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Educating for Sustainability:

Letters from an Alum

 

by

Charles W. Rusch

Professor of Architecture Emeritus

University of Oregon

December, 1997

About the Author:

Charles W. Rusch is a Professor of Architecture Emeritus at the University of Oregon, Eugene, where he teaches courses in "Sustainable Architecture" and "Architecture, Mind, and Environment." In the past, he has also taught courses in Architectural Design Studio, Architecture and Meaning, Social and Behavioral Factors in Architecture, Visual Thinking and Inquiry, Architectural Computing, and Design Arts. Mostly retired now, he lives on the edge of the Pacific Ocean where he reads, writes, and works on architectural and sustainability projects in his community. He graduated from Middlesex School in 1952.

[The following is a chapter in a book about education and the environment for the National Art Education Association. The article summarizes the Estabrook Woods situation at Middlesex School in Concord, Mass., and the correspondence the author had as an alumnus with the school as a kind of case study of visions of environmental education. Citation: Rusch, Charles W., "Educating for Sustainability: Letters from an Alum". In Joanne K. Guilfoil and Alan R. Sandler, (Eds.), Built Environment Education in Art Education, Reston, VA: The National Art Education Association, (1999), pp. 92-117.]

Abstract:

This chapter begins by describing an environmental controversy, which has developed at one of the nation’s finest prep schools, about whether and where to place some new playing fields and faculty housing. Through a series of letters, it examines that controversy to reveal its roots in the environmental crisis and values of our culture. The controversy is tied to the broader issue of educating for an ecologically sustainable culture and concludes that simple changes in curriculum will not be sufficient to meet the challenge. Rather, a fundamental shift in the values of the entire school community will be required–a shift which will be reflected not only in the curriculum, but in the school’s stated policies, its architecture and building program, its land-use plan, and its management.

Prologue:

In early September, 1995, I received a form letter from two individuals, representing a small group of alumni, students, and faculty of the independent prep school I attended in New England. The group called itself, "Common Sense at Middlesex School." Middlesex School is located on a large piece of land three miles north of Concord, Massachusetts, in the county of Middlesex. It has over 300 students of which about 25% are day students. Middlesex opened in 1901 as a college preparatory boarding school for boys, but it is now coeducational, with its graduates applying to colleges all over the country. The original campus was designed by the firm of Frederick Law Olmsted, the designer of New York’s Central Park (among many other outstanding designs), who is often spoken of as the father of American landscape architecture. It is a lovely campus, with most of the buildings arranged around a large circle lined with oak trees. Administrative offices and the main classrooms are at 12 o’clock (east), the chapel at 6 o’clock (west), the dining hall at 9 o’clock (north), and a long entrance drive comes into the circle at 3 o’clock (south). Four dormitories fill in the circle, and others hover close by. There is a half-mile long lake, Bateman’s Pond, nearby to the east with a small boat house, and across the lake a large woods called Estabrook Woods. To the north of the dining hall are the athletic buildings, and to the west, between the circle of buildings and the road lie the playing fields.

Middlesex bills itself as "the best of the small independent preparatory schools," an approbation with which I have no quarrel. It is a very fine school indeed, with excellent academics, an outstanding faculty, an enthusiastic and energetic student body, a fine athletic program, and a good physical plant on a beautiful campus. Accessibility is improved each year with a growing fund of financial aid and an aggressive program to increase diversity and gender balance. Alumni and parental financial support, on a percentage basis, is consistently among the highest in the nation. As a biased alum myself, I would place Middlesex in the ranks of the best schooling the country has to offer.

The alumni letter I received detailed a controversy taking place over some planned additions to the campus. The proportion of girls in the school is currently moving from about 40% towards 50%, and the school has decided that it needs to build more playing fields because of this new mix. In addition, many of the faculty members live off campus, and Middlesex, as a residential school, wants to build more faculty housing on campus to accommodate them. Where to put these additions is the subject of the controversy. The school’s position is that the only place for the playing fields, as well as the housing, is in an area in Estabrook Woods across some wetlands north of and near the pond. The school had recently promised to consign a large portion of its part of the Woods to a pool of privately owned contiguous properties to be held under a conservation restriction, protecting them in perpetuity, but the remainder, closest to the school, had been retained against the possibility that it would be needed in the future. This proposed expansion is the first proposal to use some of that woodland for buildings and grounds. [It should be noted here that the foregoing represents the original position of the school’s board of trustees. As the controversy has unfolded, the Board has moved away from this position of urgency to one of establishing access to the Woods for the purpose of expansion at some time in the future.]

The ad hoc alumni group was shocked and offended that the school would want to put a bridge over the wetlands and put roads, parking, playing fields, and houses in the Woods. Their position was largely environmental, but partly sentimental and educational, based on their memories of the Woods as an important part of their Middlesex experience. The purpose of their letter was to inform the alumni of these plans and to enlist support for the group’s position. All alumni were invited to comment, and I did, along with about 400 others, mostly in protest.

Shortly thereafter, the Board of Trustees sent out a response to the alumni, dated September 28, 1995, which included a two-page summary of the history of the controversy and of the Board's position. After reviewing the Board's decision regarding the need for expanded facilities, the statement, quoted as follows, turns to the issue of Estabrook Woods (the original sentence order has been changed slightly for clarity and brevity):
  

"... During this period (1991-1994, while assessing expansion needs), Middlesex initiated a number of meetings with a small group which was discussing the area of woodland known as Estabrook Woods, which is owned by many private landowners, by Middlesex (about 200 acres, which includes Bateman's Pond and the land to its east), and by Harvard University (670 acres... used as a zoological station)... Local conservation groups have been eager to preserve these Woods through a permanent Conservation Restriction (CR). Needless to say, Middlesex shares that desire. Nevertheless, when it became known that Middlesex wanted to use some of its land (approx. 12 acres) to build athletic fields, housing and tennis courts, some members of the community felt that the School was undermining any possibility of securing CRs to accomplish the permanent preservation of the Estabrook Woods. This criticism has continued in spite of the existence of photographs dating from the 1930s which show that much of the woodlands in question were farmlands...

"In the fall of 1993, Middlesex submitted its long-range land use plan to Concord's Planning Board (which has purview over changes in land use) for its review. The permitting process invites public review, and when the School's plans became public, a group of people voiced some considerable, passionate objections because of the wetlands crossing and the use of a portion of the School's land which has been considered part of the Estabrook Woods. The local press picked up the story, and since then, the School's opponents portrayed Middlesex as a local environmental villain...

"In the summer of 1994...Harvard agreed to protect its part of the Woods if...an additional 400 acres in the vicinity could be secured... As an abutter, Middlesex signed a CR on 55 acres of its land (the southern and eastern portion, not the northern portion in question here)...

"Since Concord's Planning Board unanimously approved the School's plans on May 1, 1995, Middlesex has been meeting before the Natural Resources Commission (which must review plans with potential wetlands, wildlife, or other natural resource impacts)...

"The Middlesex Board of Trustees...is absolutely committed to furthering the School's legal right of access to its own land, while still responding conscientiously to the potential ecological and archeological concerns raised..."

Before a bridge over the wetlands could be built, a wetlands permit was required from the town of Concord, and the NRC turned the school down. A revised plan was turned down a second time, so the school withheld its signed agreement to contribute 55 acres to the conservation pool until the NRC's decision had been appealed to the Massachusetts Department of Environmental Protection, and it threatened legal proceedings as well to gain its "legal right of access to its own land." These actions polarized the situation and alienated many townspeople. The controversy escalated and another group was formed, "Middlesex Graduates for Estabrook (MGFE)," which began actively lobbying the alumni and trustees on behalf of the Woods. They proposed an alternative strategy of four recommendations to save the Woods, which they submitted to the Board of Trustees: 1) at least a two-year moratorium on the School's plans for the Woods; 2) a better process of bringing together the School’s family in its long range planning; 3) consideration of other sites for new fields and other facilities; and 4) the formation of an official graduates organization. While the Board contends that they read and responded to these recommendations, representatives of MGFE feel that the four points were dismissed without serious consideration.

