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Finding the Good
Click here to go to the FINDING the GOOD website
What is Finding the Good?
Finding the Good is
A TRAVELING SEMESTER PROGRAM
for high school and pre-college students
Finding the Good is
A Different Way to Learn
Based on the study, practice, and promotion of sustainability in the areas of shelter, transportation, energy, food, culture, and environmental conservation.
Finding the Good is
A Documentary Media Venture
Sustainable models are studied, lived, documented and shared using audio and video podcasts, radio broadcast and films.
A Research Project
Findings are used to develop curriculum for educating for sustainability.
A Lecture and Presentation Tour
Students and faculty give presentations and how-to workshops to schools and community groups.
Community, Networking, and Service
Building a forum and database of local people and projects.
A Path Towards Peace, Justice, and Sanity
"The more clearly we can focus our attention on the wonders and realities of the universe about us, the less taste we shall have for destruction". --Rachael Carson
(page)
Finding the Good is a high school/pre-college semester program
Based on the study, practice, and promotion of sustainability in the areas of shelter,
transportation, energy, food, culture, and environmental conservation.
Finding the Good
is a
Different Way to Learn
Finding the Good is a different way of learning, and there are many aspects to this “difference”.
Finding the Good is based on the study, practice, and promotion of sustainability in community.
What do we mean by sustainability?
To us, sustainability means living so that the natural systems on which we depend are not negatively affected by us (humans) but rather, we learn to live in synchronization with those systems.
In other words, living in right relationship to every aspect of our Life.
If we live so that living systems are nurtured and enhanced, then we sustain those systems not just for ourselves, but for all of life, including future generations. This means that we make decisions based on our best sense of what right relationship is to Nature, to each other, to future generations, to ourselves.
Living sustainably means to bring into consciousness and therefore into everyday life a value of stewardship and responsibility for those living and those yet unborn. Even the intention to live sustainably, which is another way of saying that right relationship is being considered, vastly expands our sense of ourselves beyond ourselves. It allows us to live so that our concerns shift from personal gain, to present and future generations’ survival, wellbeing, and ability to also live sustainably.
What if we examine what the right relationship is to the current generation of young people, and to education? What if we respond rightly (or with our best estimation of what rightly could mean) to the needs and opportunities of our time, and bring young people into that process? Might we be looking at goodness – in ourselves and in the world? Might we be ready to step boldly into a new way of being and start truly Finding the Good?
The Curriculum
The Finding the Good curriculum is action based. The word curriculum derives from the Latin, currere, “to run”. It doesn’t derive from “to sit and study” or “to listen to lectures”. Various definitions of “to run” are: to stretch out over a distance of space, time, or scope; to extend beyond a certain point; to direct or control; to move about freely and without restraint; to carry out a process or program.
All of those definitions are apropos of what happens in Finding the Good. The program gives young people an opportunity to put their academic background to use in the real world long before society tells them it is “time”. But they know it is time.
High school is a time when people are growing and thriving and really want to make a difference in the world. Adults can help by encouraging our independence, because that is so important in this time of our lives. I have a vision of what education can be, and through education, how activism is born.
– Maya, high school student and panelist at a college sustainability conference, Santa Cruz, CA
“Highschoolers are looking for something to get passionate about but we aren’t given opportunities. We’re crammed into a classroom for 6 hours/day so our passion needs to be sparked.”
--Hope Bigda-Peyton, high school senior in Boston, Mass and panelist at college sustainability conference
During the Finding the Good semester, students and faculty will travel to different communities as both seekers and delegates – seeking out models of sustainable practice that are already in place out in the world, and teaching/modeling sustainable living themselves. Picture this:
Ten high school students. Two college interns. Two teacher/mentors. The semester begins at Synergia’s home base, where the groundwork is laid. The target community and major projects are already chosen. At home base, research begins in earnest.
Students and teachers look for three main components in the target community:
I. Identify living examples of what people are doing in the areas of shelter, transportation, energy, food (growing, distributing, preparing), culture, and environmental conservation/ restoration, that is sustainable and life supporting. Once identified, these models will be profiled through film and radio documentaries – finding the good.
Students will be instructed in documentary media making – from the technology and hands-on use of digital cameras, audio recording devices, and computers, to setting up and conducting an interview professionally, to learning how to tell a story effectively. As raw material is gathered, finished pieces will be created that will air on the internet, over the radio, at public venues and Direct Access television stations. DVDs will be available for school and home use.
Through actual real-life work, the students gain valuable skills in journalism, reporting, community interface, investigation, public speaking, research, technology – the list goes on.
II. Organize a service project that will involve the community and meet a community need – something that needs to be cleaned up, fixed up, restored or created. Doing good.
Albert Schweitzer, while addressing a graduating class of University students, told them, “I don´t know what your destiny will be, but one thing I do know: the only ones among you who will be really happy are those who have sought and found how to serve.” And Martin Luther King said, “Anyone can be great because anyone can serve.” How many people spend their lives in the pursuit of greatness and happiness and find neither, when all they have to do is to find a way to serve?
Service is the heart of Finding the Good – it exists so that young people experience, first hand, what it means to make a difference in the world. And, specific service projects are a component in the program of study. In each community, needs and projects will be identified and carried out. The actual projects can be as varied and diverse as the people who work on them. Or, they may already exist, and fit with the sustainability model, such as helping to build straw bale houses on American Indian reservations with an organization that Finding the Good is profiling. Finding a way and a place to serve is one of the simplest things any of us can do because there is so much work to be done.
