Kurt Hahn Reimagined

Now this is the antidote against a poisonous civilisation: the plan of life for adolescence at school and out of school, should give a place of importance to activities meant to stir and sustain the love of skill, the love of enterprise, and the love of aloneness.

On 22^nd December 1940, in the aftermath of heavy bombing in the City of Liverpool, Kurt Hahn made a speech in the Cathedral entitled:  The Love of Enterprise; The Love of Aloneness; The Love of Skill.  This was a rallying call for educators to cultivate these ‘healthgiving passions; to harness the motivations and develop the talents and dispositions of young people to find meaning and purpose through action in extraordinary times. 

This speech started: ‘If it be true that Education can heal the State, then indeed we educators have a grave and anxious responsibility.’  It is clear that the ‘State’ now, as then, is struggling to meet the challenges of the time and so our responsibility, as educators, is more acute than ever. 

Through the UWC Atlantic Changemaker curriculum we have started to reinvent and reimagine the curriculum and through this aspire to reclaim our place as a pioneering institution within the educational ecosystem.  This curriculum honours our sense of place.  We are, forever, shaped by our coastal location, while looking at the horizon to issues that are global in scope and local in impact.  As Hahn said in this speech:  ‘In peacetime the coast perhaps provides the most stirring but by no means the only opportunities of service for the young.’

Hahn invoked the ‘virtues of the watchman’ citing the value of: ‘habits of vigilance, responsibility, alertness, observation, initiative, resource, tact, and the importance of local knowledge.’  UWC Atlantic is built on the principles of service and compassion and on the premise that there is more in young people than they think.  The Changemaker Curriculum deepens connection to these ideals by building the skills and sense of responsibility, the inner and outer resources that vigilant young people require to respond to the urgent needs of our time.  UWC Atlantic has been creating Changemakers since its inception. Our intention is to incubate and accelerate this process.

The time is right for this:  emerging technologies and methodologies have the potential to power transformative learning in ways never imagined to enable young people to flourish and live for the common good.  To be Changemakers, UWC Atlantic students need to learn tools and technologies for change, they need support and mentorship, they need experiences that cultivate self-awareness.  They need a curriculum that enables them to make meaning and to flourish, to engage with new knowledge, deeply, in order to make sense of our times and to shape the future for the common good.  We are collaborating with like-minded educators, social innovators, creative disruptors and technological enablers across the world to make this possible. Through our Changemaker curriculum our students will be supremely well placed to model positive change and lead this in their communities and the wider world.

So rest assured that Hahn lives on at UWC Atlantic - reimagined for the 21st century.