Alpha_Alternative_School_1972–2012-Yumpu
ALPHA Alternative School—A Lot of Parents Hoping for an Alternative—one of the oldest alternative schools in Canada, celebrated its 40th anniversary in 2012. It seemed like a good time to take a look at the lives of some of its earliest students in order to get a sense of the long-term effects of this radical experiment in education. Our idea was to place black and white childhood portraits taken by F. Robert Openshaw in 1978 alongside present-day portraits of the same people taken at ALPHA during the 40th anniversary reunion by Michael Barker, and to contextualize the photographs with portraits in words contributed by the subjects and shaped by Ariel Fielding. The result is a sort of ethnographic art project or a personal history. It was not commissioned by ALPHA, nor was it conceived with any particular agenda in mind, except to present portraits of some interesting people with a common educational background.
ALPHA Alternative School—A Lot of Parents Hoping for an Alternative—one of the oldest alternative schools in Canada, celebrated its 40th anniversary in 2012. It seemed like a good time to take a look at the lives of some of its earliest students in order to get a sense of the long-term effects of this radical experiment in education. Our idea was to place black and white childhood portraits taken by F. Robert Openshaw in 1978 alongside present-day portraits of the same people taken at ALPHA during the 40th anniversary reunion by Michael Barker, and to contextualize the photographs with portraits in words contributed by the subjects and shaped by Ariel Fielding. The result is a sort of ethnographic art project or a personal history. It was not commissioned by ALPHA, nor was it conceived with any particular agenda in mind, except to present portraits of some interesting people with a common educational background.
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ALPHA
ALTERNATIVE
SCHOOL
1972/2012
ALPHA
ALTERNATIVE
SCHOOL
1972/2012
Colour pho tos by Michael Barker
Text and Inter views by Ariel Field ing
Black and white pho tos by F. Robert Open shaw
Notes from the Field, 2020
previous spread: Alpha Alter na tive School (circa 1979), Pho tog ra pher unknown
Copyright ©2020 by Ariel Fielding and Michael Barker.
Black and white photography ©F. Robert Open shaw.
The authors gratefully acknowledge permissions granted
to reproduce the copyright material in this book. Every
effort has been made to trace copyright holders and to
obtain their permission for the use of copyright material.
The publisher apologizes for any errors or omissions
in the above list and would be grateful if notified of any
corrections that should be incorporated in future editions
of this book.
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be
reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted
in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical,
photocopying, recording or otherwise, without the prior
permission of the publisher.
ISBN 978-1-7770266-0-8
Published in Canada in 2020 by:
Notes from the Field
664 St. Clarens Ave.
Toronto, Ontario
M6H 3X1
Contents
1 Introduction
The Interviews
9 Lucy Falkner
13 Jennifer Ferrari
15 Flannery Fielding
21 Kether Graham
23 Morgan Jones-Phillips
29 Jamie Leonard
35 Maggie Marrelli
39 Stefan Lynch Strassfeld
43 Crawford Crocky Teasdale
Appendix
48 Image overview
51 Author Biographies
53 Acknowledgements
Introduction
facing page clockwise
from top-left:
Mock election, circa 1979.
L–R: Flannery, Emma,
Jamie, Melanie
Looking at something
really interesting, circa 1979.
L–R: Max, an ALPHA parent,
Justin, Michael, David,
Morgan.
Daily meeting, late 1970s.
L–R: back row: Tim, Stefan,
Jeremy, Susan, Jenny,
unknown baby, Elaina,
Emma, Maggie (edge of
photo).
L–R: front row: Amber,
Alice (behind Michael), Yaleh,
Joseph, unknown child,
Karen.
Dance party, circa 1979.
L–R: Chanel, Amber,
Jonathon, Elaina, Vincent,
Andrew, Jason, Flannery
Sugarbush, probably at
Horton’s Tree Farm, late
1970s or early 1980s.
Decorating wooden
sculptures they have carved
themselves, late 1970s.
L–R: Chanel, Flannery,
Marianne.
ALPHA Alter na tive School, one of the oldest alternative schools in
Canada, celebrated its 40th anniversary in 2012. It seemed like a good time
to take a look at the lives of some of its earliest students in order to get
a sense of the long-term effects of this radical experiment in education.
ALPHA—A Lot of Parents Hoping for an Alternative—was unique in the
Toronto public school system when it was founded in 1972. It had none of
the usual paraphernalia of mainstream education: no homework, grades,
or tests. It was taken for granted that children do much of their learning
through play. Students explored their own interests organically, beginning
with something they wanted to learn about or something they wanted
to make or do, and enlisting the support of their teachers and friends in
finding the answers to their questions. In addition to daily one-on-one
or small-group lessons in reading, writing, math, and French, an ALPHA
student in the 1970s and early 1980s could learn to take photographs with
a pinhole camera she had built herself, then develop her pictures in an
onsite darkroom; build a kid-size wooden fort using saws, hammers, and
nails in a vast and muddy Adventure Playground; make stop-motion animated
films; construct and paint a schoolyard-sized snow sculpture of a
dragon; incubate an egg and raise the resulting chicken; write an original
musical and perform it for a rowdy and enthusiastic audience; buy and
care for tropical fish; research and write essays about art history; plan and
cook a meal for fifty people and offer it for sale at a lunchtime store; read
all the books in the school library; redesign a computer game, or any number
of other imaginative opportunities for learning.
A typical day at ALPHA in its first decade started with quiet work in the
mornings; students were separated into two broad groups by age. From
lunchtime onward, the entire school functioned as one community,
with older students serving as mentors and role models to younger ones.
Afternoons were taken up with special projects, field trips, playing inside
or outside, or walking to a local community center for swimming or gym,
followed by a collective cleanup of the school and an all-school meeting.