III. Develop relationships with schools in the targeted community. Thus, learning with others, and sharing the good.
Students and faculty will take Finding the Good into schools and give presentations on sustainability. They will work with students and faculty of those schools in making their own school more sustainable. This might mean initiating a school garden project, revamping cafeteria meals, or starting a recycling program. The possibilities are endless, the needs are great.
Teenagers need the opportunity to act on their ideals and their passion ever bit as much as they need to learn academics. In fact, these things are two sides to the same educational coin. Finding the Good is an opportunity for young people to put their academic knowledge and skills to practical use in a real-world setting.
Nine high school sophomores formed a circle around Tom as he explained the layout for the bathhouse they were about to build. “Who remembers the Pythagorean Theorem?” he asked. Their eyes grew big, but no one said anything. “Nobody?” he pressed. “Oh, we remember it”, one of them replied. The others nodded. “We just didn’t know there was a use for that stuff.”
Life and learning are not separate. Writing skills will be practiced, improved, polished and put out into the world for professional use. Research skills will be put to the test, practiced and improved. Reading requirements are rigorous. Public speaking is a given, and students will receive coaching and training in personal presentation and professional demeanor as well as in-life opportunities to speak in front of groups large and small.
Technology skills include computer graphics, digital videography and photography, database development, web design, word-processing, digital audio recording. Students make real films, real radio programs, and real podcasts that are viewed by real people. The knowledge that is needed to create well-rounded and complete educational materials and presentations will be acquired: in history, culture, science, math – all in the service of the practical, real life application. We will not try to make our curriculum fit the standards, but we will certainly use the standards in our curriculum -- where applicable, relevant, and useful.
Most importantly, Finding the Good will awaken in youth a belief that their contribution is not only valuable, but necessary; that Life is to be embraced; and that action is the natural extension of embracing Life.
Intrinsic and Extrinsic Learning
Remember a time when you had the feeling of really “getting something” profoundly? I’m not talking about an intellectual understanding of a fact or a concept, but that sense that one gets when suddenly one sees oneself and the larger world as not being separate. A whole new understanding or “seeing” emerges that was not there just a second before. One’s self-perception actually changes. This is my understanding of what is called “intrinsic learning”. When a student is learning intrinsically, then a personal connection to what is learned is made.
Finding the Good is a way of learning that starts by helping students to identify intrinsic needs, such as what is meaningful to the student. Not every high school student knows this in a clear and conscious way. Finding meaning, finding one’s own goodness, is important for everyone, but few people are helped in this endeavor. By identifying what is meaningful to the student, a sense of purpose is formed. Out of a sense of purpose comes action -- learning about what is important in the world and acting on its behalf. From an active stance comes one’s “calling” -- what one is called to do in the world, that inner sense of knowing that drives an individual to express outwardly what she loves and cares deeply for inwardly.
During middle adolescence, a young person is looking to find where she fits in with the world as an individual, as an autonomous entity that is capable of holding her own and taking her place as a contributing force. A sense of purpose is essential to this process because without it, one is living for someone else -- which amounts to slavery. Since freedom is so important at this age, anything that looks like slavery is akin to death, and rightly so.
In a recent entry in his audio journal, one student reflected, “I came to a realization today – this whole thing isn’t just about us. I think that when I started this trip, I was kind of ignorant about the hugeness of this all, but now I realize that I’m just part of a bigger picture. And so, I’m going to think that way from now on.”
Dr. Scott Forbes, author of Holistic Education: an Analysis of its Ideas and Nature writes, “Intrinsic learning requires the engagement of the person – the person’s experiencing and consequent internalizing of events are fundamental. Abraham Maslow believed that intrinsic learning is the learning that occurs in the great eye-opening moments of our lives, when we learn significant things about the world and ourselves, and is part of “the process of growing into the best human being one can be.”
He goes on to write, “For both Maslow and Rogers, it was not a matter of choosing intrinsic over extrinsic learning, but of integrating them and applying them in their proper domains. One of the ways in which this can be done is to ensure that extrinsic learning is motivated by intrinsic needs (i.e., personal needs of fulfillment, meaning, interest, etc.) and not from extrinsic stimuli (e.g., rewards or punishments).
Finding the Good is experiential learning -- the learning is not limited to theories and concepts but is in-life learning, requiring inquiry into difficult problems of living, and a new way of thinking to solve those problems. It requires active participation in learning about real-life systems and solutions and then actually creating real programs, projects and presentations for real people.
I think a lot of importance in this kind of learning comes directly from experience. The way that this is different than regular learning is that we’re out here experiencing everything firsthand and that’s a lot of the way we get our information. We’re actively participating, we’re actively seeing it, we’re being out in Nature which is something that everyone needs to do a lot more of, and be educated on those kind of issues -- raising consciousness about the world, the state of the world. Being with Synergia helps you to learn some things that I think would actually be valuable in life. – Rosalie, audio journal
Nature
Synergia Board member Dr. Robin Martin is currently teaching at Dhofar University in Oman, in the Middle East. She wrote recently, “As always, I sometimes feel a bit silly referencing the birds so much, but watching the males, the females, the individual birds, the group dynamics, the fluttering & cleaning of wings, their relation to me each morning really puts me in such a state of observation, that I can´t quite explain its potency or delicacy. It seems to be a "non-time" of day when the external/internal merges more readily for me”.