Letters and Commentary:

Following the previously mentioned activity, I received a long form letter, dated March 15, 1996, from the school, detailing the administration’s position and its justification for its intended actions, including its appeal of the NRC ruling to the state's Department of Environmental Protection. The letter also announced an agreement between the school and the town to send the issue to mediation, where they would be joined by representatives of the League of Women Voters and a citizen group. It is in response to this letter from the school that I wrote my first letter to the Head of School, Dr. Deirdre Ling. My intention was to help her understand the position of the environmentally oriented alumni, but as an environmentalist myself, I perhaps aligned myself too strongly with that position. I also did not know at the time that the terms of the mediation prevented her from responding publicly to the issues in contention. The letter follows:

April 17, 199

Dear Dr. Ling,

I have never had the opportunity of meeting you in person, but I look forward to the pleasure of doing so one day. In the meantime, I thought I would write this letter about some concerns I have, particularly regarding the Estabrook Woods debate now ongoing, but more generally about directions Middlesex might need to take as we enter the 21st century.

The strongest lesson I have learned, teaching architectural problem solving and design for the last 30 years, is this: If I am working on an intractable problem, one which refuses resolution despite repeated approaches from different directions, chances are I have been working on the surface of the problem and need to go deeper, into the very heart of my assumptions about it, to find a solution.

I think the Estabrook Woods situation may be such a problem. I have read the letters from the concerned group of recent graduates and faculty. I have discussed the issue with my class representative, when he called about the annual fund. And I have read both the annual report, with the statements of the staff, and the more recent position paper of the school regarding the Estabrook controversy which was mailed to all alumni. I think that there is one very large unstated assumption being held about the School's future which is getting in the way of resolving the issue to everyone's satisfaction. The assumption is that Middlesex in the 21st century be essentially the same school that it is today. That is to say, there should be in the future the same emphasis on traditional academics balanced by a strong athletic program, in a supportive value-based 24-hour living environment. Some take exception to the values part; from the alumni bulletin one would gather that some of the alumni would like to return more strongly to the social or even religious values of the past. But basically, the assumption held is that "we like the way the school is now, and we want to project that essential 'correctness' into the future." Sounds good. How can I argue with that? Yet I think that it is this very assumption which is getting in the way of resolving the Estabrook Woods problem.

What seems to be needed is to look deeply into the way the school operates and to make an honest assessment of whether changes need to be made as the 21st century unfolds. Once that deep thinking is done, answers to surface problems like whether to expand into Estabrook Woods will be obvious; they will simply fall into place without question, or at least that is my position in the matter.

Before I suggest some of the deeper issues to be considered, permit me a small digression. In this election year, with many candidates surfacing at all levels of governance and (if we're lucky) sometimes speaking to the issues, one often hears the expression, "Oh, (s)he's a one-issue candidate," and then some form of dismissal. I would like to suggest that there is now one over-riding issue that encompasses all others–the environmental issue. Today the environment is not often seen that way; it is usually seen as just another issue among many important issues, another marker to be traded in the give and take of politics. When President Clinton signed the salvage rider against his better judgment, he did so to realize some other political gain, but the consequences could be devastating to what little remains of our old growth forests in the Northwest. Not good. Good intentions, perhaps, but not good results. The environment is not just another issue, another pawn on the political chessboard; we have only one Earth. The environmental issue encompasses every other issue because it is the context in which all life, all activity, takes place. We must understand the Earth as we never have before, particularly its ecosystems and our role in and dependence upon those systems. For the first time in the four billion year history of the Earth, one species has managed to alter the climate of the entire planet. One author calls this "the end of Nature," meaning that even the climate is now "man-made."

You can probably see where this is headed. Within the lifetime of the students now at Middlesex, the human population of the Earth will double. Most predictions are that we shall reach 10 billion by the year 2050, about the same time that the world's supply of oil runs out. The population explosion in the developing nations is the principal problem, followed closely by over-consumption in the developed nations. [Some would put the poverty of the developing nations before population growth, but either way, it comes out the same.] The sub-problems which flow from those primary problems are anyone's guess, but I think they most certainly would include the following: dramatic climatic change, mass-starvation, arms races and wars over food/water/land/oil, pollution of air/land/water, disease, pestilence, and loss of biodiversity, including devastating deforestation and a severe reduction of species. I'm sure you're as schooled in this line of thinking as I am, so I will not draw it out. The question is, with that troubling context as a backdrop for the future, what sort of school should Middlesex be? What sort of curriculum should it have? How should it conduct its affairs and run its plant? How big should it be?

I would not like you to think that I am suggesting that Middlesex should become a school focused on a single issue, that of the environment. What I am saying is that the 21st century will be like none we have ever known, a century in continuous crisis, brought on by a human population growing out of control, and with concomitant problems in the distribution of food, energy, and resources. If I were advocating a school organized around the environment as a single issue, then the students would be educated and trained in environmental science. But what I mean, by saying that the environment is the context for all that we will do in the future, is that a Middlesex in tune with this new context would be educating students to become statesmen, doctors, lawyers, architects, planners, historians, scholars, teachers, and yes, artists, writers, and musicians, much as it does today, but with one important difference. Today the context is "growth and development"–the dominant value system. In the future, the context will be the environment and the dominant value will be sustainability, that is, living in ways that can be sustained indefinitely in a world of limited resources. "Live simply so that others may simply live," the bumper stickers say. Make no mistake, in a sustainable future, growth (in the sense of human habitation and facilities) is not good.

Reading your literature, I see that Middlesex exhibits strongly the persistence of the growth and development value in the way it communicates to the outside. In the annual report, the written statement of your Dean of Students, describing the conversion of the dormitories comes closest to the spirit of this letter. Your Business Manager's concept of the $2 million student, while not endorsed by him as a concept, is least attuned to what I am advocating here, unless, of course, you never cross that threshold. The quality and quantity of the paper you send out speaks volumes. I would hope that you are recycling as much as possible, and that you haven't forgotten the other two environmental 'R's', reduce and reuse. The fact that the dominant value (G&D) is so obvious is not the point; the point is that I have read nothing that indicates an effort to alter that value. My conclusion must be that Middlesex is currently set up and operating to educate its students for the century just past, a century none of them will live in after they graduate.

What would a future-oriented Middlesex be like? With regard to its physical plant, it would be working to minimize that plant without cutting its student population. That is, it would use each existing building to its absolute limits. It would pare its energy load at least in half through conservation. It would retrofit its buildings to draw as much of their energy load as possible from renewables, like solar collectors and maybe even wind turbines. It would not consider expanding or building new buildings except to replace old ones which absolutely could not be rehabilitated. And, as an educational institution, it would involve its students every step of the way.