The daily meeting was led by two students on a rotating basis: a chairperson,
who moderated the discussion and ensured that those who had something
to say got a chance to speak, and a “separator” or “shutter-upper,”
who kept order. Meetings were where students raised and discussed issues
of importance to them, made announcements, or proposed and voted on
school rules. Children as young as four years old could learn to be active
participants in this democratic process. There was also a school judicial
system, the Committee, where students could address grievances against
other students (and, in theory, teachers) before a rotating jury of their
peers, empowered to determine guilt or innocence and impose
appropriate penalties.
1
Facing page:
Contact sheet of ALPHA
student portraits taken
by F. Robert Openshaw
in 1978.
As a cooperative organization, ALPHA depended on every parent volunteering
for regular shifts; this had the benefit of exposing students to adults
with a wide range of skills, from microbiology and mathematics to painting
and sculpture. Students called both parents and teachers by their first
names. While the school was not immune to problems common to schools
everywhere—bullying being one example—there was for the most part a
climate of openness, curiosity, respect, and acceptance that would have
been unusual in a traditional school at the time, and would be difficult to
find outside of a school like ALPHA even today, when many of the innovative
practices devised and developed by alternative schools have been
absorbed into the mainstream.
This project came about because of ALPHA’s 40th anniversary. Our idea
was to place black and white childhood portraits taken by F. Robert
Openshaw in 1978 alongside present-day portraits of the same people
taken at ALPHA during the 40th anniversary reunion by Michael Barker,
and to contextualize the photographs with portraits in words contributed
by the subjects and shaped by Ariel Fielding. Bob Openshaw, now based
in California, very kindly gave us permission to use his photographs. The
subjects self-selected. The result is a sort of ethnographic art project or a
personal history. It was not commissioned by ALPHA, nor was it conceived
with any particular agenda in mind, except to present portraits of some
interesting people with a common educational background.
ALPHA was a glorious countercultural experiment devised in an age of
hopeful ingenuity and driven by a desire for freedom. Remarkably, in spite
of the many changes that have taken place in the world since ALPHA’s
founding—and the ongoing unease of the larger culture with alternative
education—the school is still here, now nearly fifty years old, not just
surviving, but thriving.
3
The Interviews
5
7
Lucy Falkner
“We were given a language for
community accountability.
It’s not a language that is offered
or taught in mainstream
institutional settings.”
The most important and influential aspects of my experience of ALPHA
Alternative School were the egalitarian structure and democratic nature
of the policies and practices at the school, combined with a home upbringing
that gave me a voice and a valid and valued role in my society and
environment, and offered me lessons in being responsible and accountable
for my impact on those within it. Students of all ages were invited and
expected to be compassionate, thinking, engaged members of a community.
While I remember consequences (being called out in Committee, being
confronted by a teacher or another student about something I’d done),
I don’t remember punishment.
Lucy Falkner
ALPHA 1975 to 1978, ages
4–7. Stud ied dance. Owns
and operates a Vancouver
dance company, Rhythm City
Productions. Teaches dance.
There was a recognition of accountability to your community, not just
“if I don’t follow this rule, I’m going to be in trouble” but rather, “if I don’t
participate the way the community teaches me to participate, then I will
be accountable to my community.” I think that’s really important, and is
a big part of how ALPHA operated. I think things like Committee meetings
helped to create that kind of scenario. We were given a language for community
accountability. It’s not a language that is offered or taught in mainstream
institutional settings. In the dance community, I and the people
that I work with recognize that we’re part of a community that has collective
goals, and our individual goals may sometimes require being subverted
for the sake of the community goal. I’m really fortunate in that I’ve
contributed to creating an environment in which people are really happy
to make the community goals a priority.
I was raised primarily by my mum Judy Lynne, who worked at ALPHA,
and other women that we lived with in a communal home. Fairly early on
she had us making our own lunches, participating in household chores
like making dinners and cleaning up. I was responsible for creating some
of the good that occurred; it wasn’t just granted to me. One thing that my
mum always did when she was upset with me, she would say, ‘I don’t think
you’re a bad person, I’m just upset with what you did, I love you and you’re
not a bad person.’ That helped me recognize that I’d made a mistake or I’d
done something wrong, but I was okay—there was nothing wrong with me.
I think that really helped me not to get into an identity where I think some
kids can end up being chronically bad, because their identity becomes
9
that they’re a bad kid. So that was a thing that I really appreciated as a kid,
even though I as I got older I recognized that it was a tactic. I recognized
the value of what she was saying. I was called upon to answer for things.
My mum also really taught me to question authority, including hers. I would
argue with her about this or that limitation on my freedom, or this or that
requirement of me, and I would question and argue with other adults, and
they would engage with me. I wasn’t shut down—I was engaged in discussion.
That was also what went on at ALPHA. We all had a voice; it wasn’t just
that people over a certain height had a voice. And that kind of thing I think
necessarily teaches accountability, because you’re part of the discussion.
It’s not like at a mainstream school where things happen that are outside
your control, so you don’t have to answer for them when they don’t work.
If you’re participating in how things are run and in the decisions that are
made, then you have to recognize when those decisions have a result that
you don’t want so that you can change what you are doing.
After ALPHA I went to Centennial School in Ottawa, which was a “normal”
public school: large, impersonal, rows of desks, class bells, standing in the
morning to sing O Canada, calling adults by Mrs/Mr/Miss/Ms. Whatever.
My first day there, I spoke up a lot. I don’t remember if I asked questions
or just kept commenting on things, but at some point my teacher asked,
“Good heavens. Were you this talkative at your previous school?” I swiftly
got the message and clammed up. I do recall that I was significantly ahead
of most other students, to the extent that I was incredulous and impatient
when other students would be sounding out words and progressing painfully
slowly through the reading. One good aspect of this school was that it
was designated for both children with disabilities, and children with no discernable
disability. I credit this experience with enhancing my awareness
of the needs of people with disabilities and freeing me from the discomfort
many people feel around disability. From Ottawa we moved to Vancouver,
where I also went to a mainstream school. I had a couple of run-ins with my
grade 5 teacher (a man), whom I confronted for being sexist, racist, and/or
unfair or inappropriate to other students. I believe he came to grant me a
grudging and bemused respect.