Parents often come to us with deep concern and feelings of helplessness over how much time their teens spend immersed in technology, computers, and electronic entertainment. While I, on the other hand, am far more concerned with the lack of time that youth are spending in close contact with Nature. Some may think that one displaces the other, but that is not true. I know young people who are immersed in computer games on a regular basis, but who also spend time in Nature -- to observe, to play, to lose themselves, to find themselves again. We have taken young people out into the wilderness for over twenty years. A lot has changed in the world in those past twenty years. And yet people are not that different. True, the obsession with and “addiction” to material objects such as video games, cell phones and iPods is widespread and pervasive, but it never ceases to amaze me how resilient and receptive young people are to Nature and wildness, when exposed. After a day or two living outdoors, beside a river, or on a mountain, a deeper part of them relaxes into the elements and finds a home there. A place to love and feel inspired in. And a part of them is touched and awakens to a sense of self whom they had not yet met, or had not seen in a long time. And they realize, if they are lucky, that that is a part that they cannot afford to live without.
It is not a matter of Technology vs. Nature. It is a matter of right relationship to both.
Developing a relationship with Nature in the first place is part of it. Looking closely at natural systems and seeing how we can work in concert, rather than in conflict with those systems, is part of it. Recognizing that we are not separate from Nature, is part of it.
We start quite simply with time spent in the natural world, observing. The act of observation usually begins with external nature: the trees, wind, grass, birds, insects, etc. At some point, one is aware that self-observation is also present. Powers of observation are developed by engaging them. One cannot develop such a capacity by reading about it, or listening to a lecture. It must be practiced to be learned.
First, I sit quiet in Nature and observe, senses open, body still. Then at some point I notice that am observing myself in relation to Nature, and then, I notice that I notice other humans more closely. It´s not a linear process, nor is it time-bound – not a first, second, third, progression as it sounds from the way I´ve written it. But the observation of Nature and oneself as Nature/with Nature/not-separate from Nature is a way into that process. Nature observation trains and opens and sharpens my observation capacities so that I am able to "see" subtle things in a human face, or verbal expression, or non-expression, that I would not have seen had I not learned to also see what goes on in a flock of birds, for example. And perhaps the most important thing: close examination of Nature can only make one aware that we really do live inside of a miracle. And living/relating as if we lived inside of a miracle could change everything. dw
Devyn says it like this:
“Once you get out of the city and lay on a rock, and listen to the wind, and the birds, and you see ants crawling……you know, some people are scared of bugs but when you’re out here it’s like, they are a part of you. You are a part of them. You are connected, you just don’t want to leave. You feel like you are a part of this creation, and if it dies, you die. –Devyn, high school student, audio journal
Mentoring
Mentoring at Finding the Good takes two forms. One involves meeting, interviewing, conversing with, and recording professionals in the various study areas. This may be a two-hour interview and conversation with, for example, an inventor working on biomimicry innovations, or a discussion with a world-class biologist. Mentoring also refers to the ongoing day-to-day mentoring that happens with the primary teachers, talked about elsewhere in this paper.
We can’t say enough about the power of intergenerational mentorship. Think of the people in your life who have positively impacted you in a personal way. Maybe you were 12. Maybe you were 14, or 37, or 52. Something about the presence of that individual touched you and you were receptive to learning from her or him, absorbing not just information but a sense of their humanness, their concerns and passions – their goodness. Synergia mentors are not just top in their field, and are not simply purveyors of information. They themselves have found goodness in their lives, and they carry that with them in their being.
The interaction actually inspires the learner to recognize and develop similar attributes in themselves. In other words, you were changed (for the better) by the presence of that person. And it is not just a one-way transmission but rather an exchange -- the mentor gains equally by passing onto others directly, an important part of themselves. We might say that goodness transfers from one person to another – it flows and moves and returns from where it began, increased and strengthened.
Most adults consider themselves lucky to have had one or two such individuals in their whole life. Imagine if you met twenty people like that in the course of a semester.
When our daughter was attending the local high school, at that time with a student body population of around 3,000 – we were happy and surprised when she got a teacher she liked, respected, and learned well from. That is how jaded we were by then about conventional education. By the time she was in college however – a small private liberal arts school with a strong reputation, we expected every professor to be top notch. We were aghast and disappointed when this proved not to be the case. The reality was that college was not much different than high school in terms of the number of teachers who inspired and challenged her.
At Finding the Good, we seek out those extraordinary teachers and we go to them. They may not even think of themselves as teachers, but in the truest sense, they are. They are individuals who possess the kind of substance, commitment, and passion that a young person can relate to and aspire to. We have met many such individuals over the years, almost none of them in an academic setting. We have established long-standing relationships with many of these people and have become good friends. We have traveled long distances just so our students can sit with them, inquire with them, and soak in their presence, their knowledge, and their goodness. Several of them are quoted throughout this paper.
“We’ve met so many people and it’s such a privilege for us to talk to them because not that many people get to meet these people and they’re inspired that all of us kids want to do something about the environment. So they tell us all their knowledge and what they do and you learn about that and then sit on a meadow and think about it and it’s like, wow, why would anyone want to tear this down?” -- Devyn, audio journal
Right Relationship to Self
This whole paper is a short introduction to a different educational approach for teenagers. The heading of this section alone could be the subject of volumes. So what we have to say about it will be the beginning of the beginning of a way to look at this most important aspect of education:
self-knowledge.
