Philadelphia Friends Schools (book)

[I recently co-wrote and published a modest little book about Quaker education called, Philadelphia Friends Schools.  The book was a joint-project between the Friends Council on Education and Arcadia Press. The co-writer, Janet Chance, is the lower school director at the William Penn Charter School.  Gathering the photographs required the help of archivists from ten of Philadelphia's oldest Quaker schools.  Writing the captions and chapter introductions appeared to be a straightforward task, but the peculiar components of Quaker education did not lend themselves to easy explanation.  Below are two excerpts.]

Excerpt from the Introduction to Philadelphia Friends Schools:

This book contains a unique series of photographs from the archives of the Philadelphia-area Friends schools that were founded before the 20th century: Friends Select School and William Penn Charter School, both of which trace their roots to 1689; Abington Friends School, 1697; Plymouth Meeting Friends School, 1780; Westtown School, 1799; Frankford Friends School, 1833; Friends’ Central School, 1845; Germantown Friends School, 1855; Greene Street Friends School, 1855; and George School, 1893.

After a glimpse into the origins of each school (chapter one), this book focuses on the unique pedagogy of the Philadelphia-area Friends schools during the 20th century. The chapters highlight distinctive features of Quaker education: Meeting for Worship (chapter two), Inquiry and Innovation (chapter three), Community and Collaboration (chapter four), Experiential Learning (chapter five), and Peace and Social Justice (chapter six). An introduction explains the importance of the each chapter’s theme and its relevance to Quaker pedagogy. Concluding the collection is a chapter on the Friends Council on Education, the umbrella organization for Friends schools in the United States.

Curiously, many of the images and captions in this book would not surprise Quaker schoolchildren in a bygone era of modest schoolhouses and meeting rooms, of cobbled streets and dirt roads, nor would this book seem quaint or mysterious to current students. Friends schools have always had a distinct philosophy of education. Friends believe that each person has the capacity for goodness, and the school takes responsibility to nurture that goodness. Friends schools believe that education is preparation for the whole of life: the lively development of intellectual, physical, and social-emotional capacities, as well as the development of the spirit. Friends schools are spiritual communities based on the belief that there is that of God in everyone, yet Friends schools do not proselytize or seek to convert students or faculty.

Excerpt from Chapter Two, “Meeting for Worship,” of Philadelphia Friends Schools:

Simple in design, minimally comfortable and as broad as space allows, the Meeting bench has been a Friends school’s most important learning tool for more than 300 years.

—Robert Smith, Quaker educator

Meeting for worship—or simply, meeting—has played a central part in the curricula of all American Friends schools since their emergence in Philadelphia more than three centuries ago. Even though meeting does not appear anywhere on the transcript, it is the spiritual and educational center of the school. Not only do Friends schools discuss the importance of community, they also deliberately protect and nourish their community. In perhaps no other sustained educational activity is the interconnection and possibilities of the individual and the group publicly under construction each week. Quaker educators and philosophers have variously described meeting as a budding flower, a waiting stream, and a night sky. While no two meetings for worship are exactly the same, the general idea is that members of the community assemble in the meeting room, settle into silence, and remain in silent reflection unless someone—from a kindergartner to the head of school—is moved by the spirit or an inner voice to stand up and speak. The messages are surrounded by long periods of silence. Occasionally a story is shared that is so powerful and memorable that it illuminates the room like a northern star. Other messages come and go like fireflies. At still other times, the message emerges from the communal silence and washes up on shore of the individual mind, like a true unexpected treasure. Genuine reflection and the notion that all lives are hopeful and intertwined are difficult concepts to model and teach week after week, yet that is what Friends schools are doing. This chapter contains images of meeting for worship from the archives of Philadelphia-area Friends schools. The photographs are not ordered by date; instead, they show how the meeting unfolds from the perspective of schoolchildren, who arrive at Friends schools with a wide variety of religious beliefs and practices, including some with solely secular backgrounds.

[To buy the book, visit the FCE website: Philadelphia Friends Schools.]

[Mark Franek is the academic dean at the Rock School for Dance Education in Philadelphia, and Janet Chance is the lower school director at the William Penn Charter School, also in Philadelphia.]