Introducing Our New Treasurer

Charles Burkam

Charles Burkam obtained his B.A. in Economics at Princeton (1970), and his Juris Doctor at Harvard Law School (1973). After graduation, Charles spent a decade as an advocate for equal justice within Community Legal Services, before serving one term as Mayor in Somersworth, New Hampshire. He met the threefold image of the human being through Waldorf Education, and realized that all the knowledge that had been presented at those learned institutions paled in comparison with the wisdom he found in Rudolf Steiner’s writings.

Charles left his Mayoralty and closed his legal practice to move to England in 1986. There his two children enrolled at Michael Hall Steiner School, while he did Foundation Studies at Emerson College. That same year he joined the Anthroposophical Society.

In the following years he participated in the management of anthroposophical organizations attempting to work out of Steiner’s threefold principles, as further elaborated in the Economics Course. He was Bursar at Michael Hall Steiner School, the first Advisor on Administration for the Steiner Schools Fellowship, Director of Finance & Development at Emerson College, on the Farm Management team of Tablehurst Farm and, additionally, Board Chairman of the Mercury Provident Ethical Pension Fund.

Charles returned to the US in 2000, where he and his late wife established a biodynamic small holding in the White Mountains of Arizona, with Charles serving as her apprentice. Charles has consulted for the BioDynamic Farming and Gardening Association and the Santa Fe Waldorf School. He has been a Trustee for the Yggdrasil Land Trust and Managing Director of the Institute for Responsible Technology, campaigning for the labeling of GMO’s in food.

After his wife’s passing in 2009, Charles moved to Phoenix to become Executive Director of Desert Marigold School—growing the school to a full K-12. He also has served as Treasurer of the Alliance for Public Waldorf Education and its representative to the Council for Anthroposophical Organizations (CAO), and served on the Anthroposophical Society’s Annual Conference Committee. Charles joined the School of Spiritual Science in 2011.

In addition to his studies within Spiritual Science, he is deeply interested in the wisdom of Indigenous culture, to which he was introduced by his wife, who was part Passamaquoddy and Cherokee. He has also become attuned to the wisdom of the starry heavens, which introduced itself to him forcefully during the Grand Conjunction of 2014. Welcome, Charles!