Learning about one’s self in relation to…....the whole of one’s life. The whole of one’s life. While that may seem infinitely large – and it is – it is the very thing that a person in their late teens is grappling with as they face independence and adulthood for the very first time. But not for the last. For it is the very thing that all humans, simply because we are human, are faced with over and over. It is perhaps the most important thing for a human, and therefore one of the most important things for education to support.
Developing a right relationship to self has, of course, limitless forms. One aspect may be discovering what is personally meaningful, another might be knowing how one learns as a unique individual, or developing skills and talents that one may not have even known existed. Knowing one’s fears and limitations is part of self-knowledge, and can often only be faced and overcome in the real-world context. For example, public speaking is a large component of the curriculum. Public speaking is a valued and important skill, and it is also one of the top most feared activities one can do. (A commonly sited statistic is that public speaking is the number one fear in adults – ranked above death.) One can practice public speaking in front of a small audience of friends, family or classmates, but it is only in the real-world setting of speaking in front of a group of strangers that the fear of speaking in public is faced and dealt with.
Teenagers (in this case high school juniors, seniors and pre-college) are on the brink of adulthood, yet they are not fully adult. They have not yet ventured far into the world -- they don’t know that they can support themselves, establish a career, take their place in society, contribute to their community, cultivate mature relationships, etc. because they have not yet done it. What is right relationship to all of these things? The answer to that question is not found in an SAT score. It is not found in fact memorization. It is not found in the periodic table of elements. The answer lies in the individual – moment by moment, situation by situation, decision by decision. To even know that right relationship to these things is something to think about, to consider, to enter into, is part of this educational approach.
There is commonly a tremendous insecurity and doubt in the individual as to whether they can, in fact, make an independent life in the world. At the same time, their ideals are still a strong motivating force. How does one navigate this territory? By testing the waters, with competent and experienced mentors. By stepping into the world bravely but not alone. By participating with peers, acting on the ideals that fuel action and by building success on success. In this way, one is able to step into unknown landscapes despite fear and insecurity, to face and take on the challenges that are an inevitable part of life.
What would it have meant, if you had had the kind of support at 16 or 17 or 18 to understand what “right relationship to self” might be? What was important to you then? Personally, I was longing for purpose and meaning. I had a small sense of what this might be. Not what it would look like in an external form, but what it might actually be. And I knew in my bones that if I missed this vital piece, my life would not be worth living. I was never suicidal, so I don’t mean it in that literal, drastic sense. I mean it actually in a much more profound sense. I would have missed something essential to my ability to live my life in its fullest expression. - dw
We see this same longing and acute awareness of the life-and-death seriousness this is in young people today. It is not simply that they fear the problems of the world are too great to do anything about. It is that they fear that they will not be given a position and direction to work at it. That no one will notice how critical this is to them (is anyone really noticing now, they wonder?)
A component to sustainability is the responsibility of humans to grow inwardly so that self-destruction and violence are not a part of who we are as humans. For how can violence possibly contribute to a sustainable life? How can we sustain ourselves if we don’t stop violence from the inside? And what might happen if we did stop the violence from the inside? Might love and compassion and beauty then, be integrated into sustainability? Might one then, find one’s own goodness?
Freedom/Responsibility
Another part of knowing oneself in the developing teen years, is learning well the relationship between freedom and responsibility. So often adults – teachers, counselors, parents – approach freedom and responsibility with an agenda: when a teen demonstrates that he or she can act responsibly, or make a ‘responsible decision’, then the adult grants more freedom, as a ‘reward’ or an acknowledgment of the responsible action. What we have seen, over and over, in the programs at Synergia, is that teens are capable of understanding and embodying a far more complex and subtle relationship to freedom and responsibility. At Synergia we approach this by creating an environment that requires, often demands, an act of responsibility, sometimes great responsibility, where teens are responsible for the lives of others as well as their own in very clear and unmistakable circumstances, such as in rock climbing, or white water canoeing. The freedom is not something that we grant – it arises naturally within the person when they commit to a level of dependability, trustworthiness and respect, in other words when they respond rightly in relationship to responsibility. It comes by way of a serious commitment and therefore it is well won and valued highly. It is not simply the freedom of extended privileges, though they may be included. It is the freedom of knowing that one can be rightly responsible, can take stewardship of something and defend it, can experience the solidity of a self that does not agonize over ‘choices’ but rather acts in a clear manner that involves no choice because the way is not cluttered by selfish or self-serving desires. This kind of freedom is not possible for another to “grant” – it is found through right relationship to responsibility, and at times with risk.
Finding the Good mentors seek out and make available this kind of responsibility opportunity and commit to supporting the students in appropriate exploration and experimentation.
We were in Bahia de Los Angeles, Baja California, Mexico, at the sea turtle research and rescue station. Antonio Resendiz, our good friend and the research scientist who founded the station, was expecting a large group of middle school students from the U.S. for a lecture and a tour of the turtle tanks. Antonio moves so fast between projects, meetings, and presentations that one can barely keep up with him. As he was dashing off to a meeting, he turned to Anna, then 16, handed her the keys to the turtle enclosure, and said, “Anna – you give the turtle lecture. You know what to do. I’ll be back.” Anna stood there, stunned. She had heard the “turtle lecture” several times over the years, and had studied well all that we learned from Antonio. She was already an intern with Synergia. With no time to talk her way out of it, or succumb to timidity, she smiled and greeted the students warmly. She then proceeded to give the talk, and answer all of the many questions. She was poised, confident, and held the students attention. I suspect that Antonio’s meeting was not as urgent as he made it out to be. He understands that young people need the chance to prove themselves in real life situations, so that they can start the process of taking over the work. He also understands how important it is for younger students to receive a teaching from one who is also still young. – dw
A Documentary Media Venture
Sustainable models are studied, lived, documented and shared using audio and video podcasts, radio broadcast and films.