I attended two Vancouver alternative secondary schools in the public
system: Ideal Mini School and Total Education. Ideal was the most like
what I remembered of the community of ALPHA. It was politically active
and community-driven. We had weekly full-school meetings at which
we would discuss coming events, policy, kitchen cleaning problems,
grounds use, and various school projects. We had a school banner, which
we would take on the annual peace march. The school had no bells and
no one expected to be called by their last name. Total Education was less
of a community, but teachers expected students to be responsible,
accountable, and compassionate.
After high school, I studied dance. I own, operate, and teach for a dance
company that is devoted to and inspired by vintage jazz music and
dance: swing-era solo and partner dance, such as Charleston and Lindy
Hop. I am a community leader and organizer, and I make fun things
happen for happy people who appreciate what I do and who love to help
out and contribute.
11
Jennifer Ferrari
“The democratic nature of ALPHA
influenced me one hundred percent.
It makes a huge difference to people
to feel included and have a sense
of ownership.”
jennifer ferrari
ALPHA 1973 to 1984, ages
4–14. Stud ied at Trent Uni versity.
Works as an Auto mo tive
Technician.
What was the most impor tant part of ALPHA for me? As a young per son,
being treated with respect by the teach ers. The way the school was set up
to have all stu dents, teach ers, and par ents take part in the run ning of the
school. Being included in hir ing teach ers, mak ing and chang ing the school
rules, all being respon si ble for clean ing and car ing for our school. That
no mat ter how young a stu dent was, we all deserved equal respect and say
in how the school oper ated. I learned to care about every phys i cal envi ronment
I am in, even if it is not my home; I still need to care for where I am.
I learned to care about all the peo ple I am with, no mat ter what age, no
mat ter what differ ences we have. Grow ing up with a sense of self respect
and inclu sion. And com ing out of school with less hope less ness than the
stu dents I met who went to reg u lar schools. We were encour aged to try
things, cre ate things. We were intro duced to chal leng ing projects above
our “grade lev els.” We were treated like we were smart.
I went to alter na tive high schools, then Trent Uni ver sity, where I completed
a three-year bachelor’s degree. I worked in a ware house for a bunch
of years and then went back to school to study auto mechan ics. I completed
four years of appren tice ship and achieved my offi cial cer ti fi ca tion
as an Auto mo tive Tech ni cian. I have also helped to get more women
included in the auto mo tive trade. We have three women work ing at my
garage, more than any auto mo tive garage that I know of anywhere.
The demo c ra tic nature of ALPHA influ enced me one hun dred per cent.
It makes a huge differ ence to peo ple to feel included and have a sense of
ownership.
Hav ing a com mu nity is the most impor tant thing in life. As the world gets
harder and harder and faster and faster, hav ing a com mu nity of peo ple to
rely on will be what saves us. Not hav ing stuff or a lot of money. I also really
care about what hap pens to our nat ural envi ron ment. I care about social
jus tice and the treat ment of young people.
I know that because of going to ALPHA, some of my hard skills, like math,
spelling, and essay writ ing are not as strong as other stu dents who went to
reg u lar school. But I would never trade the human skills I learned at ALPHA
and have car ried with me ever since. These are the skills that it is harder to
learn later, whereas the hard skills are way eas ier to acquire any time.
13
Flannery Fielding
“I always appreciated the
opportunity that ALPHA offered
for self-directed learning.”
I was already at ALPHA as a baby since my older sis ter was there and our
fam ily was a part of the com mu nity, but I still dis tinctly remem ber going
in with my mom to sign up to attend as a stu dent. Sit ting on a bench in the
main hall, it seemed so big.
flannery fielding
ALPHA 1977 to 1985, ages
4–11. Studied Nursing at
Ryerson University and
University of California, San
Francisco. Works as a Nurse
Practitioner in Palliative
Care. Creates art, sings, and
plays the ukelele.
I always appre ci ated the oppor tu nity that ALPHA offered for self-directed
learn ing. That trans lated into a lot of read ing for me. At home, I read
Nancy Drew, the Nar nia books, Madeleine L’Engle. At ALPHA, I read whatever
I could get my hands on. The book I remem ber best was some kind
of pic to r ial ency clo pe dia with pic tures of chil dren suffer ing from ter rible
dis eases of mal nu tri tion. There was a pho to graph of a kid with corneas
clouded and shiny blue that was awful and some how thrilling. The
down side of that free dom to do what I liked was less expo sure to math and
other sub jects, and I think that worked to rein force my sense that I wasn’t
good at math or French. Still, I have fond mem o ries of hang ing out in the
back cor ner of one of the big rooms on the third floor, a room the big kids
used for art—it had a loom and a pot tery wheel—lis ten ing to music on
an 8-track some one must have donated. I learned all the words to Kenny
Rogers’ The Gam bler, most of the songs on Break fast in Amer ica (Supertramp!)
and we played Michael Jackson’s Thriller album over and over
again on this lit tle turntable.
I think most kids at ALPHA had a sense of supe ri or ity about the free dom
we had—to learn, to play, to be our selves—although for me and my friends,
that even tu ally trans formed into a kind of dread about what we might be
miss ing, how hard it was going to be for us in the “real world.”
From ALPHA I went on to two differ ent alter na tive junior high schools
and then to a “reg u lar” high school, which was ter ri fy ing at first but turned
out to be eas ier to adapt to than I expected (although I never really got the
hang of home work.) Drama was the one sub ject in high school where I truly
felt at home. I seri ously con sid ered fol low ing my dad’s path into the atre
and even audi tioned for the National The atre School. After high school,
I worked in Toronto’s the atre com mu nity for a num ber of years as a performer,
tech ni cian, and gen eral par tic i pant in the scene. Through another
family connection I began travelling frequently to Central America,
volunteering with medical groups and studying Spanish.
