MANZANITA’S mission
Education to Heal the Earth
MISSION STATEMENT
The mission of Manzanita School is to re-awaken mutual symbiosis between human beings and the more than human world (what most people call “nature.“) Through time-tested “core routines“ of Nature Connection, we promote a love of the earth and foster interbeing between students, staff, and the natural world. Through the practice of Land Stewardship, we re-awaken ancestral sensibilities of tending the Earth. The local chaparral is the living classroom where this work takes place. We support the concept of a living earth, and animistic world views which are both ancestral to humans beings, and which counteract tendencies of human supremacy over nature. We use the setting of modern schooling to offer a new curriculum for our times, and teach an interdisciplinary science-humanities core that directly reinforces Nature Connection and Stewardship. Through our Manzanita Institute, we seek to scale up this program to challenge the limitations of contemporary schooling, and to promote more egalitarian world views through an innovative and paradigm-shifting model of education that can better serve humanity and the earth.
“Manzanita School provides a safe, challenging, diverse, unique approach to learning that has benefited our child today and will surely benefit her for the rest of her life. This school and the many adventures experienced have provided our child with amazing growing opportunities that are sure to be applied to real life lessons in her future.”
— Danielle, former MANZANITA SCHOOL Parent —