Youth media has been a part of Synergia programs since our exploration of the Hetch Hetchy issue in Yosemite National Park in 2004. An award-winning film, “Dude, Where’s My River?” came out of that project. What we learned from the experience was invaluable and would shape the future of our programs as well as redefining the way we viewed the relationship between media and youth.
Youth today face a barrage of media influences – some good, some bad. Parents are concerned at the level of time and attention that their children are spending on electronics and technology, from the internet to iPod use to “entertainment centers.” Young people are growing up with contradictions just as every generation has – the irresistible pull of “forbidden fruit” in the form of exciting new innovations, juxtaposed to parental concern, authority and disapproval. And in this case, along with other influencing factors, the physical wellbeing of young people today is at risk.
How confusing for them. The messages they receive over their use and overuse of technology are so often negative and mixed. And yet, it is their technology. A colleague once said to me, “Imagine that you were born into water. It was your medium, and you knew it intimately, and then you were told that water is bad.”
Teaching youth to use media as a positive force for change and education means that their inherent affinity for and talent with technology are put to good use. A right relationship to technology is possible. Youth can act on their ideals in a positive way, using technology as a tool for their own self-growth.
Despite the high-tech aspects of life today, many of the applications and much of the allure still boils down to an ancient source: Story.
Story is a part of being human. Human and cultural survival once depended on (and in many places still does depend on) the oral tradition – passing knowledge from one generation to the next. And we’re still hooked – movies are stories, history is made up of stories, video games follow sometimes-intricate storylines. For recent confirmation one need look no further than the Harry Potter phenomenon to know that humans, despite our high-tech world, are still captivated by story. Using story and technology to reach people and to educate them on vital solutions, events and to pass on knowledge is much of what Finding the Good does.
Synergia has three student-involved films to its credit. With the guidance of mentors, students explore an issue and a region, filming and photographing, recording and interviewing, and documenting personal thoughts and opinions in written and spoken form. These films came out of three Youth in Conservation programs – intensive 3-week summer programs that combine wilderness living, social competency, environmental conservation and youth media. These programs more than any other are the inspiration and prototype for Finding the Good. Below are descriptions of the three films:
“Dude, Where’s My River?”
In the summer of 2004, eight teenagers and three teachers embarked on a unique expedition: to follow the Hetch Hetchy water system from its source at the headwaters of the Tuolumne River in Yosemite National Park, to its culmination in San Francisco Bay. They met with and interviewed environmentalists, water managers and planners, lawyers, grass roots activists, and ordinary citizens. And, they participated in a unique form of education, and are now taking what they learned and, though the medium of film, are educating others on one of the most critical environmental issues of our time.
Cache Creek Wild and Scenic
In the summer of 2005, an international team of high school students, college students, and teachers set out to document what has since become an environmental victory: the state Wild and Scenic River designation of Cache Creek in Northern California. The group explored the area’s riparian habitat and wildlife by canoe, kayak and raft. They interviewed environmentalists, lawmakers, and citizens. And they dedicated themselves to learning all they could about the relationship between humans and wilderness and how each depends on the other.
California Assemblymember Lois Wolk, author of the bill, had this to say about the students and the film:
“The Cache Creek film helped tremendously in achieving the goal of a wild, scenic and environmental river on Cache Creek. This group was instrumental in getting the attention of the governor’s office -- their vote and their support, and a signature. So I’m very grateful to them and when you see this film you’ll see why we had to preserve this river.”
Awakening the Bear River
In the summer of 2007, the Youth in Conservation program concentrated in three areas of study. For the first 5 days of the program we backpacked high in the Eastern side of the Sierra Nevada mountain range. The middle three days were devoted to the Sierra Nevada Alliance conference at Lake Tahoe – a professional conference and convergence of conservation groups. Synergia co-directs the Young Environmental Leaders track of the conference. Synergia students speak at the conference, participate in panel discussions, and interact in an intergenerational milieu. Prior to the conference in 2007, Synergia had put word out to the conservation community that our group would show up at one of the member organizations and help “tell their story” through photographs, audio interviews and other media. We pictured spending the last week of the program with an organization and leaving them with a podcast, and photos for their website. Little did we know when we agreed to help with the Bear River project what we were getting ourselves into! Five intensive days later, we had studied hydro-power re-licensing, Gold Rush era mining history and its effects on the Sierra, resource development, levee set-backs, floodplain issues and housing development, PG & E Land Disbursement, Native California culture and people, Native fish habitat, and the list goes on. We walked away with armfuls of photos, audio journals, written journals, recorded interviews, and our heads spinning. After much work all fall, students and teachers managed to render all the collected material into a 30 minute documentary that is being used to educate the public on all of the above issues, and mostly to show people a beautiful river, a different way to learn and engage the world, and how they as ordinary people can get involved in protecting their watershed.
“It’s so fascinating to learn about water because if you try to just learn about the river you find that there’s so much more involved with it than that one thing that you thought you were going to study. I thought that we were just going to study about the Bear River but it’s so connected to everything else, and I guess that goes for life. Water issues are so interesting to me because water affects everything and because everyone needs water to live, and at the same time I don’t think enough people really realize what’s going on with our rivers and streams and creeks. These issues are not just going on here, they’re going on everywhere.” – Courtney, Youth in Conservation intern, college student
Research project
Findings are used to develop curriculum for educating for sustainability.