15
“I think most kids at ALPHA had a sense
of superiority about the freedom we
had—to learn, to play, to be ourselves—
although for me and my friends, that
eventually transformed into a kind of
dread about what we might be missing,
how hard it was going to be for us
in the ‘real world.’”
I had to go back to get high school sci ence cred its when I decided to study
nurs ing, push ing past the lim i ta tions of what I thought I was good at (art
and lan guage) to dis cover new strengths and apti tudes. It was a rev e la tion
for me when I sat down to write papers on cholera and thalido mide (for OAC
Biology and OAC Chem istry, respec tively) and found myself com pletely
fas ci nated and inspired. I have been a nurse for ten years and I fin ished my
graduate studies at UC San Fran cisco to become a Nurse Prac ti tioner in 2011.
I work in the field of Pal lia tive Care tak ing care of peo ple who are deal ing
with seri ous ill ness or advanced dis ease and help ing to address phys i cal,
emo tional, and spir i tual aspects of illness.
The demo c ra tic struc ture that was built in to ALPHA had an enor mous
influ ence on my life. It is incred i bly empow er ing as a kid to have the level
of involve ment that ALPHA allowed and to have a sense of agency in your
life and in your com mu nity. I value the con nec tions that were cre ated at
ALPHA, the sense of com mu nity, and the sup port that existed between
kids, teach ers, par ents when I was there that con tin ues up to the present.
I’m not nec es sar ily in close touch with the peo ple I knew dur ing my time
at ALPHA, but there’s always a sense of just a few degrees of separation.
One of the things that I appre ci ated dur ing my years at ALPHA was the
sense of refuge it offered. I never knew what ter ri ble mood my father would
be in when I got home from school or when one of his fits of rage would
be directed my way, but I knew that I wouldn’t get yelled at while I was at
school. The worst that could hap pen would be to have Com mit tee called on
me if I did some thing bad or broke one of the kid-defined rules. Although
I don’t think it was some thing I was aware of on a con scious level at the
time, in ret ro spect I’m so grate ful for the safe space and pos i tive adult relation
ships that ALPHA pro vided.
17
19
Kether Graham (née Beaulieu-Urbanski)
“The democratic nature of ALPHA
likely influenced every aspect of
my life, but it is most apparent
in the way that I raise my children.
I was very quiet and shy. I remem ber actu ally hid ing behind my mother’s
skirt when I met new adults. ALPHA gave me a place where I could have
con fi dence in myself, where I knew that my opin ion counted for some thing
and that I would be lis tened to. It taught me that every one can have valid
ideas and points of view, no mat ter how big or small, young or old they
are. I find that even now as an adult I have to remind peo ple that chil dren
should be lis tened to and that bosses or other author ity fig ures are peo ple
too, and can be spo ken to as well as chal lenged when necessary.
KETHER GRAHAM
ALPHA 1975 to 1979 or 1980,
ages 4 – 9. Stud ied Law
Enforce ment at Seneca
Col lege, then Bak ing and
Pas try at George Brown.
Works for the City of Toronto.
After ALPHA I went to a reg u lar, main stream pub lic school until Grade 10
in high school. My grades started falling and my mother sug gested that
I return to the alter na tive school sys tem, because it had worked so well
before. I went City School and then on to SOLE and grad u ated. After that
I went to Seneca Col lege and grad u ated with high hon ours from the Law
Enforce ment pro gram. Later in life, I took a year’s leave of absence from
my job and went to George Brown Col lege and grad u ated with hon ours
from the Bak ing and Pas try program.
The demo c ra tic nature of ALPHA likely influ enced every aspect of my life,
but it is most appar ent in the way that I raise my chil dren. I’ve taught them
that if you aren’t happy with some thing in your life, then do your best to
change it.
My mem o ries include moun tains of hum mus at potluck events, danc ing to
Grease on the stage, mak ing things at the craft table, being in charge of the
big wooden blocks for the day, scary story time, kiss ing tag, giant tires in the
play ground, spur of the moment field trips, tak ing the street car to school
with our teacher Susan and bunches of kids from the neigh bour hood after
the school moved across town from its orig i nal loca tion, call ing com mit tee,
weekly meet ings, most of all being a kid, being happy and hav ing fun.
21
Morgan Jones-Phillips
“It wasn’t just kids running around
screaming and breaking things,
it was kids making the school into
what they wanted it to be.”
Morgan jones phillips
ALPHA 1975 to 1981, ages 4 – 9.
Stud ied Lan guages and
Lin guis tics at York Uni ver sity,
French as a Sec ond
Lan guage at Uni ver sité du
Québec à Trois Riv ières,
and Para medics at
Cen ten nial Col lege. Works
as a Para medic. Does
stand-up comedy.
ALPHA was a free school, which appar ently was quite differ ent for the
time, but as a kid it felt nor mal to me. I took for granted that it was different
from any where else or that there was any thing unusual to be aware of.
My under stand ing of what made it differ ent was a per ceived lack of for mal
struc ture. I don’t remem ber ever hav ing to do any thing. This may sound
like com plete chaos; cer tainly if you let the kids in a reg u lar school plan
their day, it would be chaos, but I think that because that was our nor mal,
we cre ated our own day. We, as stu dents, took it upon our selves to cre ate
the struc ture that wasn’t being imposed on us. We didn’t cre ate chaos to
rebel against the estab lished struc ture; we cre ated a struc ture where there
wasn’t one. If the struc ture that was being estab lished by one kid wasn’t
one that inter ested you, you fit into some one else’s, or if no one was cre ating
the day you wanted, you could cre ate your own and let oth ers join you.
It wasn’t just kids run ning around scream ing and break ing things, it was
kids mak ing the school into what they wanted it to be.
I remem ber play ing a lot of tag and being a pretty fast run ner. I remem ber
being able to fit inside the giant tires in the play ground. I remem ber acting
out Grease after school. I remem ber going to the park across the street.
