Waldorf Pedagogy Expands and Opens First College in Brazil

04/18/2018 - 10h41

Swimming against the current of schools which have been increasingly using computers, tablets and smartphones in education, Waldorf's pedagogy values crafts, movement, and student's contact with nature, and it is now expanding with the opening of the first Waldorf college in Brazil.

Authorized by the Ministry of the Education at the end of 2017, Rudolf Steiner College started its activities in February and it will hold an event to mark the opening next Thursday (19).

It offers a pedagogy course and in addition to traditional education, it teaches the Waldorf methodology. It is defined, therefore, as a Waldorf college of pedagogy, and not as a college of Waldorf pedagogy. Their program associates subjects such as Brazilian dances, poetical experiences, and education of the body to regular subjects required by the Ministry of Education.

Those who complete the course will be able to teach in any school. This is, by the way, the intention of the group responsible for designing the course's structure.

"It will be excellent to create a dialogue with different educational lines. We wish that the majority of teachers who graduate here work especially in non-Waldorf schools, particularly public schools", states Melanie Mangels Guerra, 54, college dean.

Brazil currently has 74 schools authorized to use the methodology by the Federation of Waldorf Schools, with a total of 9,702 students. Approximately 130 additional schools are undergoing their certification process. The state of São Paulo has 40 official schools, the largest concentration in the country. There were only nine, 20 years ago.

Seeking that less conventional approach, Olívia Schimidt, 22, enrolled at Rudolf Steiner College. "We feel an internal transformation, it is not only about learning new content", she said.

Translated by ANA BEATRIZ DEMARIA

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