Sudbury Valley School (SVS) has valued democracy as an essential part of their model for over 50 years. The SVS community “extends to all students the same rights, privileges and responsibilities available to every American adult for the enjoyment of life, liberty, and the pursuit of a meaningful life.” ²

The critical role of democracy in the Sudbury Model extends beyond the system of governance. Democracy is a way of living. In a democratic school community, daily interactions between members provide, in the words of John Dewey, “conjoint, communicated experience.” ³ Sudbury communities depend upon the ideas of unique individuals to develop in health and creative strength. In turn, individuals require the support and sense of value provided by Sudbury democracies to grow and pursue their unique interests. The symbiotic relationship between members of the school and the democracy itself is the foundation of the Sudbury Model. It rests upon maintaining both individual rights and equal rights in the daily interactions of the Sudbury school.

There are many advantages to doing democratic Sudbury schools versus continuing the kinds of schools most of us grew up with. These advantages are a direct result of basic Building Blocks: Time, Trust, Democratic Process, Equality, and Individual Rights.⁴ The Sudbury Model incorporates these blocks which give students the opportunity to become responsible, self-directed adults.

We are all familiar with the benchmarks of traditional schools: tests, textbooks, authoritarian “top down” structure, predetermined curriculum, similar age groupings, grading of students by teachers and time divided into “periods” (often using bells). By contrast, Sudbury schools are characterized by a democratic structure, mixed age interactions, and self-directed learning.

The first Building Block creating the unique democratic environment of our Sudbury Model school is our use of time. Time is a limiting factor in all human lives. How we spend our time and its meaning shape who we are. There is nothing more important in education than learning about living in time. In Sudbury schools, students are able to decide how to spend their time. In addition, children’s free and unstructured play is highly valued. Exploring, learning, interacting with others, and figuring out how the world works happen naturally as students choose how to spend time in a democratic environment.

Often in conventional education teachers act as though the time spent in childhood is just a preparation for adulthood. However, at Sudbury schools, childhood time is a right of children in and of itself. Staff do not interrupt childhood activity any more than they interrupt an ongoing conversation between adults.

In traditional schools, time is structured by those in authority. Days are divided into predetermined periods. In our school, students have control over how they spend their time. They can choose whether to spend all day reading a book about trains or spending five minutes looking at a few pictures in a book. Students can build lego cities for days or spend time playing outside. Students can sit and think about their life choices as long as they want. The range of activities and the depth of explorations are in the hands of each student.

Free time also gives students many chances to become responsible. They practice from a young age making decisions about the best use of their time. As children grow older, they become more aware of the important attributes of time. On some days, Cleanup Time arrives just as play is at its most intense. Coping with the frustration of running out of time, such as at the end of the school day, is an experience we all must face in our daily lives. Awareness that time goes on helps us understand that tomorrow will bring many other opportunities to continue or expand our activities.

On other days, time seems to drag, nothing suits, and it can be hard to avoid the temptation to misuse time by violating others’ rights or breaking rules. The varied possibilities in life can feel overwhelming on hard days. Unlike traditional schools, our staff members do not take away students’ responsibilities to deal with time by telling them what to do. The process of being bored, of “hitting the boredom wall”, teaches students to use their time responsibly by reflecting on their own purposes, learning about themselves, and finding a passion to sustain them.

In sum, free unstructured time at a democratic Sudbury school is a cornerstone of each growing child’s education. Choosing how to spend hours, days, and years gives students the opportunity to get to know themselves, to learn to understand how they interact with the world, and how best to responsibly follow their interests.

The second Building Block of democratic Sudbury schools is trust. Trust is more difficult to achieve than time because it requires special effort from all the adults in the child’s world: both staff and parents. Most adults did not experience a trusting educational environment as children. It is hard to give what they didn’t receive. The interpersonal work of learning to trust students to make their own choices takes extra effort from the staff and parents in students’ lives.

The effort required to trust each other, though sometimes difficult, is worthwhile. The school’s democratic structure and process rests on trust as a foundational element. If students don’t feel trusted to make their own decisions and pursue their own interests, the process of becoming an independent, responsible person is undercut. Students quickly perceive lack of trust from their parents or staff. Students’ ability to participate fully in creating a life at school is enhanced or limited by their feeling of being trusted.

As previously discussed, it takes time for students to discover and value their interests and learning abilities. At a democratic Sudbury school, students are trusted in all facets of their school experience. If parents and staff members can trust students to make decisions, learn from their mistakes, interact with other school members of different ages, and pursue their passions, amazing growth takes place. It takes extra effort for adults who experienced a traditional education to let go of their fears and expectations. However, learning to trust students reaps rewards in terms of increased confidence, responsibility, and skills.

The third Building Block is democratic process. Most people think of democratic process as part of our system of governance. The way we create rules and the structure we use to make things happen for the school are the obvious ways our democracy works. Less obvious, yet equally important, is democratic process—the daily interactions which help create the school’s culture.