Such a school would be rethinking its curriculum for the benefit of its students to assure that they would be citizens able to play important roles in this uncertain future. It would have broad general courses on the environment and the future. The students deserve to know what it will take to be effective. I have taught such a course to mostly architectural students for the past five years at the University of Oregon. The science courses–physics, chemistry, biology–would be shaped around understanding nature and its ecosystems. Estabrook Woods, Bateman's Pond, and the wetlands are tremendous resources for such study which few schools have, but one has to get out of the classroom and into nature to do it effectively. All other courses, including the traditional subjects and the social sciences would be taught in the context of a world in change, striving to achieve world-wide sustainability. Problem solving, design, and computer usage would be part of the background skill development that is required of all courses. When I taught at UCLA over 20 years ago, I was the founding director of an interdisciplinary program called the Creative Problem Solving Program in which any undergraduate could minor. At the secondary school level, those pragmatic skills would just be what you learn as a normal part of going about your studies.

Returning now to the Estabrook Woods controversy, in a school devoted to understanding the environment and how to live on the Earth, in an overpopulating world rapidly running out of oil and amid nations amassing arms to protect their sources of it, having another set of playing fields just doesn't seem too pressing. Building them at the expense of wetlands and woods does not compute at all. At the college level, I doubt if it will long seem reasonable to fly two football teams, including bands and coaches–a couple of hundred people–thousands of miles to play each other for an hour or two in a bowl game. Similar pressures will surface at Middlesex, and while it may be possible to continue to play Groton and St. Marks, perhaps St. George's will soon be too far away, if it isn't already. In fact, sports might make more ecological sense as inter dormitory games than as inter school games. After all, I would argue, the point is to develop the potential of the human body and to explore the possibility that teamwork has to offer, not to smash some historically chosen rival at a distant school. Blasphemy to some I suppose, but all this is to say that the effort in a future-oriented school would be to get the sports program to fit the playing fields available, not the other way around. Perhaps it is now clear how the assumption of keeping Middlesex unchanged is getting in the way.

As for faculty housing, a good ecological (and sociological) argument can be made for having such houses close to the rest of campus, perhaps nearby in the Woods. Further, I can imagine places in Estabrook Woods, facing south over the pond, where a few small homes could be set lightly on the land without removing significant trees or disturbing the ecosystem of the Woods. But there would not be roads, or automobiles, or power lines to such houses, in fact, nothing at all except a simple foot or bike path. And each house would be a demonstration of self-sufficiency, generating its own electricity, collecting its own water and heat, and handling its own wastes. It is possible to build such houses, and to make them comfortable, requiring no major changes in lifestyle. Believe me, I've been teaching architectural design for a long time now; I know it can be done. And in a school such as Middlesex, it should be done, even if only for its educational value.

I hope these comments have been useful to you. On your shoulders fall the burden and the opportunity of leadership and vision. It is up to you to set the course which will determine whether Middlesex creates a new standard for the future or becomes increasingly irrelevant. What an opportunity! It is exciting to me to imagine Middlesex as a model of environmental responsibility. I'm sure Frederick Law Olmsted would be pleased. And what an education! To see demonstrated everywhere in the institution around you the principles and values of a sustainable future would be the best possible way to affirm the possibility that one can affect the future. And finally, to send waves of graduating classes so prepared out to take on the 21st century would be the ultimate satisfaction of teachers and alumni alike.

I should say that I think this educational proposal would keep Middlesex highly competitive in its market. There will always be some parents who will opt for the latest facilities and the nostalgia of the past, but there are many others who will be excited by the vision of their children supremely prepared for the future. I would like to see you compete with the other schools by using the accuracy of your vision and philosophy, rather than by outspending them on facilities. I believe that strategy has served your three predecessors well over the history of Middlesex. We have never had the facilities of a Groton, Andover, or Exeter, but we had the vision, and time after time, led the way to a stronger, more relevant, independent school experience. We are again on the cusp, asked to choose a path for the school. Please choose wisely.

It all comes down to vision, alignment, and getting down to work. I would be glad to help in any way I can. I think we can get all parties aligned. What an opportunity! Let's do it; nothing could be more important.

Sincerely,

Charles W. Rusch, ‘52

Before responding to the letter, Dr. Ling copied it widely to interested parties and gathered feedback. About three months later, I received a reply from Dr. Ling. She said that my letter had been a point of conversation among trustees, faculty members, and administrators. She thanked me for my perspective on the situation, for my loyalty to the school, and for my eloquence. She said she hoped to meet me someday and invited me to my 45th reunion the following May. She accomplished all this in five sentences, later telling me that "to discuss the issues would have been in violation of the terms of the mediation process."

It took me some time to respond to the Ling letter. Not knowing that her response was constrained by the mediation, I found it difficult to interpret the letter as anything but a dismissal. Yet I thought my argument had merit, and more important, I was and am convinced that Middlesex, with its pond, wetlands, and woods could make an amazing demonstration of the environmental direction that our schools could take, indeed, will have to take in the near future.

Because Dr. Ling had circulated my letter so widely, I thought that she might still be open to the ideas contained therein, particularly if I cast them in a wider academic context. I wanted her to see the full possibility of an educational system based on sustainability as well as see the need for good working examples. It also occurred to me that Dr. Ling probably had very little idea of the background that I was bringing to the issue, so as a primary goal, I thought I perhaps needed to summarize my experience in education and then, as a secondary goal, to give my position a broader base, share with her some of the most telling reading I had done recently related to the subject. I hoped thereby to initiate an ongoing dialogue with her and perhaps with the faculty as well on the possibilities of, as C. A. Bowers puts it, "educating for a ecologically sustainable culture." I therefore wrote a second letter which set out to accomplish those goals. Here it is, although somewhat abbreviated for this chapter:

September 16, 1996 (abridged March 31, 1997)

Dear Dr. Ling,

Thank you for your considerate letter. I have been thinking since I received it about how or whether to answer it. I don’t want to present myself as some kind of extremist, hell-bent on converting everyone to my point of view, nor as another disgruntled alum, unhappy with some aspect of the school. Quite the contrary, I think Middlesex is an excellent school, by any normal standard, and from what I can tell at a distance, I think you are doing an admirable job of administering it. My first letter was intended to clarify why some alums may have found the school’s position on Estabrook Woods so troubling. What seemed to me to be missing was an environmental position on the school’s part which would be evident not just in its stated policies, but in its planning and building program, its curriculum, the dietary choices of its menus, its waste management, the papers and inks of its publications, etc. With that in place, those alums may have honored the decision to build in the Woods as a necessary action of an environmentally enlightened administration, knowing that it would be done in a way maximally sensitive to the Woods. Without that in place, perhaps they felt obliged to speak out and to assert the values they hold dear.

It occurred to me after sending my first letter that I should have told you more about myself before speaking my thoughts about the future, lest you think that I am just another grouch mouthing opinions about the state of the world. I have devoted my career to education and been effective on several different levels. Early on, in 1965 at Berkeley, I taught the first computer-aided architectural design studio in the country. Then, at the Center for Advanced Studies at Illinois/Urbana, I studied visual thinking and imagery (before those became popular topics), and worked with third graders in a local elementary school which was part of the University’s Curriculum Lab. At UCLA, I helped start the Graduate School of Architecture and Urban Planning with specific responsibility for the Social Building Program, was the founding director of the campus-wide interdisciplinary Creative Problem Solving Program, and later, the Associate Dean of the School. While at UCLA, I also started an independent experimental mobile middle school, called MOBOC, which ran for 12 years and drew much positive attention for both its high quality and innovative character. Finally, after a stint as Head of the Department of Architecture here at the University of Oregon, I went on to develop first the computers-in-architecture program, then the behavioral factors part of the curriculum, and finally, the architecture and environment courses, all while also teaching architectural design studio each term.