I was there with some one and we found a patch of four-leaf-clovers. We
picked a shop ping bag full and brought them back to Alpha and some one
older than me didn’t believe me and said, “I used to do that trick when
I was a kid.” I remem ber wait ing for the street car to go home and going
to Bill’s Restau rant and order ing a glass of water and some crack ers for
free while we waited. I remem ber a giant air tight wooden box and tak ing
turns lock ing each other in it and tim ing how long until we asked to come
out. I remem ber we stopped after a kid passed out and couldn’t alert us
that he was ready to exit—to my knowl edge, no one ever died. I remember
an elec tion where every one chose a polit i cal party. I ran as NDP, which
was kind of a no-brainer. I made signs and thought my cam paign slo gan,
“Fill-up, with bet ter gas prices” was pretty clever, but it didn’t work on a
poster: it was purely word play with my last name, Phillips. The fact that
a school elec tion was using gas prices in a cam paign was lost on me. Given
the demo c ra tic nature of the school, I doubt that any power was wielded
by the win ner, if there was a winner.
23
There were so many oppor tu ni ties to orga nize things that inter ested
you that it gave me a fun da men tal feel ing that if I wanted some thing to
hap pen, I should just make it happen. I defi nitely came away with out
a fear of author ity figures.
I think my Dad grew tired of dri ving me across the city, and I switched to
my local school for grade 4. I did well in the rest of ele men tary school.
I tested above grade level in every thing but math. I’m actu ally quite good
in math now. I didn’t fin ish high school. I was a few cred its short and
didn’t want to con tinue after grade 13; it felt like enough school ing at the
time. I went to York Uni ver sity as a mature stu dent for one year to study
lan guages and lin guis tics. After my first year, I thought it would be more
ful fill ing to con tinue the same line of study, but in French, so I trans ferred
to Uni ver sité du Québec à Trois Riv ières. I didn’t speak French, but fig ured
an immer sion pro gram would fix that pretty quick. I worked as an actor,
drama teacher, and direc tor for many years until 1999 when I decided
to become a para medic and went back to col lege. I worked hard and was
a good stu dent. I had good grades in col lege. I’ve been a para medic in
Toronto ever since.
I’ve also writ ten a book called The Emer gency Mono logues about my
expe ri ences as a para medic. I have a one-person show with the same title.
I remem ber that I used to tell jokes to the other kids at ALPHA in the
morning. They weren’t my jokes—I used to stay up and watch Dave Allen
at Large with my Dad, and I’d just repeat the same jokes the next day.
It’s funny, because my dream was to be a stand-up comic and I basi cally
started doing that in the last few years with my show.
25
27
Jamie Leonard
“At ALPHA the students asked just as
many questions as the teachers.”
Given that so many of my devel op men tal years were spent at ALPHA,
there are many aspects of my expe ri ence that formed who I am and how
I look at the world. The sense of per sonal respon si bil ity and free dom to
explore what inter ested you—with direc tion of course—was both a ter rific
strength and (rarely) a bit of a weak ness. At ALPHA the stu dents asked just
as many ques tions as the teach ers. The teach ers usu ally sat at tables with
the stu dents, and took far more of a per sonal inter est in every stu dent
than in a main stream school. I sus pect the nature of the school itself drew
teach ers who wanted that inter ac tion. We were guided, occa sion ally led,
but often just let to run.
Jamie Leonard
ALPHA late 1970s to 1980s,
ages 4 – 13. Stud ied Journal
ism at Ryer son Uni versity.
Works in Infor ma tion
Technology/Server Sup port.
Rides, col lects, and writes
about motorcycles.
I remem ber a sci ence project—it was one of those light bulb moments where
you are work ing through things and all of a sud den a lit tle piece of the universe
clicks into place. An edu ca tion that makes you respon si ble for your
own learn ing process teaches you some thing very valu able: how to keep
learn ing, how to explore things that catch your inter est, and how to look at
the world as some thing of a mys tery to be explored.
You didn’t fall into the trap of con ven tion al ity in your think ing, and didn’t
develop the fear of try ing new things. Wood carv ing comes to mind; it isn’t
some thing I would have sought out, but I did try it and enjoyed the experi
ence. Mak ing wire frame plas ter ban dage sculp tures. Build ing a knight’s
suit of armor out of tape and found objects. Developing my own pho tos and
pho tog ra phy. I mean, how many kids those days would have had access to
a darkroom? Just being around par ents and stu dents who were fero ciously
cre ative was a good experience.
I remem ber spend ing a week on an ani mated clay ma tion film. I had a
news caster hav ing a bad day, hair piece falling off his head, papers get ting
blown away, falling over his desk, fol lowed by peo ple being chased by a
dinosaur—because a fly ing toupée just nat u rally leads to think ing about
dinosaurs of course.
I’ve always had an inter est in com put ers, which started at ALPHA with
the excit ing world of the Com modore PET. Amaz ing how a waver ing green
screen with 80 char ac ters in a row was filled with so much imag i na tion.
Now I work in IT/server sup port for a com pany that makes sen sors for
steel mills, in a range of build ings from oil soaked machine shops to clean
room labs with signs right out of a Bond movie—BEWARE OF LASER
being one example.
29
I keep a hand in with writ ing for the Cana dian Motor cy cle Guide
(CMGonline.com). My main vehi cle is a Russ ian side car motor cy cle that
was orig i nally designed in the 1930s.
ALPHA has influ enced my life greatly to this day. At least that’s the only
expla na tion I can think of for the odd sit u a tions I keep find ing myself
in. I’ve dri ven a moped 800 km while dressed in a silly cos tume, been
mis taken for a WWI re-enactor when I wasn’t re-enacting any thing at all,
dri ven across the coun try in a side car bike to hon our a man who rode large
wheeled bicy cles, and had din ner in a baron’s château while lis ten ing to a
group of men describe how they blew up var i ous church steeples. Somehow
I don’t think life would be quite as much of an unpre dictable adventure
if I hadn’t had ALPHA to teach me to be open to new things. Why often
I even order the soup of the day with out ask ing what it is. That’s the kind
of non con formist rebel that ALPHA made of me. That and often wear ing
mis matched socks.
