Education: That Dreadful School

Alexander Neill’s father was a strict Scottish schoolmaster, who used to spank his children rather repetitiously. Young Neill developed a fear of his father that haunted him until early manhood. Years later, when he began studying child psychology, he decided to found a school of his own, to produce children who would go through life free from fear and who would never need to be psychoanalyzed. Last week, by special invitation, Headmaster Neill, 64, was in the U.S. to give a series of lectures to interested educators and parents on the psychological and educational theories of Alexander Neill.

In 1921, in a rambling, red-brick Victorian house with a rambling garden, he opened his famed progressive Summerhill School for boys & girls, where 70 sons & daughters of middle-class parents enjoy its unusual atmosphere. “The art of teaching,” Neill decided, “is the art of leaving children alone.” Summerhill is Britain’s most progressive school. At his school (“That dreadful School,” he likes to call it), there is no discipline, except for such rules as the children lay down in their weekly meetings. The children are permitted to swear, steal, smash things up, masturbate, lie, play hookey or do anything else that, in Schoolmaster Neill’s judgment, will rid them of inhibitions. At Summerhill, “inhibitions” are a prime preoccupation. Discipline, Neill believes, is “a substitute for a knowledge of children.”

The school teaches the usual British public-school curriculum, but in a way that would make most public teachers’ hair stand on end. There are no examinations (says Headmaster Neill: “They are easy methods of discovering what isn’t worth discovering”). There is no compulsion to attend classes. Says plump, pleasant Mrs. Neill: “The young children are so terribly active with their own interests, they often do not attend school much until they reach the age of twelve.”

General Meeting. The big event of the school week is the Friday night meeting of the general assembly. Neill believes that it is impossible to be progressive unless the children govern themselves completely. The general meeting is presided over by a student chairman. Each child has a vote. The vote of a four-year-old counts just as much as Neill’s or any other teacher’s. All school problems are brought before the meeting and suitable punishments (for offenses such as excessive rowdyism or chronic stealing) are voted by a show of hands.

Often Neill is voted down by the council. Once he tried to introduce automatic fines for swearing. He took a shrewd line: “Why should I suffer if some fathead swears in front of a prospective parent? It’s not a moral question at all; it is purely financial. You swear and I lose a pupil.” Said a 14-year-old: “Neill is talking rot. If the parent is shocked he doesn’t believe in Summerhill anyway.” The council decided to go on swearing.

It is Neill’s belief that it is better to let children swear than to repress this enthusiasm; he finds that it presently wears itself out. It is the same, he feels, with other repressions. At Summerhill, the worst behaved children are always the newcomers, because, of course, they have been most repressed. New pupils often work out their repressed hate of their elders by biting, scratching, swearing interminably and “being generally anti-social.” Says Mrs. Neill: “A small boy will sometimes walk in here, fix me with a glare and say, ‘You stupid bitch.’ But it doesn’t mean anything to me. I know he’s working up some hate he has.” Sometimes the little fellow returns and says experimentally: ‘You silly cow.'” Mrs. Neill fails to react, and the boy is supposed to lose his little inhibition.

Problem Teachers. Teachers are sometimes as big problems as the children. There are ten on the Summerhill staff; they have been thoroughly indoctrinated and soon learn to be as patient as Mr. & Mrs. Neill. But when the regular staff was in service during the war, the school had a pretty bad time.

One or two unenlightened stopgap teachers reacted much like new children to the school’s free atmosphere. They swore a great deal, were mean, spiteful and irresponsible. “Quite hopeless,” says Mrs. Neill. No doubt they felt that they had a case. Says one current teacher: “Believe me, it is the hard way. Sometimes it is no longer possible to bear it. Then the only thing to do is to clear out completely for a few hours. The noise is the worst thing.”

Others find the continual damage to property the hardest thing to bear. Neill is particularly sensitive about the way students smash up his school. But he says that one has to face the fact that children are not possessive about objects. Furniture, says Neill, means nothing to a child. Everything at Summerhill is as tough and unbreakable as possible, but it is still difficult for adults not to lose their tempers when students tear up favorite books or shatter records. But, says Neill, the children don’t mean any harm.

The Bees & Flowers. Sex arouses the most curiosity about Summerhill. It is discussed freely and unemotionally. There is no specific sex instruction, but a child is given simple, straightforward answers to anything he asks about. Headmaster Neill is convinced that guilt connected with masturbation is at the root of most “antisocial” children’s disturbances. Says Neill: “Free’dom in masturbation means glad, happy, eager children who are not much interested in masturbation. A masturbation Verbot means miserable, unhappy children, often prone to colds and epidemics, hating themselves and consequently hating others. I say that the happiness and cleverness of Summerhill children is due to the removal of the bogey of fear and self-hate that such Verbots give.”

NeilPs theories make the forbidding of shared sex life among the students out of the question. But he explains to them that if any girl should have a baby the school would be closed by the Government. Neill also points out that students are economically unable to support a baby. This approach seems to prevent intercourse; at least, there has never been an illegitimate baby at Summerhill. “Of course,” says Mrs. Neill, “the children are fully instructed in birth control.”

Mild-mannered Alexander Neill, however, believes scientific knowledge without emotional adjustment is not enough. “Otherwise,” he argues, “a medical doctor would be a better lover than a South African native and I’m sure that’s not the case.”

Who? Religion is another controversial subject. Says Mrs. Neill: “There are many children here who probably would not know who you meant by Christ, except very hazily.” But Headmaster Neill says that his is one of the few schools that Christ would have approved of. “We don’t teach religion. We live it,” says Neill. “If religion means anything, it means giving out love. Children at Summerhill are loved.”

Another important thing at Summerhill is the private lessons (PLs) given by Headmaster Neill to maladjusted children. These are really individual psychoanalytic sessions. Neill may send for a child, but he prefers to have the child come to him. Typical of his method is his treatment of a little girl who came to him and announced that she had just stolen £5 from his desk. “Well,” said Neill, looking at his watch, “you’ll have to hurry if you want to spend it before the store closes.” The little girl ran off and spent the £5, but, says Neill, “she never stole again.”