The research aspects of Finding the Good are at least two-fold. One: sustainable, working models and practices are sought out and documented, and Two: Finding the Good is a research project in itself as we develop a way to educate for sustainability.
The definition of sustainability is currently the subject of much public and academic discourse. We address our definition earlier in this paper. Sometimes it is easier to understand what something is by stating what it is not. Author Michael Pollan defines an un-sustainable system as "a practice or process that can´t go on indefinitely because it is destroying the very conditions on which it depends."
But…..what if synergy could exist between humans and the environment to the extent that our relationship and interaction may actually create something greater rather than to diminish either? Could this be considered right relationship to the environment?
The students will be delegates in the world, bringing not just what they learn, but who they are -- their insights, passion and creativity so that others may learn from them. For example, a group of students may want to research and document a “farms to school” lunch program. They set out and learn as much as they can about the program, how and why it works, and what makes it healthful and sustainable. They document and record the program for the purpose of applying and adapting it in other communities. They may then move on to start a similar program themselves, in their home communities, or somewhere else. Using what they learned as a starting point, and adding their own insights and ideas, they may help to further develop a viable model of sustainable living. A student who may have an affinity for and interest in nutrition now has a new paradigm to consider, and a new career opportunity that he never even knew existed. In this way, new innovations, new programs, and new models are developed and shared throughout the world. The learning becomes inseparable from living and involves a network of relationships that includes nature and the student’s own communities.
When research on a given model or practice is complete and documented, it is entered into the Finding the Good database of local models of good projects and sustainable solutions that can be re-created and utilized within its community and beyond. This database of projects will be made available to school classes and community groups so that they can use them to make their own place better. As Zenobia Barlow and Michael K. Stone write in the introduction of Ecological Literacy: Educating Our Children for a Sustainable World, “We have discovered that successful programs don’t necessarily replicate, but rather migrate, as educators, parents and community activists are inspired by them to seek solutions that solve for pattern in their own situations.” Making the models known and available for such migration, including the model that is Finding the Good is a vital component of Finding the Good. It is the component that gathers the parts together so that sharing, migration, and ultimately, new innovations all over the world can happen.
Lecture and presentation tour
Students and faculty give presentations and how-to workshops to schools and community groups.
As good models are documented, the stories behind the models are shared through a lecture and presentation tour. Students learn the skills of public speaking, of creating comprehensive and cohesive presentation materials, of presenting themselves with a public face. In this way, those of all ages learn about the good work in the world, and in their own communities; they learn about a different form of education since the story of Finding the Good is inseparable from the telling of the researched stories.
And there is more. We have seen, time after time, when youth are given a position of leadership, of speaking out to others young and old, something happens that is very powerful. Older people see the youth in their ideals, intelligence, and passion and are heartened by the knowledge that teenagers will soon be taking the reins and leading the world. Younger people see the teens and are inspired by them for a different reason, as the teens clearly communicate by their very presence that one is never too young to make a difference. And they inspire their peers, because things can get discouraging, and we all need each other to remind us that we can take action, work together, and take our rightful place.
Community, networking, and service
Building a forum and database of local people and projects.
We have spoken some about relationship. It is in community that right relationship to others is learned, practiced, and developed.
A brother asked Abba Matoes: what shall I do? My tongue causes me trouble and whenever I am among people, I cannot control it and I condemn them in all their good deeds and contradict them. What, therefore, shall I do? The old man answered him: If you cannot control yourself, go away from people and live alone, for this is a weakness. Those who live together with others ought not to be square, but round, in order to turn toward all. Further, the old man said: I live alone not because of my virtue, but rather because of my weakness. You see, those who live among people are the strong ones.
– Teaching story from Desert Fathers
Many of the ills in our society today can be traced to a lack of community. A school is a community in itself, but we need to find more and better ways of connecting schools to the wider communities of which they are a part. An aspect of the Finding the Good curriculum is to bring students and communities together through shared projects. Nothing breaks down barriers between people faster than working toward a positive common goal. We have seen this enacted time and time again in Synergia service programs (and never more dramatically than with rival gang members on the Challenge Ropes Course). We all need to know that we belong, that we have a place and a purpose in our community, and that our community values and needs us.
“I go to college in a small town in Eastern Washington State. The students and the community aren’t just separate – there is animosity between them. The students are only there for four years, so they don’t have much of an investment in the greater community. They act as if the community is there to serve them – they have a tremendous sense of entitlement. The community feels this and is resentful. I have to wonder if the general disconnect these days between young children and Nature leads to disconnect with community when those children grow up. I talk to my peers, and they have no comprehension of what they are doing to alienate the community – they talk as if the rift is due to the community alone, and that they have no responsibility in it. I think they haven’t learned what relationship is. They don’t know what it means to be part of a community. --- Michele, college student
Finding the Good involves the study of community, and the creation of community. Studies have found that humans are most comfortable in clusters of 10 to12 -- family sized groups. Each semester will accept a maximum of 12 students. Students collaborate on projects, and more importantly, they learn to live together, day in and day out. They learn what is necessary to share resources – limited ones! – to live in community, work on projects together and be accountable to one another and to the community as a whole. They learn to put their skills and passions into something that serves the greater good.