I would say going to ALPHA defi nitely made you more aware of authority
fig ures as human beings. You didn’t end up with that cer tain awe of
teach ers as semi-mythical fig ures, hand ing down deci sions and com mandments.
While they weren’t pre cisely peers, you did have a rela tion ship
that made them much more approach able than the reg u lar student/
teacher dynamic, to the ben e fit of both. You were more involved in your
own edu ca tion, which often led in direc tions that were sur pris ing for both
teacher and pupil.
31
33
Maggie Marrelli (née Garrard)
“ALPHA was a home to me,
and my classmates were a family.”
Mag gie Marrelli
ALPHA 1976 to 1984, ages
4 – 12. Stud ied Fine Arts.
Works in Home Improvement.
Cre ates art.
I’d say ALPHA gave me a sense of com mu nity and of myself as a val ued
per son, with things to con tribute, and also the abil ity to explore and learn
in an inde pen dent fash ion. The dis ad van tage was prob a bly that, as a kid
who really hated aca d e mics, I took every chance I could to avoid the for mal
learn ing ses sions, and thus have some holes in my foun da tional knowledge.
I went to extremes to avoid my work, such as hid ing my math book,
a ploy that was side stepped with amaz ing cun ning on my teacher’s part
by pre sent ing me with mimeo graphed work sheets. Foiled again! When I
wasn’t slav ing over frac tions I was usu ally play ing G-Force or turn ing bookshelves
into apart ment build ings for toys with my friends. I also spent
a lot of time in the craft cup board mak ing boats out of milk-cartons or
some such, a pre cur sor to the art work I do as an adult. There were also the
par ents who came in and taught us cook ing, sewing, car pen try, singing.
There was a space cap sule full of tog gle switches and a life size por trait of
the Queen we all col lab o rated on where some one painted her neck green.
There was always some thing going on.
I always felt val ued—despite the fact I was a rot ten lit tle shirker—but one
time that springs to mind is when I wrote, directed and nar rated a skit for a
potluck night. I lost the script at the last minute and it was a total dis as ter,
but every one cheered at the end and I felt great.
For me ALPHA really was an exten sion of home and fam ily, as my mum was
a teacher and my sis ter went there as well, but beyond that I have always
thought that my rela tion ship with the other stu dents was more like cousins
than class mates. The school was so small that we were always together,
many of us from the begin ning to the end of our time there, so we had our
good times and our bad, friend ships and con flicts, like any fam ily. The
teach ers and other adults inter acted with us in a warm and acces si ble way,
like aunts and uncles.
I spent a year at Hori zon Alter na tive School, a year at Cen tral Tech ni cal
School, and a year at Inglenook Alter na tive School before drop ping out. At
my main stream high school I was quite shocked by the stu dents vs. teachers
men tal ity, which seemed like such a bar rier to learn ing. In my early
twen ties I returned to school as a mature stu dent and stud ied Fine Arts,
which I still prac tice but haven’t made into a career. I infor mally apprenticed
as a handyper son and have run my own home improve ment company
for the past decade and a bit.
I believe the demo c ra tic nature of ALPHA has made me a more sen si ble
per son. I also see that qual ity quite strongly in the peo ple I went to ALPHA
with, now that we are all grown up. I just wish I could still call Com mit tee
on people.
ALPHA was a home to me, and my class mates were a fam ily. I don’t think
you can have a bet ter start in life than that.
35
37
Ste fan Lynch Strassfeld
“I never got a grade or a report card
or was pitted against my peers. I got to
be interested in things and was given
the time and resources to learn more.
We were so spoiled in such rich ways.”
Stefan Lynch Strassfeld
ALPHA 1977–1984, ages 5–12.
Ran an inter na tional organi
za tion for kids of LGBTQ
par ents. Stud ied Nurs ing
at Uni ver sity of Cal i for nia,
San Fran cisco. Works as
the direc tor of the health
clinic at Juve nile Hall, San
Francisco.
One for ma tive ALPHA expe ri ence I remem ber was mak ing lunch with
Bar bara Klun der to sell to the rest of the school, as part of a reg u lar activ ity
called “store”. The lunch itself was easy. But Bar bara—a par ent—made
it not into a cook ing les son but a nav i gat ing-the-world les son. A hand ful
of us decided as a group what to make for lunch—I think it was ants on
a log and milk or some thing like that. Then we all—prob a bly five 6-to-8
year-olds—walked down Queen Street to a lit tle mar ket and decided as a
group who would buy what item. Bar bara gave us each some cash, and we
each went in on our own and found our item on our own and paid for it
on our own, and then came back out and counted change with Bar bara—
I remem ber her being nice to me about my fear of the stern shop keeper—
then walked back to ALPHA. We added up how much we had spent, tried to
fig ure out how many “orders” it would make, and then (with Barbara’s
help) fig ured out what to charge for each order. Then we made the food,
sold it from a lit tle table in front of the kitchen at lunch, counted what
we had made, and com pared that to what we had spent.
This was an hours-long focused project—for six-year-olds. The main thing
I got out of it was more con fi dence in deal ing with shops and count ing
my change but more impor tantly I remem ber the sense of own er ship I had
over those lit tle ants on the log.
I also have so many mem o ries. When we broke into the wine boxes on an
all school camp ing trip. When I brought a water gun to school from my
sum mer on Fire Island shaped like an erect penis with the balls as han dle.
When I was refus ing to learn to tie my shoes at seven years old because that
was what Vel cro was for. When I first learned to spell and went around
typing/writing “You are a pig!” on every thing I could. There was a real
sense of account abil ity and con cern and a lot of ask ing for my thoughts
and opin ions. It felt lov ing in a way because my teach ers really knew me.
My par ents, from vol un teer ing at the school, knew the issues and the
teach ers and the processes.