So now, semi-retired, I teach one quarter per year and live on the coast of the largest ocean in the world, reading, writing, and exploring my new surroundings. Some days it seems as if I can see all the way to Japan, and on others I cannot even see to the waves breaking on the beach in the fog. I‘d like to think that these letters are part of those far-sighted days, but these are complex issues, obscured by the presence of persistent priorities, and you are right to exercise caution. My intention in this letter is to share with you some of my recent readings which bear upon the issues raised in my first letter. The viewpoint represented by these letters is not just my personal perspective, as your letter implies, but is widely shared in a very large literature.

Of the dozens of books I have read since moving here, the one which is most relevant to these letters is C. A. Bowers’ latest (1995) book, "Educating for an Ecologically Sustainable Culture." Bowers is a professor of education and the book appears to have been written for an academic audience, that is, other educators, such as you and me. The message, the insights, and the vision I found quite remarkable. The subtitle is, "Rethinking Moral Education, Creativity, Intelligence, and Other Modern Orthodoxies." It is as profound a piece of "rethinking" as I have read. On the chance that you may have not yet come across this book, I should like to review it a bit here.

Bowers spends only a brief preface on the environmental issues; he assumes the readers are up to speed, and want to know what education would be like in a sustainable culture. A broad introduction raises the issue of how a culture’s beliefs and myths shape its action, and gives an overview of the book, indicating the "modern orthodoxies," he intends to attack. In the second chapter, he begins with moral education. Drawing broadly from philosophy, psychology, ecology, and educational theory, leaving Piaget, Kohlberg, and others in his wake, and with help from Aldo Leopold, he ties right and wrong to a "land ethic" as the fundamental building block of a sustainable culture. To quote, "Whether viewed as individually or culturally centered, behaviors are wrong in every sense–morally, politically, educationally, economically, and ecologically–if they threaten the integrity, stability, and beauty of the biotic community." Quoting Alan Durning, he says, "the new Golden Rule is simple: each generation should meet its needs without jeopardizing the prospects of future generations to meet their own needs."

In the third and fifth chapters, Bowers challenges our concepts of creativity and intelligence, respectively, as tied too firmly to individuality, a concept not tenable or defensible in a sustainable culture (which should be "ecocentric rather than anthropocentric)." As I understand it, the problem is not so much with individualism as with independent individualism. Every cell and every organ in our body can be seen as an individual cell or organ, but not as independent of the other cells or the body as a whole. Similarly, each of us are absolutely dependent upon the ecosystem of which we are a part. If we would see ourselves that way we would not think of taking any action which would damage the ecosystem, because we are part of that ecosystem and we would be damaging ourselves. I tell my students to try to identify not so much with their names, attached to minds (in heads on bodies), as with their awareness. If each of us could actually be our awareness moment by moment, then we would just naturally take care of the environment as we now take care of our bodies–as part of who we are. But instead, we foster a view of creativity as being the original, self-defining expression of the individual, and intelligence as the self-defining capability of the individual. Unfortunately, both of these taken-for-granted assumptions are held central to our culture and to what we consider good education. Now we are beginning to reap their devastating consequences.

One of Bowers’ most interesting chapters is the one on Trans-Generational Communication. The full title is, "Toward the Recovery of Trans-Generational Communication in the Educational Process." Essentially, he argues, as others have, that we have thrown away much of the knowledge and many of the ways of knowing possible in our culture by retaining only what can be put down in books, film, and on computer disks. Or, to say it another way, there is no longer any avenue preserved for learning from our Elders. Indeed, there are few left who would even qualify as Elders. He gives many examples from other cultures (sustainable cultures) where that chain has not been broken and powerful ways of knowing have been preserved across the generations. Bowers sees this form of communication as critical to achieving sustainability. In his final chapter, Bowers reviews three very different experimental educational programs that most closely model what is needed in a sustainable culture. Partly because none of the three were created for that purpose and the fit to his criteria is somewhat loose, this is Bowers’ least convincing chapter, but at the end one has a sense of what the curriculum and style of such a school might be.

All in all, it is a remarkable book; one that has already contributed enormously to my understanding of myself and my task in what remains of my life. I hope this very inadequate summary will lead you to study this book, if you haven’t already.

To address the architectural side of sustainability, I would like to mention briefly three other books; they are: "From Eco-Cities to Living Machines," by Nancy and Jack Todd (1994), who live and work in Massachusetts; "Ecological Design," by Sim Van Der Ryn and Stuart Cowan (1996); and "Deep Design," by David Wann (1996). All three speak to the issue of designing communities for sustainability, and thus bear upon the sketch I included toward the end of my last letter about what Middlesex might be like if it went down this path. We need schools which teach through example (buildings, landscapes, gardens) the great good sense of living in harmony with the earth. These books contain an abundance of information about alternative building materials, forms of renewable energy, natural wetlands-based waste treatment systems, alternative transportation systems, alternative forms of agriculture, and alternative forms of community planning. The Wann book is the most comprehensive of the three with dozens of examples from all over the world of these systems in place and working. In addition, it is one of the most upbeat and hopeful in a genre which tends toward the glum. None of the three has the depth of insight into our culture that the Bowers book does, and they therefore drift into recommendations now and again which I am sure would violate many of his stringent criteria. In particular, Wann thinks we can design our way out of this mess, and reviews a myriad of work ongoing which is intended to do just that. However, he doesn’t ever mention the growth of the human population rolling on in the background, so I am afraid some of his deep designs are not deep enough. All three books will be assigned in my "Sustainable Architecture" class this fall, and are positive, hopeful, and readable by Middlesex students. It is exciting reading.

My new "home town", Florence, Oregon, is a small coastal town of 6,000 residents, a little over an hour’s drive directly west from Eugene. It is about as pretty a drive as you get, winding through the Coast Range of low mountains, through forests of cedar and fir, and along the edges of streams and rivers. However, if one looks directly through the trees along the road (what environmentalists call "beauty strips") one can periodically see the clear cuts in the forests. The only signs of life in these areas are the seedlings trying to start another forest, but growing at best into a tree farm instead. Flying in a plane overhead, the clear cuts become a dominant part of the landscape forming a checkerboard pattern of scars. Rather than learning to live as a part of nature we are destroying it to get our lumber, read our newspapers, and eat our beef.

If the population of the world were stabilized, we might be able to maintain this pretense, that we are not part of nature and not subject to its laws. However, mirroring my remarks in my first letter, we are currently adding 91 million people per year to the world’s population, equivalent to the population of the United States every two and a half years. At this rate, the population will double every 41 years–unless starvation, pestilence, and/or birth control slow it down. The forests of the world may someday be as rare as a cedar in Lebanon.

There is another way; I find it almost fully spelled out in the literature, but it requires a cultural shift so enormous, I am not sure we can make it. And that is where the schools come in. Can we raise the next few generations with a different mind set, with different goals and values, into a different culture, and into a different, sustainable, future? I hope so. Perhaps Middlesex will lead the way, perhaps not, but the moment will come when the direction of education will shift to support sustainability; it has to come. Will it come in time? When you’re talking generations, forty-one years can pass by very quickly. We need at least enough lead time to educate one generation, and before that, educational models in place for the world’s schools to emulate. In the past, one of the places we looked when we needed such a model was in the independent prep schools of New England. I would like to think that is still the case.

I’m available. Let me know if there is some way I can contribute and return the gift that my Middlesex education was to me.

Sincerely,

Charles W. Rusch, ‘52

Still constrained by the mediation process which was to go on for seven months, Dr. Ling chose not to reply to this letter. I, of course, had no idea why I was getting such a minimal response, and I began to doubt my effectiveness in the matter.