A Path Towards Peace, Justice, and Sanity
Finding the Good is needed today. Youth today are exposed to the realities and problems of the world in ways that no generation before them ever has been, due to the vast and rapid distribution of information through various forms of new media, especially the internet. This can contribute to feelings of overwhelm and helplessness at a time when young people are on the brink of impending adulthood. Traditional education has kept up with providing access to the vast stores of available information, but it has not kept up with young people’s urgent need for the tools and the clear direction to take up the vitalizing work of creating a just and sustainable world.
As Paul Hawken discovered when doing research for his book, Blessed Unrest: How the Largest Movement in the World Came Into Being and No One Saw it Coming, there is a gathering of forces world-wide to create a just and sustainable world. He likens this force (the millions of non-profit and community organizations dedicated to environmental and social justice) to the human immune system. Just as antibodies rally when the body is under threat, people are joining together to defend life on Earth. This is happening at a time when negative messages about the environment are practically all one ever hears. Young people today need to be educated in sustainable living solutions and empowered to take leadership because they are inheriting the most pervasive problems the world has ever known. If we are to solve the problems of humanity, education must change.
In a recent interview with Richard Louv, author of Last Child in the Woods: Saving our Children from Nature Deficit Disorder, the author tells of speaking with a group of high school students about their health and their direct experience of nature. He says, ”In the next forty years, all our lives must change because of global warming and other environmental challenges. We’ll need new kinds of agriculture, new kinds of urban design, new kinds of architecture, new sources of energy. Whole new professions will emerge, for which we don’t even have names yet. After the students left, I asked the biology teacher why he thought they’d been so attentive. He said it was simple: I’d said something hopeful about the future of the environment. They never hear that. The major message that comes through to kids is that it’s too late for the environment. Why suit up for the game if it’s already over? We need to change that message.”
Finding the Good does more than just change the message. It provides an actual, real, in-life experience to young people to start finding the good, the sustainable, the creative in the world -- and in themselves.
University and Adult Life
Most teens in traditional schools are required to learn in ways that are inadequate for meeting the challenges of University and the challenges of being an adult. The reasons for learning are too often disconnected from real life needs and problems. The goal of education in so many instances has been reduced to scoring well on standardized tests, and focusing on a grade, rather than on learning how to learn. A high grade point average becomes the goal so that admission into a prestigious university is achieved, so that a well paying job is assured, with the assumption of financial security. This very progression is based on a system of competition. Students are not adequately learning the practice of collaboration and teamwork and are instead being conditioned to live as though competition is necessary for their very survival. When in fact, long term survival and the ability to sustain ecosystems and societies is dependent upon humans learning to cooperate with one another to collectively solve the problems we’ve created by not cooperating with one another. Most real-world working environments are social structures themselves where co-workers are inter-dependent – they rely on one another and success is dependent on their ability to support and work with one another. A portion of Synergia’s ropes course clientele over the past twenty years has been with the corporate and business sector, teaching teamwork and cooperation in the workplace. And most struggle enormously with these basic qualities because their education did not adequately include them – they literally don’t know how to do it well.
If, as an adult, you think back on the most challenging time in your life, and what you had to find in yourself to overcome it, and then ask yourself if you learned that in school, what would your answer be? If not in school, where and how did you learn it?
We know from speaking with hundreds of parents that what they most want for their children is for them to learn to learn in a meaningful environment. They want their children to live meaningful lives. We know from speaking with thousands of young people that they want that as well. They know that a life or a career without meaning is no life at all.
“I don’t like it when people say that there’s no hope and that everything isn’t going to be O.K. The things that we want to do, the things that we want to accomplish, the things that we’ve made wrong -- that we can’t somehow make them right again. And I disagree and it’s hard to tell whether any amount of reasoning would change my mind.”
Rosalie
Finding the Good prepares students for the challenges of navigating the adult world. Traditional high school does not teach for this purpose. Synergia recently received the following plea from a top student recently graduated from one of the most highly regarded high schools in Marin County, near San Francisco:
I am currently a freshman at Vassar College. When I arrived this fall, I had a shuddering realization that I was lost, and didn´t know what I wanted from college yet. I needed to get a clearer sense of myself. There is so much I have wanted to learn, see, read. There are so many places I want to go. I am aching to be out in the wilderness for selfish and selfless reasons. I want to benefit from the deep spiritual experience I have watching the sun rise between trees, or the smell of an approaching night, and the glimmer of the stars that are like diamonds in a jewelry store case. I also want to give back to the earth, and to human communities. I want to help protect our soil, our trees, our mountains, and our animals - we are all interconnected, and negligence of the earth is negligence of self; I want to help others to see this.
I wasn´t ready to do this. I was not ready for college. I have followed the rules all of my life, and had reached my boiling point. I am not ready to be confined in the classroom, in the dorms, on a campus. I needed not to search for another school, a different school, but for myself, a different self. I needed to get a clearer sense of myself. -- Ariel M.
This is not a singular or unusual case, but rather quite a common one. Even with students who stay in school (this student did not) the feelings she expresses are widespread and commonly held by young people across the social and economic strata. We have seen them, talked with them, coached them, and empathized with them. At last we can offer them something more.
The Students
What kind of student is a match for Finding the Good? Finding the Good students are ready for a big step in their lives. They are ready to explore the aspects outlined in this paper. Most of all, they have a desire to find purpose and meaning in their lives, even if they don’t have a clue as to how. They are ready to explore themselves in relation to the world. They are ready to develop and practice leadership. They are ready for an expanded relationship to freedom/responsibility.
