ihat he will act on his knowledge in a
truly constructive and unselfish way
after receiving a formalized education,
Uninvolvement is a difficult habit to
shake. In the words of director, More
rls Mitchell, FWI is a school designed
to produce “agents of social change"
and in the process teach the "joy of
purpose.” The JOY of purpose. If you
can give someone these sorts of oriem
tation then formal. traditional education
will become a means to specific ends
and not a "necessary evil" or even
worse, an end in itself. The problems
that our generation faces, if it once
face them, are war, race prejudice,
waste of natural resources, hunger.
housing, education, population explo-
sion, pollution of air and water, poverty
amidst afﬂuence and in general, a dis-
astmus intolerance of and insensitivity
to both local and foreign cultural pat-
terns which in any way deviate from
the familiar. These problems are the
subject matter of FWI. The fact that
students in general in the United States
have one of the softest and least influen-
tial voices of any student group in the
entire world is frightening testimony to
the apathetic and often times down-
right selfish attitude that American ed-
ucation is giving to its products. Ever
increasing affluence in the US. is used
as a sort of perverted excuse for ever
escalating greed rather than being taken
as a responsibility and opportunity for
the furthering of the humanity of men
everywhere Whatever disadvantages
its approach may involve FWI hopes to

avoid this trend and give to its stu-

dents an awareness at the truly cone
structive potential of both wealth and
knowledge.

 

 

 

 

 

 

AN OUTDOOR DARKROOM IN CUERNAVACA, MEXICO — [L in R)
John Phillips, Laura Jones and Stove Rait, all iiudsnts at FWI. A basic

educational in of of ille school it in develop

individual talents and

ofentiai creativitios of each student in I way that best suit! him. Phii~
ipl lo. been working in photography and creative writing so well al
regular curriculum rtodien iii . are no "grader" given to student. or

ill- , school. - ' ’

 