In the meantime, after eight meetings of mediation between the Board and the NRC over a 7-month period, a settlement was announced. The school agreed to sign over immediately roughly a fourth of the land in discussion, 49 acres, to a permanent conservation restriction (CR), and agreed to place another 46 acres in CR status upon approval (permits) and construction of a bridge over the wetlands to the "East Fields." The school retained the rest of the woodland for future building expansion. On half of the retained land, it promised not to build the fields before June of 1999 and the housing for seven years. On the other half of the retained land, it promised not to build anything for the next twenty years. In other words, if approved, the school would get its wetlands permit and pretty much the rest of what it wanted all along, but not immediately. In exchange, it would eventually commit 95 acres to CR status rather than 55. [In several documents, the School has stressed the fact that it knows of no other school anywhere which has signed over any portion of its land to a conservation restriction.]

In the mediation agreement, the opposing parties would get the school’s plans to construct new fields in the Woods delayed for two years and the housing delayed for seven years, giving time for both sides to rethink the necessity of expansion and alternative locations if needed. Because the building of the bridge, its foundation and roads, and perhaps even the site preparation for the fields was not part of the moratorium and, in the opinion of some of the opposition, would do the bulk of the damage to the wetlands and the Woods, the Concord Historical Commission, the Thoreau Country Conservation Alliance, the Thoreau Society (Thoreau walked these woods), the Sierra Club, and the MGFE, were opposed to the settlement, but Concord’s Natural Resources Commission, after holding a number of public meetings, signed it.

Probably the most favorable outcome of this controversy is that the Board of Trustees of the school has seen what a serious step an expansion into the Woods is considered to be and as part of the mediation has agreed to consider other alternatives. Of course, the Board thinks that it considered all other alternatives in its expansion study conducted between 1990 and 1993. However, now with the opposition to its choice (expansion into the Woods) so passionately aligned, it might see the necessity of reconsidering some alternatives previously rejected. MGFE thinks that the school should begin acquiring land across the road as it becomes available, and indeed has proceeded to raise money and purchase a three acre parcel just west of one of the road properties in order to start the process off. The Board had previously rejected that option as basically unsafe, given the high volume of traffic now common on Lowell Road. MGFE, cognizant of this, still seems determined to get an alternative agreed upon before the Woods is permanently scarred, but so far has not yet gained an equal place at the table. If they raise all the money needed to purchase enough land (12 to 15 acres) across the road (as it becomes available) as the basis for an alternative, they may yet prevail, but that is asking them to take on fund-raising responsibilities more properly belonging to the Board. That they raised $400,000 in gifts and loans in such a short time to buy the first parcel is truly remarkable, yet MGFE (representing at least 400 alumni) is currently receiving little cooperation or even acknowledgement from the Board. In my opinion, this is a serious oversight on the Board's part, as well as bad strategy, and should be corrected.

As of this writing, it is hard to say if the Woods have been saved from development or not. The Trustees seem quite committed to building the bridge across the wetlands as an option for future expansion. They see building the bridge now as fulfilling their fiduciary responsibility to the school. It would seem to me that in the future we shall all have to do more with less, particularly with regard to the use of land. At this point, I am still not convinced that the school cannot do it all–build more playing fields, respect the Olmsted plan, and save the Woods–without going across the road. I do not think that the bridge needs to be built and, in my opinion, building a large bridge to nowhere could make it and the Board objects of ridicule, while using it to provide access to extensive construction in the Woods might alienate up to a fourth of the school's so far loyal alumni.

As for expansion, I think that a good argument could be made socially and pedagogically for increasing the size of the Middlesex student body to around 400 students, but rather than build more dorms and playing fields for these extra students I would enroll them into a variety of study abroad programs in the languages, arts, sciences, and environments of cultures around the world. In other words, at any one moment, Middlesex could be maintaining a significant portion of its student body at off-campus learning sites. If so, just think of the rich experiences they would bring back to campus when they returned!

As situations go, I found that I was never particularly able to remain a dispassionate observer in this one. Then, in the midst of it all, the opportunity arose of writing this article for a wider audience about Middlesex as a case study and about some thoughts on curricula for an ecological education which had been taking shape in my mind. I decided to write one more letter, but this time directly to the Board. I believe the Board and I are worlds apart on these issues, but you never know; perhaps it will be helpful to all parties to have another, distant, voice speak for the Woods.

July 11, 1997

Dear Members of the Board,

This letter is written in response to your invitation to comment on the proposed plans to expand the school across the wetlands and into Estabrook Woods. I appreciate the invitation. As many of you know from my letters, I am not in favor of that particular expansion. I do not intend to dwell in this letter on my reasons for that conclusion; I would rather concentrate on the possibilities present now in this post-mediation period for bringing the disparate parties together into a common vision for the school.

I will, however, summarize my reasons for opposing the expansion. I have followed the situation carefully from the moment I received that first concerned letter in September 1995. As someone trained in architecture and someone who has taught architectural design for some 30 years now, it seems to me that the central idea of this expansion was doomed with difficulties right from the start. First, there is the wetlands to cross, then there is the slope of the land to contend with, then there is the composition of the soil (which some say is largely rock) on which to somehow create large, level, well-drained irrigated playing fields, then there is the historic and natural value of the land and woods, and finally, there is the emotional and sentimental meanings which are loaded onto this piece of land where Thoreau once walked. I think these woods can be fairly termed as sacred to the Middlesex and Concord communities. As if that were not enough, when the final bids come in, I believe you will find the project prohibitively expensive. Building in the Woods is simply a bad idea.

If there were no other alternatives available, the idea might still be considered further if the need were great enough. However that need has not been convincingly established, and there are quite good alternatives available. I have studied the one proposed to you by Carol R. Johnson Associates for tightening up and reorienting the existing fields and I think that it shows great merit. My best professional guess is that, while tight, the School could make that scheme work, and while regrading and replacing the irrigation lines will be costly, it certainly has to be less expensive than the bridge and hillside scheme. In one stroke, it not only corrects the orientation of the present fields, but also preserves the Woods (!), saves money, and demonstrates for both communities the excellent judgment and intentions of the School and its Board. That scheme could be a winning idea; it should be reconsidered.

You have stated that you believe you have a responsibility to build the bridge to keep the option of building in the Woods open for the future. I say just the opposite–you have a fiduciary responsibility to close down that option forever. Future generations will treasure the Woods, but will not value another set of scars in the landscape. Please do not build that bridge. Enough. That’s where I stand in the matter.

Having lived in distant parts of the country since graduating from Harvard in 1956, I have had only a few opportunities to visit Middlesex in the intervening years, and fewer yet to get to know any of you. My last two visits were to my son’s graduation in 1980 and my 35th reunion in 1987. It is therefore with a feeling of inadequacy that I turn to the task now before me. I would like to shift this "conversation" from the negative to the positive, from short range problems to long range possibilities, from woods to overlook, if you will, and I would like you to come along with me on it. I know I can be accused of not keeping up with the many positive changes to Middlesex over the last ten years, and of not being aware of how you have all personally contributed significantly to making it the fine school that it is. My only response can be to agree that that is true, and to state that I have been attentive, if from afar, and that I have also been a responsible student of the world situation.

I think that Middlesex can make an enormous contribution to the world in the next fifty years by taking this present situation and turning it into a quite remarkable demonstration of all that is positive about the independent New England private preparatory school. Before I get into spelling out that possibility permit me one necessary digression.