Diversity. Biodiversity is essential to the health of an ecosystem. We believe that diversity in human communities is essential to the health of a community. By “diverse” we mean in every way: culturally, socially, economically, intellectually. In personality, character, interests, skills, and talents. In background, ethnicity, family, origins. In ways of thinking, ways of looking at the world, relating, socializing. In order to create a healthy community, we not only invite, but appreciate and actively seek out a diverse range of people. That is what makes life interesting, and friendships vital. It is what allows us to learn and grow beyond our comfort level, biases, stereotypes, limitations and prejudices. It is what offers us the chance to know acceptance and compassion. It is why we design intergenerational learning opportunities, and the teaching/learning as a fluid system.
Most high school environments are segregated, if not by race or class, then by clique and identity. Not by decree, but by invisible barriers and social boundaries that few dare to confront, or cross, if they think about it at all. This is an entirely unnatural environment, and the root of much suffering and violence on campuses across the country. People recognize the detrimental, alienating and dangerous effects of such a set-up, yet they go largely unchanged, despite efforts – some very noble – to address the problem. We have found that people have to live with people who are different than they are in order to know and therefore appreciate difference.
Students are in the 11th, 12th and post high school range. Students from public schools, private schools, homeschooling, unschooling, community college, and independent study are all welcome. You do not have to be a high academic achiever, nor an “environmental” or “outdoorsy” type. Grades are not a factor. You will, however, need certain academic skills, as this is a program that will round out your academic education and give you the opportunity to put those skills to real-life use in the world. The program application goes into further detail on who is eligible for Finding the Good.
Finding the Good students? They are university bound, and they are students who will never attend college. They are straight A students and students who are never graded, and everyone in between. They are students who love to read, and those who don’t; students who are artistic, and those who would rather solve a mathematical problem than anything else. They are dancers, and writers, and people who love children, and the whole spectrum of diverse and fascinating human expression. They are ready to bring the fullness of who they are to a learning community and learn in a whole new way.
The teachers
The main teachers and mentors of Finding the Good are part of a learning community, not a teaching institution. Students and teachers learn together. We use the term mentor to refer to the teachers who are with the Finding the Good students on a regular basis, and also those who we meet on our travels to interview and learn from. Both types of mentors are the kind of people who have lived full lives, who are passionate about learning and sharing what they learn and what they know. They care about humanity and life on earth, and understand that teaching, like parenting, is a sacred calling. They know that it is the highest responsibility and the greatest honor to teach and learn with young people.
Just as self-knowledge and self-development is a part of the student’s work, so it is a part of the teachers’. Teaching at Finding the Good is not a top-down process but a shared inquiry and a sharing of knowledge.
In letters to the schools, Volume II, J. Krishnamurti wrote, “Our…intent is to bring about a good, intelligent, extremely capable, free human being. This is my intent as a dedicated teacher, and it should be yours, too, as parents. It should be the intent of all humanity, for we are all concerned…..
…..The future is our responsibility, so this is our immediate problem. My problem and yours is to cultivate the comprehensive intelligence from which all other things flow.”
In his lifetime, Krishnamurti founded schools in England, India and the U.S. that are still in operation today. He knew that for society to change, education had to change first, to an approach that nurtured the whole human -- teachers and students alike.
In addition to teachers, there are two positions per semester for student interns – college students who are fulfilling an internship as part of their studies, or independently. This learning and teaching opportunity gives interns the chance to participate with a high level of responsibility and in-life career training.
Teaching and learning happens in relationship, just as with everything else. As Goethe said, “We only learn from those we love.”
I’m here because I believe that our world is in serious trouble and that its fate largely depends on the next generation and its motivation to work for positive change. What better way to affect change than to spend time with these young people and share with them my love of life and passion for creating a better world. – Artec, student intern, Hetch Hetchy project, summer 2004
From the Directors of Finding the Good:
People often ask us why we do what we do, and what keeps us going, running a non-profit organization and working intensively with young people. Put into terms of Finding the Good, one could say that I feel very fortunate that we have known goodness in this life. When one has touched goodness, there becomes no choice but to make that possibility open to others, in whatever realm one occupies. We happen to be experiential educators, so it is within this realm that we do whatever we can to know goodness, and to help so that others can know it. We live in a fragile world, and our ability as humans to successfully live together, love one another and take care of the planet seems to be our biggest challenge. Offering the Finding the Good semester program is one way that we choose to serve humanity through working with and teaching young people.
Director’s Bios
Tom Weistar, Executive Director
As a young man, Tom followed two of his passions: wilderness education, and fine woodworking. He first trained with the Yosemite Search and Rescue team, and then he struck out on his own and started a woodworking business. His work was represented in shops and galleries in eight western states. He taught industrial arts at a private art institute, and construction technology at the community college level. With the woodworking business well established, he then co-founded a non-profit educational organization and built the outdoor education program from the ground up, drawing on his experience as a challenge ropes course trainer with such institutions as Project Adventure, On Course, and the University of California Los Angeles. His expertise in the wilderness as a teacher and guide ranges from whitewater rafting and canoeing, to rock climbing and backpacking. As part of his early non-profit work, he studied land use/planning and eventually came to manage one of the largest earth construction/green building projects on the west coast. Tom has worked in the non-profit business sector since 1985 applying his skills in cooperation, teambuilding and consensus leadership. As executive director and co-founder, Tom brings his diverse background to Synergia’s organizational structure, service learning and community building curriculum.
Debra Weistar, Program Director
Debra’s background in education began when she and Tom decide
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