39
“It was an illusion that we “ran”
the schoolby democratic process.
The issues we could address were,
in retrospect, narrowly defined.”
But that’s also an exam ple of the kind of deep coer cion that was hap pening—I
really felt like I had a say in whether I learned to hand write or tie
my shoes or do long division, or for that mat ter to make the rules at school,
except you couldn’t change the no-running rule. But there were a million
things you also couldn’t change. It was an illu sion that we “ran” the
school by demo c ra tic process. The issues we could address were, in retro
spect, nar rowly defined. We didn’t pick the hours of the school day or
the edu ca tional model or hire/fire the teach ers or for that mat ter even do
the seri ous clean ing (thanks John the Jan i tor.) In the end, there was no
way my par ents and teach ers were going to let me not learn to hand write
or tie my shoes, but they made it seem as if I had a voice because they as
adults could maneu ver me through sub tler uses of their power, to make me
believe I was mak ing deci sions for myself. As a par ent, I can feel the allure
of lis ten ing and giv ing your kids a voice, but in the end it’s my house, my
rules. There is a cer tain self-denial of author ity and the respon si bil ity of
adults to set lim its for chil dren in the way that ALPHA used “direct democracy”.
It’s a tough one: in order to teach me that I had agency, I was given
some agency even though it was largely illusory.
The school wel comed my dad, an out gay activist, with out a hic cup as far
as I know. Even in San Fran cisco in the pub lic schools in the Cas tro today,
that’s not some thing that con sis tently hap pens. What a sur pris ing and rare
gift to a par ent who didn’t have to fight to spend time with the kids help ing
us do musi cals; to a kid who wasn’t shamed or stig ma tized; and to a fam ily
that was already under extra strain from homophobia.
Finally I would say that I was allowed to spend months one year doing
noth ing but read ing Isaac Asi mov books on sci ence. I learned how to mill
wheat for apple pies which I also learned to make. I explored burned out
ware houses near the CN tower over extra long lunches and didn’t get in
trou ble, and learned to love urban decay. I kissed the boys in kissy tag and
the teach ers didn’t inter fere—although the kids were super het ero nor mative
about that. I got to be in a musi cal with my dad about cryo gen ics.
I learned early how I was priv i leged by hang ing out with my ALPHA friends
who lived on Ward’s Island and in Park dale: both had sin gle poor moms
and cre atively scrounged for food dur ing the day and after school with no
money. I learned about dis abil ity from Doug, punk from Max, naked ladies
from the paint ings in the Leonards’ loft—where I also heard Pink Floyd’s
The Wall for the first time. I spent hours of school time, at my leisure, making
a work ing replica of the func tions of the ear. I never had home work.
I never took a test. I never got a grade or a report card or was pit ted against
my peers. I got to be inter ested in things and was given the time and
resources to learn more. We were so spoiled in such rich ways.
41
Crawford (Crocky) Teasdale
“The most important lesson of ALPHA
was love… We need to learn to love
ourselves first, in all our glory and our
imperfections.”
Halfway through grade two I was bored at school, and I changed to ALPHA.
I’d fin ished all my math books and spelling books and Eng lish books early,
and I had noth ing to do. ALPHA was great because there was some cre ativity,
which was really lack ing in the pub lic school sys tem. I remem ber playing
the piano there a lot. There was a piano in the hall way, and I loved it.
I wanted to play gui tar but my hands weren’t big enough, so I just mostly
taught myself to play piano, and I guess I played the dul cimer. I remember
our teacher Mike, he used to play the I love peanut but ter song, and he
taught me how to play that on the piano. In a cou ple years my hands were
big ger and I got a gui tar and taught myself how to play. I can also remember
col lab o rat ing on ani mated films at ALPHA, paint ing cels and putting
them under a cam era and mov ing them around.
CRAWFORD TEASDALE
ALPHA 1973 to 1978, ages
7–8 & 10–11. Stud ied at the
Royal Con ser va tory of Music.
Works as a graphic designer
at Maple Leaf Sports and
Enter tain ment. Makes music.
*The Ontario Insti tute for
Stud ies in Edu ca tion, now part
of the Uni ver sity of Toronto
When I was nine, ALPHA teacher Mike McCarthy helped me get into a
cat a lyst pro gram [a pro gram for high school stu dents who wanted to audit
uni ver sity courses] at OISE* …I’d go there after school one day a week and
learn BASIC pro gram ming. I remem ber I had to sign out two big floppy
discs that were the size of records: one of them made the com puter start
up, and the other one was for my data. I went on the Inter net in 1977. I got
to dis cuss BASIC pro gram ming, through what we would now call chat, with
some one from Cal i for nia who was much older than me, at a uni ver sity.
There would be a ter mi nal win dow and you’d type some thing and the other
per son would see it and they’d type back. I just thought this was amaz ing—
I couldn’t believe it—and when I told peo ple they didn’t believe me. I was
nine, and most of the peo ple who were doing the course were much older
than me, they were in high school. I just went and did it. It wasn’t that
hard, and I learned to do BASIC pro gram ming and that helped me down
the road a lot.
They always told me at ALPHA that the future’s in com put ers, and that you
should learn your math and your com puter skills. So I did. We saved up, my
broth ers and I, and bought a Com modore PET, and I used it for pro gramming,
and they used it for play ing games. I mostly would just get games
and then look at the code, and try and change the graph ics or the order of
things. I learned that you could resave the file and make the graph ics differ
ent. So I took some games and I made them into my own games. I didn’t
really pro gram them, I just stole some one else’s game and changed the way
it looked and played. I was get ting on to eleven by then.
43
Then I was in an acci dent in 1978, I got run over by a car, and I spent two
years in bed. So I did a lot of gui tar play ing in those two years. When that
was all done I got into a band with some friends. We were called Slightly
Dam aged, we did psy che delic punk rock. After that I moved on and got
a rep u ta tion as a good gui tar player, so other bands would hire me, and
I did some ses sion work.