In our school Constitution, we quote John Dewey describing democratic process as “conjoint, communicated experience.” ⁵ What do those words mean to us? “Conjoint” means together. We create our daily lives within a democratic environment that we build together. “Communicated” means expressing what we think and feel to each other. We have the opportunity for each school member to not only vote on what the School Meeting passes, but to be ourselves and communicate our ideas freely to each other. “Experience” means how each individual perceives the world, the interests they pursue, the choices they make and the consequences they undergo. Experience also includes the impact the culture has on each school member and the changes they make in the culture through their participation in it.

Through democratic process, school culture is continually changing. Just as individual school members grow, life at school develops on a daily basis. This democratic life has to be protected and valued by the individuals who come to school. The staff is particularly responsible for being aware of the ways the school is functioning on a daily basis, but students also need to be aware of their role in keeping our democratic process vital and alive. The respect that school members show each other, the equality that members experience as they live their lives at school, contribute to this democratic process.

The joys of living in an environment created through democratic process include individual freedom and equal social interaction. When new students come to school for the first time, they bring their past experiences with them. They may not be able to trust fellow school members to respect their rights or value their communications. As they experience democratic process over time, the new students begin to understand that they can create their own school life. Their choices matter – not just in their own activities, but in helping to create a school culture where individual rights are protected.

Learning to understand the school’s democratic process can be challenging, especially for students whose out-of-school life is vastly different. However, as students learn that they have individual rights and must make an effort to maintain those rights for everyone, they begin to see the importance of democratic process. Communicating, building a place to express themselves, and interacting on an equal basis with all school members gives individual students an opportunity to create their own meaningful experiences as they grow.

Equality is the fourth Building Block supporting democracy in Sudbury Model Schools. In American society, equality—especially when children are involved—is difficult to achieve. We have experienced a resurgence of social movements for equal treatment of minority groups and women in this country. However, children are still considered property instead of human beings worthy of equality. Beginning with their dependence in early life, children are a suspect class until they turn 18. The differences between individual children are overshadowed by the simple fact that they are “under-aged.”

At our Sudbury Model school, equality is a fundamental value in our daily life. Children are treated as equals in every aspect of school operation. The results of that equal treatment can be seen in the way students think independently, figure out creative solutions to problems and work cooperatively with other school members regardless of their ages. Students volunteer and are elected for responsible positions at school including Chairperson of the General School Meeting, Judge Clerk, and Clerks of many committees, clubs, and guilds. Our democracy works smoothly when all ages have equal rights.

One assumption people make when discussing equality is that equal means “the same.” We do not assume that individuals, whether children or adults, are the same. When we elect officers or clerks to do different jobs at school, our School Meeting carefully evaluates their skills and abilities to do the job in question. We do not consider age as a factor in the decisions, but we do elect the best individual to do the job. For example, we have had student Treasurers who developed the math skills to handle the income and expenditures of the School Meeting Account, as well as overseeing the finances of special interest groups.

The protection of equal rights lies in the hands of individual school members and the School Meeting. If members fail to recognize and point out bias in interactions, equality is at risk and so is our democracy. If a school member believes that another member is being treated differently from others, but the member doesn’t bring up the problem at School Meeting, our school culture is in danger. We hold the ideal of equality for all regardless of age, but if it is not practiced by all school members, our school does not function democratically.

Equality is also protected by our Judicial System. The Judge Clerk is responsible for handling cases and running judging in a fair and equitable manner. Threats to equality include biased judges, incorrect procedure, and cruel or unusual sentences. We created an appeals system to counteract these threats. Defendants can appeal a case to the School Meeting if their rights have been violated. Maintaining equality requires commitment on the part of every school member. Children are capable of working toward equality and do it every day in our Judicial System.

Each of the five Building Blocks is important in creating a Sudbury school. The fifth one, individual rights, is essential in our democratic environment. We are protective of individual rights in our school judicial system, in our School Meeting, and in our daily lives. We believe that each individual is unique and possesses the innate ability to reach out and interact. We recognize that individuals’ differences in viewpoints and interests are valuable to our democratic community. We need their unique approaches to problem-solving, learning, and creating solutions to give us a respectful, open minded, and dynamic society.

After a few years of democratic experience at our Sudbury school, we created a Constitution and developed more safeguards to protect individual rights in our judicial system. When new students and staff begin school, they sometimes take a while to respect individual rights. The tendencies to take what they want, manipulate other less sophisticated school members, or even to physically retaliate when wronged, can be strong in newcomers. However, after interacting in a democratic environment, they soon learn that individual rights apply to everyone.

At our school, the freedom to figure out who we are is an essential individual right. School members come to see the advantages of discovering who they are and pursuing their own interests—even if no one else in the community shares their passions. Our Sudbury school culture benefits from the many contributions which result from protecting each member’s individual rights.

For more than 40 years, we have adopted the Sudbury Model with a clear awareness of the importance of including democracy to create a free and equal educational community. Practicing democracy protects both our school members and the school itself as we create meaningful lives. Children can experience unstructured play, taking their own time and making their own decisions. The trust of the community enables our students to explore their interests, discover their paths in life, and become responsible school members. Democratic process, equality of all community members, and individual rights support the daily interactions of our Sudbury Model. Our experience reinforces the essential role of democracy in Sudbury education.