Albert Bartlett is a retired professor of physics from the University of Colorado at Boulder. For many years now he has been traveling around the country and giving the same lecture wherever he goes. It is not that he has only one thing to say, but that there is one message so important he has decided to devote his life to speaking it whenever he can. Perhaps you have heard him speak. The message has to do with understanding the arithmetic connected with the population explosion, in particular, the relation of the growth rate to the doubling rate. The arithmetic is simple and known to every business person; if you divide the constant 70 by the percentage growth rate, you get the doubling rate. The human population of the world is currently growing at 1.7% per year. At that rate, the total population will double in about 41 years–and then again in another 41 years. Of course, if we can slow down the growth rate, it will take longer to double (whence the prediction of 10 billion people by year 2050).

In his talk, Bartlett tells the following story: "Imagine a microbe in a jar which reproduces by dividing in two every minute; that is to say, it has a doubling rate of one minute. Imagine that the jar is of a size that it takes exactly one hour for the microbe to fill it, and that the microbe starts at 11 pm and completely fills the jar at midnight." Then Bartlett asks, "At what time will the jar be half full?" He pauses, "Yes, one minute to midnight. At what time will the jar be a quarter full? Yes, two minutes to midnight. At what point do you think the microbes will realize that there is a problem? When the jar is half full? A quarter full? An eighth full, that is, three minutes to midnight?"

Bartlett develops this line of thinking over an hour’s talk, but you get the point. Our doubling rate is every 41 years, not every minute. But what time is it? One minute to midnight (41 years, 11 billion people)? Two minutes to midnight (82 years, 22 billion people)? At what point do you think we will realize that there is a problem? What size human population can the world sustain? At some point our growth will have to be constrained; how will that happen? Can we even slow it down?

I believe it is now clear to most thoughtful people that the growth rate of the human population, a modest 1.7% annually, is the mother of all our global problems. In my first letter to Dr. Ling, I discussed the implications of these facts for the school. I am not saying that there is anything "wrong" with the school. I readily (proudly) agree that students at Middlesex get the finest education available in the country, but I am writing to say that that education will not be sufficient to meet the challenges of the 21st century. I say this, with some conviction, out of the fact that that very fine education is based upon all of the same assumptions of western culture which created the crisis we’re in! We need a new model for our educational institutions to emulate, and I think that Middlesex is uniquely positioned to create it. Not incidentally, I believe that making this new commitment and gradually moving the school in that direction will resolve all the problems it now faces with regard to expansion. It will also heal the division which has recently occurred within the school community. We need to move to a new set of cultural assumptions, and the leadership of the Board is critical to making that shift possible.

I hope that in making these statements, you do not consider me an alarmist. I do not think of myself as an alarmist. Paul Revere sounded the alarm, but was he an alarmist? Do you think that he had a problem convincing the countryside that the British really were coming?

Apparently, Milton Academy has gotten the word, and is on the move. Not only do they have an outreach program, located in Vermont, called the Mountain School Program, but they have taken on the 26 million acres of the Northern Forest as a "student" project. The idea is to do some true problem solving on a complex real issue, interview and research all sides of it, and make a set of recommendations. [To start its exploration, Middlesex does not need to find an issue, it just needs to use the one it has created in its very own forest as a educational project.]

In my second letter to Dr. Ling, I reviewed Educating for an Ecologically Sustainable Culture by C. A. Bowers (1995). At the end of this important book, Bowers reviews three programs which more or less fit the criteria he has drawn up for such an education. One of the three is the Common Roots Program, now being adopted in many elementary schools in rural Vermont, which teaches children the connections among food, community, and ecological responsibility, including some time spent growing their own food. There are many watered-down versions of similar programs springing up around the country, and even something of a backlash against them and against environmental education in general. Just last week, the Investor’s Business Daily (July 3, 1997) had an editorial decrying such course work in a school in Los Angeles as mere gardening and an unfortunate distraction from traditional education. The Common Roots Program in Vermont is much more than gardening, but I would agree that while gardening has its values, it would not by itself form the basis for a new direction for 21st century education.

The Orion Society comes closer. In their magazine and notebook series they frequently cite work done in a movement called "place-based education" which I think holds great promise for reconnecting our culture with our environment in a meaningful way. The Society itself has helped develop programs which connect school children with interns from Middlebury College to blend outdoor excursions (some overnight) and careful observations with art, and expository or creative writing exercises.

On the other end of the country, in Hawaii, the School for Field Studies sends high school and college students with well-qualified professors, to six centers they maintain around the world, to conduct studies in wildlife management, marine resources, sustainable development, and the protection of wetlands, coastal environments, and rainforests. San Francisco State University, through their College of Extended Learning, has a similar program with trips to the wilderness areas of the U. S., as well as to Baja California, Nepal, Russia, New Zealand, and Thailand. Many of the courses in both of these programs are given in the summers, but an almost equal number are given throughout the year, when the climate is favorable in their part of the world–and all for course credit. Most are led by scientists.

For decades, the University of Oregon has had a residential marine science program on the Pacific coast at Charleston. Students go there for a quarter and take courses in marine science which have a large direct-experience component. In addition, Oregon has an environmental studies program which has over 600 undergraduate majors and 30 to 50 graduate students. Both programs are broadly interdisciplinary with a heavy emphasis in the sciences and both have more recently begun to incorporate courses from the humanities as well. I consider these strong programs, but weakened by omitting the outdoor emphasis of the above programs.

If Middlesex were to move in this direction, what are the possibilities? I think it would be important that the transition be gradual and seamless and that it be place-based in structure. I would start with having a class of students study all sides of the current Estabrook Woods controversy, with a final presentation of their findings to the School and to the Board. I would then make sure that the existing science courses, particularly the life sciences, have as large a direct-experience component as possible. That is, the students should spend enough time outdoors studying the ecological systems of the area to become familiar with the particular niche in which the school is located. Next they should learn as many of the plants and animals in the ponds, wetlands, and woods as possible. They should study the seasons, the weather, and the effects they have on the local ecology. They should study the anthropological history of the area, its settlement patterns, and how the architecture reflects the people, the climate, and the building materials available. These latter studies might be several years from now and adjustments might have to be made to the current curriculum to fit them in, but by then a structure would be emerging to do that. Throughout, what the students were learning and feeling about the particular place in which the school is located would be routinely expressed in their writing, their poetry, their art, and their drama. And, of course, the philosophy and values underlying the curriculum would be evident throughout the operation and administration of the school, its publications, and its physical plant, as I outlined in my first letter. The goal would always be towards an integrated whole, a holistic comprehensive understanding of a natural system that includes humankind as one of many species wrapped up in the swirl of its ecological forces and determinants.

As the teachers and the students begin to feel comfortable with their knowledge of local conditions in these ways, the circle of understanding could be widened. Perhaps the connection would be through the seasons and the weather which are clearly part of larger systems, or perhaps through the natural step from the local ecology to the ecology of the watershed and then to the bioregion. Or perhaps the expansion in scale comes from following the wildlife corridors of the animals into the Northern Forest or the migratory flights of the birds which stop on and near Bateman's Pond for renewal. However it happens, at some point the scope of the study should be expanded to deepen the understanding. I would expect that the direct-experience learning would expand as well with frequent trips out into the region. I would further imagine that the expansion of scale would match the students’ progression in the school, so that the seniors would be considering global systems, including both natural ones related to planetary health, and the political/economic systems that have impacted them.

Summers, particularly for upperclassmen, might be spent in another culture in some other part of the world, maybe as part of the previously mentioned environmental science programs, or with other study abroad programs. We want the students to understand the cultural roots and cultural assumptions that have led to what is happening to our planet and to humankind. One of the best ways to achieve that understanding is to be thrust into a quite different culture.

