Testimonials - Noted Experts

Waldorf education has earned acclaim from many noteworthy authorities. Here is what some of them had to say:

“By the time they reach us at the college and university level, Waldorf students are grounded broadly and deeply and have a remarkable enthusiasm for learning. Such students possess the eye of a discoverer and the compassionate heart of a reformer, which when joined to a task, can change the planet.
- Dr. Arthur Zajonc, Associate Professor of Physics, Amherst College

“Ideal for the child and society in the best of times, Rudolf Steiner’s brilliant process of education is critically needed and profoundly relevant now….”
- Joseph Chilton Pearce, Author

“If you’ve had the experience of binding a book, knitting a sock, playing a recorder, then you feel that you can build a rocket ship—or learn a software program you’ve never touched. It’s not bravado, just a quiet confidence. There is nothing you can’t do. Why couldn’t you? Why couldn’t anybody?”
- Peter Nitze, Waldorf and Harvard graduate, and Director of an aerospace company

“If I had a child of school age, I would send him to one of the Waldorf Schools.”
- Saul Bellow, Author and Nobel Laureate

“American schools are having a crisis in values. Half the children fail according to standard measures and the other half wonder why they are learning what they do. As is appropriate to life in democracy, there are a handful of alternatives. Among the alternatives, the Waldorf School represents a chance for every child to grow and learn according to the most natural rhythms of life. For the early school child, this means a non-competitive, non-combative environment in which the wonders of science and literature fill the day without causing anxiety and confusion. For the older child, it offers a curriculum that addresses the question of why they are learning. I have sent two of my children to Waldorf schools and they have been wonderfully served.”
- Raymond McDermott, Ph.D. Professor of Education and Anthropology, Stanford University

“The advent of the Waldorf schools was in my opinion the greatest contribution to world peace and understanding of the century.”
- Willy Brandt, Nobel Prize Winner, Former Chancellor of West Germany

“At a time of searching and reappraisal in American education, the Waldorf movement, with its unique understanding of the education of the child, and its years of teaching practice and experience deserves the informed consideration of those genuinely concerned with education and the development of human wholeness.”
- Douglas Sloan, Ph.D Professor Columbia University Teachers College

“By the time they reach us at the college and university level, Waldorf students are grounded broadly and deeply and have a remarkable enthusiasm for learning. Such students possess the eye of a discoverer and the compassionate heart of a reformer, which, when joined to a task, can change the planet.”
- Dr. Arthur Zajonc, Associate Professor of Physics, Amherst College

“If there is any one thing that the Waldorf system does, it nurtures, protects and develops beautifully the intelligence of the true child.”
- Joseph Chilton Pearce, Author

“The Waldorf School I have observed celebrates the uniqueness of each child, blends a rich curriculum in creative ways and sensitively evaluates student progress along the full range of human talent. Waldorf students are encouraged to live with self assurance, a reverence for life and a sense of service.”
- Ernest Boyer, Chairman Carnegie Foundation for the Advancement of Teaching

“I think that it is not exaggerated to say that no other educational system in the world gives such a central role to the arts as the Waldorf School Movement. There is not a subject taught that does not have an artistic aspect. Even mathematics is presented in an artistic fashion and related via dance, movement or drawing to the child as a whole… Steiner’s system of education is built on the premise that art is an integral part of human endeavors. He gives it back its true role. Anything that can be done to further his revolutionary educational ideas will be of the greatest importance.”
- Konrad Oberhuber, Curator Fogg Art Museum, Harvard University

“The importance of storytelling, of the natural rhythms of daily life, of the evolutionary changes in the child, of art as the necessary underpinning of learning, and of the aesthetic environment as a whole—all basic to Waldorf education for the past 70 years—are being “discovered” and verified by researchers unconnected to the Waldorf movement.”
- Paul Bayers, Professor Columbia Teachers’ College

“In linking their curriculum and schooling toward children’s developmental stages, Waldorf schools seem to have a unique sense of what children are ready for. [They] promote creativity and critical thinking in an inter-disciplinary fashion…exactly the direction public education needs to move.”
- Jack Miller, Professor Ontario Institute for Studies in Education University of Toronto