September 2022 Volume 5 Issue 2

Banbury Crossroads private school is a community that feels like a family. It’s a fact: this is a school where you love to be every day and where you have the freedom to be yourself. At Banbury you are seen, heard, and understood. Self-Directed Learning stimulates engagement and happiness.

Diane Swiatek is the Founder & Director of Banbury Crossroads school. She has a passion for learning, teaching and helping young people become the best versions of themselves!

“Children have the right to determine the course of their own lives.” Diane Swiatek

Q & A with: Diane Swiatek; Founder of Banbury Crossroads Private School

Q: Why did you start a private school?

A: Fundamentally, I did not want to teach in a conventional school. From my own experience, I knew, through attending typical schools, that I could satisfy my curiosity to learn, in some basic ways. However, as a child, I had wanted much more contact with the real, outside world, more hands-on and experiential learning, and more meaningful, mutually caring relationships with my teachers and peers. Although I went through my own schooling years being extremely busy with managing assignments and activities, and memorizing information, the spark of initiative and inspiration within me was muted. I could satisfy the expectations of the adults in my life, but I was not free to invent or implement my own dreams.

As an adult, I came to dislike and disbelieve in the power differential between students and their adult teachers and administrators, whereby students had very little power to

make consequential decisions. I did not like the formal, institutional atmosphere in most schools. Indeed, I probably would have never chosen teaching as a career; I would have done anything other than become a teacher. Life happened, though. I read a book, and I changed my life in response. It was called, Summerhill, by A. S. Neill. He ran a boarding school of about 60 students in England. Neill believed that children have a right to be happy, as a basic human right. He also believed that children should have the right to determine the course of their own lives, as long as they don’t interfere with the rights of others. These two main ideas were startling to me, in their positivity and their practical expression of liberty. I was inspired as a young adult when encountering the idea that, although many schools are built of stone, the ideas behind them are not actually written in stone. This realization opened up a vista of change for me through the possibility of designing a different vision of schooling. I came to understand that schools are merely human philosophical constructs regarding child rearing and education that are manifest in the operations of schools. I also discovered the Open Classroom model in the modern British infant system, where the practical organization was based on a student-directed, tutorial model of instruction, rather than a teacher-paced, lecture-based method. I loved the thought of young people being able to move, make decisions, collaborate and experience the real world directly, all within the expectation of mutual respect. In other words, I discovered that school did not have to be the way I had experienced it. It could be otherwise. Children could be happy in school. Banbury Crossroads School has become that otherwise school to me.

The reason that I chose to create a private school, rather than become an alternative school under a public board, was that at that time, a current alternative program within the public system was simply discontinued. That was the Logos School. As a consequence, I thought, “I am not going to put all of my effort into creating a school, only to have someone else decide to end its existence.” Therefore, I approached Alberta Education to establish a private school. That government department was very helpful, very respectful and very supportive. Voila! Banbury Crossroads School is a private school.

Q: Why is it important to teach children at a young age to think for themselves?

A: One of my fundamental beliefs is that self-direction, responsibility and autonomy are necessary for personal emotional health, and for providing citizens with the means to create a healthy democracy. It is commonly accepted that practice is necessary to develop skill in any repetitive behaviour. Thus, it is essential for students to have opportunities to develop these attributes, in a developmentally appropriate manner, from an early age. The concept of “thinking for themselves” relates to the process of gathering information dispassionately. It relates to moral and cognitive reasoning. It relates to analyzing information for relevance, usefulness and factual truth. It relates to attempting to think objectively and from others’ viewpoints, so that a concept of big-picture understanding can emerge. This analytical search for reliable information is done, first, to gain knowledge or hypotheses about the situation, and then, to use that knowledge for decision-making. Learning is all about decision-making. In practice, it also relates to being able to change one’s mind, given new information— flexibility and insight. Social connectedness would be impossible without the self regulating behaviour and altruism that arises from our wise decisions. This is actually an enormous topic. The point is that we need to teach children the way we wish them to grow. We need to start small, to model our values and skills. We must engage in both difficult and exhilarating conversations, in order to guide our children with empathy, support, engagement, and the actions that speak a thousand words.