When I was 18 my com puter skills landed me a great job at Col oriza tion,
doing ani ma tion on a Dub ner com puter. I was also in a band called Neon
Rome, and I was accepted to the Fac ulty of Music at U of T, so I had to
decide what I was going to do. I decided to work with Neon Rome. We were
going to be signed to Vir gin Records, and Bruce McDonald’s first film was
about us. We had a treat ment and every thing, and it was all ready to go,
and then our singer decided that he was going to take a vow of silence for
a cou ple of years, and basi cally we didn’t do the movie and the band fell
apart. It was very sad. Our singer Neal’s lit tle brother’s band ended up doing
the movie, and it won the first prize for the film fes ti val, and he went on to
become very suc cess ful, and our band would have gone on to be very success
ful if our record had come out and our movie had come out. But things
hap pen for a rea son, and you can’t let it get you down. I kept doing my
job—I decided that being a musi cian wasn’t the life that I wanted, I didn’t
want to travel all the time and be poor, I wanted some stability.
I was still work ing at Col oriza tion, and I learned a lot about com put ers and
ani ma tion, and I man aged to get a job at Canada A.M. doing the weather
graph ics. Since then I’ve worked mostly in tele vi sion and sports, so it all fit
together, what I learned at school and what I ended up doing. Ani ma tion
is what I do now. I have worked as an art direc tor, cre ative direc tor, and
man ager. I had a band called Crock star, and we broke up around 2003, but
we still get together, and we play shows quite a bit. In Crock star I write the
songs and I sing them, and I play the gui tar and the har mon ica some times,
and once in a while I play the piano. I also play the vio lin, the man dolin,
and the accor dion, but I don’t do that in the band.
The most impor tant les son of ALPHA was love. So many won der ful Alpha
peo ple taught me to love. A John Lennon quote says it all for me: “There
are two basic moti vat ing forces: fear and love. When we are afraid, we pull
back from life. When we are in love, we open to all that life has to offer with
pas sion, excite ment, and accep tance. We need to learn to love our selves
first, in all our glory and our imper fec tions. If we can not love our selves,
we can not fully open to our abil ity to love oth ers or our poten tial to create.
Evo lu tion and all hopes for a bet ter world rest in the fear less ness and
open-hearted vision of peo ple who embrace life.”
45
Appendix
47
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
Image
Overview
2
1
3
4 5 6
7
8
9
1. Lucy Falkner
2. Jen nifer Ferrari
3. Flan nery Fielding
4. Kether Gra ham
5. Mor gan Jones-Phillips
6. Jamie Leonard
7. Mag gie Marelli
8. Ste fan Lynch Strassfeld
9. Craw ford (Crocky) Teasdale
49
Authors
Ariel Field ing received her early education at ALPHA Alternative School
starting in 1974; hers is the family with the longest attendance in the
history of the school. She returned to ALPHA first in 2008–2009 to work
with the youngest students, and again in 2011–2012 as a member of the
organizing committee for the school’s 40th anniversary. Free schooling,
with its emphasis on equality, has influenced Ariel’s work of honouring
and amplifying minority voices in the arts, and engaging and educating
new audiences. ALPHA gave Ariel a foundational sense of belonging to a
strong and vibrant community, something she has been seeking to replicate
ever since. She holds a Master of Music degree from the University
of London; was a research associate at the Smithsonian Folklife Festival
in Washington, D.C.; and has directed marketing and communications
for both Duke Performances, at Duke University, and the Ackland Art
Museum, at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.
Michael Barker is a graphic designer and pho tog ra pher based in Toronto,
Canada. He grew up in the Bain co-op, a progressive cooperativehousing
project, and attended ALPHA in the 1970s. He attend four alternative
schools in all: start ing with ALPHA and con tin u ing with Hori zon alter native
Senior School (Grades 7 – 8), City School (Grades 9 – 12), and The Student
School (OACs). He graduated from the Ontario College of Art and
Design in 1996. www.michaelbarker.ca
51
Acknowledgements
Thank you to everyone who helped to make this project happen:
Laura Jones, who identified the photographer of the black and white
pictures seen here as her friend Bob Openshaw and hunted in her basement
for the (still lost) negatives; Laura’s son Morgan Jones-Phillips,
who supplied a contact sheet of Bob’s photographs and agreed to be a
part of the project; Lucy Falkner, who flew across the country from
Vancouver to come to the reunion, and whose brother Neil, who died in
2002, was also an ALPHA student; Jennifer Ferrari, who went to ALPHA
with her sisters Elaina, Vanessa, and Natalie; Flannery Fielding, one of
three siblings who went to ALPHA over a span of 14 years, during which
time their mother Marjory went to scores of parent meetings, created art
for school auctions, and spent many hours working on art projects with
students; Kether Graham, who had a vast collection of Archie comics in
her ALPHA years; Jamie Leonard, who went to the school with his brother
Jonathon, and whose dad John was beloved for projecting movies and
making popcorn on Wednesday afternoons during his weekly parent
shift; Maggie Marrelli, sister of Emma Garrard and daughter of legendary
ALPHA teacher Susan Garrard, who taught generations of kids to
read, organized the mammoth annual school camping expeditions, and
threw fabulous school Hallowe’en parties, complete with bobbing for
apples and eating donuts from a string while our hands were behind our
backs; Stefan Lynch Strassfeld, who travelled from San Francisco to be at
the reunion, and whose late dad, Michael Lynch, was a noted gay rights
activist and the director of many an ALPHA musical; and Crocky Teasdale,
who went to ALPHA with his brothers Andrew and Jason, and whose late
mother Linda spent many hours making art with kids at the school. Last
but not least, thank you to Deb O’Rourke, retired ALPHA staff member
and scholar of ALPHA, for planting the seeds for this project through her
inspiring research, and to current teacher Emily Chan for carrying the
ALPHA torch. Thanks to both Deb and Emily for being fantastic humans
who helped to make this project happen.
53