Finally, while all the above is perhaps straightforward and if done well would create an opportunity for a transformation of one’s relationship to nature, I still do not think it would be sufficient to meet the challenge we face. There is no easy way to say this. I think that what is called for in the next century is giving up much of the ease of living given to us by our culture. Our comfort and high standard of living have come at the cost of natural systems that are now depleted perhaps beyond restoration. We are over-fishing the oceans, exhausting our topsoils, drawing down our supplies of water, denuding our forests, and changing the very climate of the earth. In our success at taking care of our own, we have threatened the longevity of the species. We now need to give to the next generation the basis for establishing a new culture, a simpler one, still satisfying and civilized, but one that can exist, not in opposition to nature, not even in harmony with it, but as part of it. I have some ideas as to how to create such a transformation, but they will have to wait for another invitation. I would imagine that I have long since exhausted this one.

I think that Middlesex is uniquely poised to be the model to bring forth the transformation in education indicated above. It has the perfect physical plant and campus setting for such an exploration, with pond, wetlands, and woods, and it has a reputation as one of the finest schools in the land. I happen to think that, as one of the top schools, it also has a responsibility to lead the way. What we need is to state clearly our common purpose and our concerns about the future. Thus the process would start with a declaration of the vision as well as the commitment to see it through, or to put it in business terms, a mission statement to which we all subscribe. That declaration is what will unite us and heal our divisions. I believe that such a vision is what has been missing and needed in the controversy over the Woods. In the context of the above argument, expansion into the Woods is not a vision about the future; it is a sacrilege. We need a set of new goals to give the school a new direction and to bring us together around the task of educating a generation of graduates to meet an enormous challenge–men and women to match our mountains, if you will. I have no doubt that the journey offers excitement, relevance, purpose, direction, the camaraderie of shared action, alignment with nature and with each other, and perhaps, for some, the spiritual transcendence of which Thoreau and Emerson once wrote. It is a task worth engaging; I would be happy to join with you in carrying these ideas forth.

I apologize for the length of this letter, but I assure you it is only a sketch of what I have to say on the subject. Thank you for the invitation to write and for your attention.

Sincerely, Charles W. Rusch, ‘52

Conclusion:

Ultimately, the controversy of whether to build or not in Estabrook Woods will be resolved, one way or the other. In this case, the controversy was over new playing fields and faculty housing. In another school, it could as easily have been over new classrooms, a science building, computer labs, or art studios. As I made clear in my letters, if the school had had a view of the future as something other than a continuation of the past, and was busily preparing for that future, the whole controversy might not have happened. We all need to learn to do more with less and to do it in a "natural" way–that is, in a way which demonstrates the same economy of means that nature demonstrates daily. There is no waste in nature.

The case represents a circumstance which will become more and more frequent as the years pass and the environmental crisis intensifies. Today, the dominant value system of the culture is "growth and development." In the future, the dominant value will be sustainability, that is, living in ways that can be sustained indefinitely in a world of limited resources. We do not have a lot of choice about this; it has to happen because the earth has finite resources and a limited carrying capacity. Further, with the human population of the world expanding out of control, we do not have a lot of time to effect this enormous shift in values–perhaps 50 or 60 years.

The growth and development paradigm of our culture will not go quietly. In fact, growth is such a deep part of our history, that it is hard for any of us to imagine a future without it. One of the most useful middleground statements made on the subject that I have read is by Paul Hawken (1993) in the Ecology of Commerce. This author and co-founder of several successful businesses picks up on and extends a distinction between growth and development made by economist Herman Daly in his powerful book, For the Common Good (1989,1994):

A growing economy is getting bigger; a developing economy is getting better. An economy can therefore develop without growing, or grow without developing.

Hawken (1993) then goes on to add,

The idea of development implies that the product or service supplied will actually help people use fewer resources in the long run, and at the same time will serve or improve their lives... A company…should provide a product or service that helps people develop their lives, and not merely increase the amount of their possessions. (p. 140)

I think that one could say the same for schools. It is a distinction which could unlock the future at Middlesex–hold the growth, no more expansion, bring on the development, orient it all towards educating a generation of students who are in tune with the environment and its needs, who want to contribute, but also want to live simple satisfying lives of constrained consumption. It is incumbent upon each of us as educators to address critical environmental issues now, to bring them before the schools and school boards with which we deal, and to help align all parties behind a vision of what is necessary and needed from the field of education in building toward a sustainable future. This effort must necessarily be interdisciplinary; we need to weave together education for not only art and architecture, the subjects of this anthology, but natural and social science, as well as literature, history, and language–and all in a context of ecological sustainability. We need a new model for a new culture if we are not to become an endangered species ourselves. Unfortunately, we need it now.

Epilogue:

Three months after I sent my third letter to the president of the Board and to its East Fields Planning Committee, I had had no response. The school was doing a fairly good job of sending out letters to the alumni regularly summarizing the situation and the Board's current position and actions, and I was about to conclude that that would have to suffice. The trustees were probably getting dozens of letters, and the only reasonable way to respond to them all was with general mailings of summary statements. However, just as I was about to conclude that I had done all that I could, I heard that there was a Board meeting coming up. I decided to try one more time by sending my latest letter to each of the trustees individually. Very shortly after doing so, I received four personal replies from Board members thanking me for my thoughts, and a long two-page letter from Dr. Ling, now free from the constraints of mediation, responding to the issues. I answered them all, and while the issues are by no means resolved, these last letters bring some closure for me and some balance to this phase of the correspondence. Here is the letter from Dr. Ling, followed by my response.

October 8, 1997

Dear Professor Rusch:

I am writing to thank you for the very thoughtful letter which you addressed to the Middlesex School Board of Trustees this summer. This letter, as well as your earlier letter dated September 16, 1996, are among the most thought-provoking and reflective responses to the School's proposed East Fields project which I have had the pleasure to read. I appreciate your desire to inform the School about important work done in the area of environmentally based education, to influence the direction of curricular revision and, indeed, to help shape Middlesex School's agenda for the future.

These letters are useful and timely as we approach the symbolic moment of a new century. Your remarks strongly support the integration of the study of the environment in a traditional curriculum, and the extension of the intellectual and cultural reach of our students beyond the confines of contemporary American culture. Both areas are of genuine importance to me and useful to the entire community as we conduct a curricular review of all our offerings throughout the academic program.

Since your remarks are largely oriented toward the area of the curriculum normally considered the science program, it may be important to note that the place of science in the academic life of Middlesex School has increased in significance in the past few years. This year, for example, more than three-quarters of Middlesex's students are studying science. Within the School's science program, environmentally oriented study has grown steadily. Biology, for example, is increasingly taught from an environmental perspective. Middlesex School is also an active member of a Concord-area Environmental Science Consortium. This organization of science teachers from Middlesex, Concord Academy, and Concord-Carlisle High School offers each year an environmental science course which includes significant field research utilizing the local ecology of woods and ponds.

As a further indication of the significant place of science in the academic program, this week we are about to inaugurate a Science Lecture Series designed by the noted M.I.T. writer and physicist (and Middlesex parent), Alan Lightman. The opening speaker in the series is a distinguished biologist, Prof. Robert Weinberg, co-founder of the Whitehead Institute for Biomedical Research. At the Board level, the Trustees recently added John Blanchard to their ranks. A professor of biochemistry at Albert Einstein College of Medicine, John is enthusiastic about assisting the School in thinking carefully about the role of science in the curriculum.