Encouraging our children to “think for themselves” will arise spontaneously when they discover instances when their decisions are not shared by their peers or significant others. Their peers may go down paths that are truly dangerous to their health and wellbeing. They may believe in taking street drugs, shop lifting, taking vindictive action against their “enemies”, bullying vulnerable peers, stealing cars or bicycles, and so on and so on. Young children and teens need to be able to see that these actions are not prudent. They need to not be swayed like reeds in the wind to follow such actions. At moments like these, parents tend to give advice such as, “If your friend jumped into a fire, would you jump into that fire?” These words have been used for generations to indicate the need to think courageously for oneself, to live according to one’s values, and not to be led like a lamb to the slaughter.

So, even when children are very young, it is important to explain your reasons for your decisions to them. They do not need to necessarily understand those reasons…but they do need to know that you have reasons.

As children grow, they need to experience decisions as resulting from an evaluation of applicable reasons. Absolutely, they do not need to experience modelling on decision-making as taking arbitrary, unreasoned positions, such as the approach that states, “I allow this,” or “I forbid that”. When children grow up with such authoritarian parental or teacher pronouncements, they automatically assume that decision-making is capricious, illogical and haphazard. It can lead to deadly consequences. It can lead to teens saying, “Well, I’ve decided to take street drugs,” not because they have researched the issues and understand what they are risking, but rather because they want to unthinkingly follow a charismatic leader, belong to a desired group, or ignore their inner turmoil. The unfortunate thing is that such abdications of analytical decision-making can destroy their lives. It can also lead to people jumping down rabbit holes of conspiracy theories, being swept up by risky social contagions, and capitulating to mob action.

School staff and parents need to provide a nurturing environment for young people to think and act for themselves. We want to enable them to empower themselves regarding aspects of their own lives. This is what it means to be living with an internal locus of control, not an external locus of control. It allows them to realize that there is always something they can do to make their lives better. It also requires them to take responsibility for the actions that result from their decisions. Taking responsibility necessarily acknowledges the fact that decisions acted upon always have consequences. They need to learn that acting upon a decision, and dealing with the aftermath of the resulting consequences, are not just about them. It’s also about how those actions affect everyone else around them. Blame and denial are unacceptable, because decision making inevitably causes individual agency to bump up against the social milieu in which people exist. It is, again, the concept of liberty being the combination of freedom with responsibility. The purpose for training youth to think for themselves is only to assist them to clearly see the reality of their lives, to gain strength to advocate for themselves, and to make amends for their blunders and the pain they cause.

In schools, and in homes, young people need practice with making decisions that are developmentally appropriate for their stage in life and congruent with their ability to comprehend the consequences of certain actions. Children should be able to make decisions on recreational activities, the clothing they wear, the music they listen to, the projects they design in collaboration with their teachers, the schedules they devise for their academic work, and the way they handle challenging situations. At all moments, though, adults are required to intervene with feedback. They may be prompted to offer, “So, how did that decision work out for you? Do you want to make any changes?” Being responsive to the actual results of our choices is just as empowering as making initial decisions. Our decisions, in concert with the decisions of those around us, actually create everything about the lives we live. As Daniel Swiatek, my husband, says, “Decision-making is the engine of education and of life itself. Otherwise, you just drift.” We all have to act upon our decisions, then evaluate the results, which in turn affects further decisions and actions, on and on. Children can, and need to, participate in this process from an early age—provided that the decisions regard issues appropriate for their age and experience.

Q: What makes your school different?

A: I once asked a student who had been here her whole elementary and secondary life, “What is one thing that is different about Banbury Crossroads?” Her reply was, “Oh, I don’t know! There’s so much!” I once had a graduate student in psychology who undertook to write a paper about how the public system could adopt the values that guide Banbury Crossroads. His conclusion was, “It couldn’t. It would change everything.” The truth is that this school is not a simple, one-issue school, such as a science school, or a sports school. It is fundamentally different, because of its underlying attitudes towards why schooling is undertaken, what the practical conditions are for optimal learning, where and when learning can happen, how classes can be arranged and grouped, and how students can be treated emotionally and socially.

Many influences melded into this philosophy that underpins Banbury Crossroads. At the beginning, and for 6 years, I read only books on innovative schools around the Western world, and on psychology related to child development and communication. The more I read, and then, the more I listened to, observed, and experienced the children who wove through my life, the more complex the whole topic of schooling became. I discovered a multitude of reasons for having schools at all. I chose values and principles to guide my endeavour over 43 years ago that have remained fundamental today: mutual respect, small classes, empathic communication, emotional and social intelligence, meaningful relationships, an atmosphere of comfort and hope, real-world experiences, self-directed learning, flexible scheduling, vertical age grouping, self-responsibility, collaboration, and altruistic contribution to the community.

It is the combination of these principles that create the same outcomes every year, no matter the teachers, no matter the students: engagement through unfettered curiosity, social connection, self-awareness, emotional safety and trust, self-assurance with problemsolving, academic growth, excellence in written and oral communication skills, a quiet sense of dignity and confidence, and joy. Over the years, many teachers joined me on this honorable endeavour. Together, we experimented, planned, and discerned, how to design the multitudinous practicalities of creating a school that reflects the values and foundational principles I had adopted from the beginning. I am joyful, realizing the uniqueness of this school that exists in the world now.

Question: How do you define education?

A: The word, “education” comes from two Latin words: ducare, meaning to lead, and e, meaning out. This can mean to lead what is interior to the student, out into the world. Or else, it can mean to lead the student out into the exterior world. The students learn about the world inside them—their talents, aptitudes, creative expression, emotions, intellectual interests, and skills. They also learn about the world outside them—the physical, cultural, social, political, scientific and artistic realms that make up human collective experience. These two processes of education occur everywhere, anyhow, and always. Human beings have an innate drive to master their environment. They are social beings, and they love to share what they know or believe. Education thus happens inside schools and outside them. It happens every moment of every day. It happens with or without direct instruction. We learn through what works— to keep doing it—and we learn through what does not work—to stop doing it. Learning, therefore, and the lifelong process of education, is like the air we breathe. We exist within the medium, and we cannot exist without it.

Q: Are grades important?

A: What a question! Some people think so, and some do not. Some are relatively unquestioning when it comes to accepting the reliability of marks, and others question it very much. Some people think that marks are so important that they allow them to define who they are, including their success in life. Others think that they are limited indicators of overall worth, and look to other measures to determine their success in achieving their lifetime goals.

Within schools, it is a practical reality that at certain times in students’ lives, marks are very important indeed—such as when they are applying to universities, technical institutes or colleges. Marks are used as a filter for post-secondary institutions, indicating whether or not students possess a basic willingness to be diligent and persistent in academic studies, and a basic ability and aptitude for that type of work. Potential post-secondary students must prove that they are mentorable.

Then, marks are used at the end of this post-secondary period. We all understand this reality, although we may not often think about why this occurs. One major reason is that it is for the good of the larger society—we need to protect citizens from charlatans and incompetents. We want to ensure that when people claim to have expertise in any important field of endeavour, they actually do have that expertise. When generally-acknowledged and trustworthy “experts” give their seal of approval to a novice, people usually feel more confident that they can trust that newcomer to the field. Of course, in the end, after the training is done, novices must prove through their lifelong actions that they are worthy of that trust. Particularly in large urban centers, practitioners in any field must prove their worth, because people are always watching and making judgements—just to protect themselves from strangers they have no close or prior knowledge of.

However, the value of marks during elementary and junior high schooling is a matter of opinion. Many people agree, without debate, with assigning comparative marks. They want to be able to differentiate clearly between students’ abilities and accomplishments, for a variety of reasons. These people have no problem with marks, and they follow through accordingly. At Banbury Crossroads, as students are in the phase leading up to graduation, we teachers see the value of marks as some measure of evidence of demonstrable knowledge and skill. Students understand the need for demonstrating their accomplishments, too—in a variety of ways. However, when it concerns younger students, we have discerned 6 different reasons why marks are of little value on report cards. We have come to see the complexity of this topic. Marks are the last step in examining students’ work. They can only be determined after a thorough assessment of knowledge and skill has been conducted. It is the assessment that illuminates what teachers and parents want to know: how much understanding and expertise the students have gained through the learning process. Indeed, the assessment process itself, if it is conducted with the student, adds to that learning process. Assessment is part of learning, as I alluded to before—we learn from examining our work, particularly when we are primed to care about improving it. Our report cards are long and detailed, with anecdotal observations, specific curricular accomplishments and checklists, so that these assessments are clear when reporting to parents. Actually, for us, marks alone are insufficient for the purpose of communicating with parents. And as for the comparative factor inherent in marks, when it comes to young children, I have seen lists of famous scientists, writers, artists, mathematicians and musicians throughout history who were told when they were around 11 years old that they would never amount to anything—a message which low marks inevitably do convey. I am not interested in being counted in that group of arrogant and erroneous people.

Q: What is the best thing you have learned from students?

A: How to be real.