As Middlesex approaches its second century, we find that our students are already moving into a world which appears to be significantly different from our own. The central question which your letters pose is an important one, and one that we will employ in our ongoing curricular review–that is, what kind of education will be sufficient to meet the challenges of the Twenty-First Century? This timely question was considered recently in a series of Trustee/Faculty discussions. While it was clear to all of us that this question is important, it was also clear that we could not agree on a single answer to the question. It may be true that we need a new paradigm for our educational institutions, but it may also be true that there is more than one conceptual model to inform curricular choices in the future. In that case, it will be prudent for the School to search broadly for new curricular options. The demands which may be placed on the School in the future–on its trustees, faculty, program and property–may be ones that we cannot anticipate at this time. Therefore, with regard to the School's land as well as other parts of its heritage and traditions, we must be, simultaneously, both faithful stewards and the agents of thoughtful change. In sum, in order to uphold our fiduciary responsibilities, we should not limit our ability to make a wide range of decisions in the future.

I appreciate the opportunity to read your engaging and useful thoughts about curricular reform and the direction of the School in the future, and I look forward to continued correspondence. I also hope to meet you on my next trip to the Northwest on behalf of Middlesex School.

Sincerely, Deirdre A. Ling

And my response:

October 13, 1997

Dear Dr. Ling,

I returned last night from a weekend in Eugene to find your letter waiting. First, I want to thank you for taking the time to respond. From my days as department head, I can imagine how fully scheduled your life must be. Add to that the complexity of life in a boarding school and its 24 hour format, faculty, 300 plus students, their parents, 3000 alumni, 38 trustees, fund-raising and community building events and trips, etc., and it gets a little overwhelming to think about. So when I thank you for taking the time to answer my letters with a considered one of your own, I truly mean it.

I almost didn't come out here to the beach today. I teach my Sustainable Architecture class on Tuesday evenings and I was tempted to just stay in Eugene until then. But the morning broke sunny, clear, cool, and calm and I knew I had made the right choice. The ocean has been roiled with storms as of late, but today the waves are rolling in out of a smooth ocean with machine-turned precision... And the pelicans are here fishing! They glide up and down the waves in small squads, barely moving their wings as they seemingly surf the thin currents of air just above the crests. Every so often one peels off and with a large loop, up and down, plunges into the water for a fish. Remarkable.

As for your letter, I certainly appreciate the fine words. It is a great thing to hear from the Head of one's old school that one's letters are "among the most thought-provoking and reflective responses to the School's proposed East Fields project which I have had the pleasure to read." It is gratifying to hear that you are putting them to use in the discussions you are having with faculty and trustees. I am also pleased to read of the environmental emphasis in parts of your science program, of the new lecture series, and of the appointment of Prof. Blanchard to the Trustees.

However, the end of your letter gives me some pause. You say that in your Trustee/Faculty discussions about the 21st century, "we could not agree on a single answer to the question. It may be true that we need a new paradigm for our educational institutions, but it may also be true that there is more than one conceptual model to inform curricular choices in the future." Of course, it is not surprising that such a diverse group would come up with a diverse set of priorities and directions for the school. I somewhat addressed this issue in my first letter when I spoke of digging deeper to get below the surface of an intractable problem, and again later when I spoke of our wariness of the single issue candidate.

I don't think we can look upon the environmental viewpoint as just another conceptual model to be placed among many others. It is much larger than that. That is why I referred to it as the context for all action in the future. It is true that there are numerous competitive conceptual curricular models afloat today, but all exist in the context of this massive environmental dilemma. We need to pick those models which not only serve our diverse interests but also work to address and ameliorate the environmental context. So I suggested that we hold on dearly to what we can of the curriculum of traditional schooling, but begin broadening it and deepening it to address that larger context. Ideally we would wind up with a curriculum (and a school) which is culturally diverse, meets the special interests of parents and trustees, and in every component pulls us into harmony with nature while teaching us how to heal the environmental damage we have already done. I imagine that sounds impossible, but I suggested a set of programs which might begin to do it and you suggested some of your own in response. That suggested structure, I believe, could form the basis for a new institutional paradigm.

Let me try to state the dilemma as clearly as I can. The problem is that we are so privileged in this country, having all of our needs and most of our wants satisfied almost immediately with merely a phone call, that we shall be isolated from the worst effects of the environmental crisis for decades. But the environmental crisis is happening now in Somalia, Rwanda, India, Bangladesh, Indonesia, Brazil, Mexico, and many other countries. For them it is not some abstract possibility. But it is for us, and therefore capable of denial. Other alternatives seem to exist–surely we can still grow our way out of this mess... We all want to believe that this is so, and so we keep our economy growing by buying resources from poor countries and producing more and more products, hoping that we can sell enough back to them to raise their standard of living and get their economies growing. And in the meantime, there are 90 million more mouths to feed every year and fewer and fewer resources left from a finite supply. Unfortunately, the earth itself is not growing to keep step with our demands on it.

I do not think the situation is hopeless. It is hopeless if we do nothing about it, but as I said in one of my letters, the answers are all worked out in the literature. We know what we have to do. The problem is producing the enormous shift in our culture that is necessary right now when all of our needs are satisfied by just picking up the phone. It is too easy to say, "What problem?" "Is there a problem?"

I know there are many curricular models and each has its strengths, but there is only one over-riding environmental collapse in the works. We need to use every curricular program and tool possible and we need to put them all into service of this one contextual problem, while we still can. That may sound like a limiting, confining thing to do, but I cannot imagine a broader, more holistic, more liberating education for the students. To do all of this, we need dramatic, concerted, educational leadership, and we need to continue graduating students who are increasingly prepared to meet the challenge.

I would love to meet with you on your next Northwest trip; just let me know when and where.

Sincerely, Charles W. Rusch, '52

Over the last two years of observing the events of this controversy unfold and of interacting with its participants, I have been struck by the sheer number of well-intentioned people who are volunteering their time and intelligence to resolving its issues. While each "side" has its "opposition", there are no antagonists here. Dozens and dozens of individuals are devoting hours and hours of their time to seeking the best outcome for both the School and the Woods. Imagine what we all could accomplish if we were pulling in the same direction, if we had a common vision as well as common goals. If you can imagine that and act on it, then perhaps the 21st century will not prove to be as bleak as I have predicted it will be in this chapter. I hope so.

References:

Bartlett, A. (1984). Forgotten Fundamentals of the Energy Crisis. Videorecording. Boulder: University of Colorado Academic Media Services.

Bowers, C. A.(1995). Educating for an Ecologically Sustainable Culture. Albany: SUNY Press.

Brown, L. R., et al. State of the World, 1994 - 1997, annual reports of the Worldwatch Institute. New York: W. W. Norton.

Caswell, K. (1996), "The Practice of Nature," The Orion Society Notebook .The Orion Society, Great Barrington, MA, Autumn/Winter, Vol. 2, No. 2.

Cohen, J. E. (1995). How Many People Can the Earth Support? New York: W. W. Norton.

Daly, H., & Cobb, John B., Jr. (1989, 1994). For the Common Good. Boston: Beacon Press.

Daly, H. (1996). Beyond Growth.. Boston: Beacon Press.

Elder, J. (1996), "Education and Confluence," The Orion Society Notebook .The Orion Society, Great Barrington, MA, Spring/Summer, Vol. 2, No. 1.

Hawken, P. (1993). The Ecology of Commerce. New York: Harper Business.

Reisner, M. (1993). Cadillac Desert . New York: Penguin. (1997). Video series, PBS Video.

Sessions, G. (1995). Deep Ecology for the 21st Century. Boston: Shambhala.

Todd, N., & Todd, J. (1994). From Eco-Cities to Living Machines. Berkeley: North Atlantic.

Van der Ryn, S., & Cowan, S. (1996). Ecological Design. Washington, DC: Island Press.

Wann, D. (1996). Deep Design. Washington, DC: Island Press.

 

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