Posted on by

Job Opening: Faculty Position at The Tutorial School

Position:  Faculty Member

When:  August, 2022

Location:  Santa Fe, New Mexico, USA

The Tutorial School is seeking to hire a faculty-member who is self-motivated and self-directed and looking to become a stable fixture in growing a democratic education school together with the current faculty and students. 

About The Tutorial School 

The Tutorial School is an educational community dedicated to the development of independent, responsible students, prepared with life skills that encourage and sustain a thoughtful, successful, and meaningful life. We are an independent, alternative, democratic school for ages 10–19 in Santa Fe, New Mexico, offering an education based on freedom, trust, and self-governance. Since 1982, The Tutorial School has filled a vital need in the community, helping children become happy, effective, functional adults.

The mission of The Tutorial School is to nurture in children confident self-determination, independent creative thought, and affective self-knowledge. This is accomplished through the process of students being responsible for their own education while sharing power in the governing of the school as active members of the community.

About the position

The Tutorial School is looking for a motivated individual who is ready to become a stable fixture of the school and grow our small and dynamic community together. We are looking for individuals who have unparalleled passion for helping the students seek their own style of education, while modeling agency, healthy boundaries, and self-motivation. Most importantly the faculty member must be dependable and responsive to feedback from other faculty members and students. 

School hours are normally Monday – Thursday, 9:00am – 5:00pm, but there is flexibility to the working hours. Occasionally faculty works outside of school hours, including nights and weekends.

The faculty members work together with students to carry out specific responsibilities to ensure that the school keeps running. The faculty do conduct traditional classes at the request of students, but much of their tasks involve engaging in collaborative projects with students — field trips, cooking, art projects, science demonstrations, fabrication and repairs, and games of all sorts. The primary focus of a faculty member is to actively listen to the students and provide mentoring. Faculty also support the operations of the school, including grounds maintenance, administration, and cleaning.

Essential:

  • Some understanding and willingness to learn about the philosophy of the school 
  • Must be willing to learn to navigate a non-hierarchical organization, where students have an equal voice on important matters in regards to the running of the school, and the final say on hiring and firing
  • Must have prosocial communication skills. This entails open, honest and supportive communication with students and faculty through active listening, self reflection, positive verbal/non-verbal body language. Use supportive, non-punitive language and active listening skills to promote mutual respect
  • Must demonstrate respect, for themselves, their peers, colleagues and most importantly students and their process. This includes recognizing and showing understanding of each student’s learning history and current knowledge base without directing, preaching or otherwise overpowering the students natural abilities to acquire knowledge and expertise
  • Must be committed to continuous personal growth, and open to be challenged to grow by students and other faculty
  • Must be self-motivated and willing to seek and take on new tasks that positively contribute to the school, students and other faculty 
  • Must be organized, reliable and able to manage their own time while being attentive to ideas and beliefs that maintain the school’s positive learning environment
  • Must have strong self-management skills, including the ability to manage and finalize projects with faculty and students while balancing and keeping in mind their availability and scheduling
  • Must be able to consult with faculty and students regarding personal needs or actions that may impact the school community such as time off
  • Must exhibit patience and unconditional positive regard for students without having an agenda for them. We work for the students

Beneficial Experience:

  • Knowledge of Carl Rogers, Riane Eisler, Jiddu Krishnamurti
  • Experience or background in client-centered therapy, at-risk children, or counseling
  • Experience with non-hierarchical organizations
  • Speak a foreign language
  • Travel experience

Pay

Pay is modest but can include housing.

To apply

Please send an email to contact@tutorialschool.org with a brief description of yourself and your experiences. For those who the school and the applicant find is a good fit, there will be an interview and a trial period. The students will have the final say in hiring.

Posted on by

Help Needed for the Ashram/Orphanage in Nepal

Sri Aurobindo Ashram/Orphanage Crisis Needs More Support From YouCrafts Hand Made at the Ashram Will be Sent to Donors on Request
We appreciate the donations that have come through helping to support the orphanage in Nepal through their crisis.
AERO sent them $2000. I donated $1000 of my own savings, and our readers have sent $933! If we can get the orphanage through the next few months they might see a return of tourism in Nepal and they may develop other sources f support. We have more than $6150 to go.
I have just found a big bag of hand made pashmina, dresses, shoes, hand bags, wallets, necklaces, small blankets, and hand made incense from flowers (see above). It was left here to sell from an earlier visit from the Ashram. They were all hand made at the Ashram/orphanage. For any $100 donation we will send a small item of their choice to the donor. For donations of $250 or more, the donor may choose any item.
Ramchandra said he is already spending the funds we sent. I have a better picture of their financial situation now. He said they have about $10,000 a month income from milk and organic food sales locally, but sometimes the local markets are closed because of COVID. Also prices for things that are needed such as cooking oil have doubled in the last year.
Here is a list from Ramchandra of the Ashram’s yearly expenses, but they can only cover half of it now:
“We need to buy rice worth for the whole year for 300 people for USD 9000. 30 tonnesWheat                                            USD 8000. 25 tonnesLentils                                            USD. 6500.  6 tonnesSugar                                             USD 4000. 5 tonnesOil                                                 USD 8200  3.6 tonnesSalt                                                USD 500.  1.8 TonnesVegetables for whole year                          USD 15000.Fruits for whole year                                   USD 15000.Electricity for whole year                             USD 14000.Medications for 300 people                        USD 22000.Books and note-books, pencils etc.            USD 11400.Clothings, summer and winter                    USD 12000.And other miscellaneous items                   USD 15000.”
(From Wednesday’s special)Some of you know that AERO has long supported the Sri Aurobindo Ashram/orphanage in Nepal. Sri Aurobindo was the “Dewey” of India. It is so named because the founder, Ramchandra, ran away from Nepal at 12, got himself educated in India, ending up at the Sri Aurobindo Ashram in Pondicherry, India. He returned 20 years later and saw all the poverty and children on the street in Nepal. He then started the orphanage. I first met him when he was doing fundraising in New York more than 20 years ago. He subsequently came to the IDEC organized in 2003 by AERO, bringing one of the children and one staff member. The child was Vedananda, who eventually got a Masters Degree in Math and Physics in Germany and is now principal of the orphanage school. Some will remember him for hosting the 2020 IDEC. So the Ashram is absolutely amazing with what it accomplishes for its children. It also raises some of its own food and even has a small dairy on the 2 ½ acres on the outskirts of Kathmandu. They sell excess milk in Kathmandu every day. There they raise 200 children with almost 100 other children on the farm in Terai in the south of Nepal and in the mountains in Gulmi. Ordinarily the Ashram is nearly self-supporting as it hosts tourists on their campus and at another site they built in the mountains. But that ended two years ago with the pandemic. They have spent all of their savings and even had to sell some of the land behind the school to keep going. AERO once raised funds to buy them a small piece of land to add to their 2 1/2 acres. Selling land is unthinkable and tells you how desperate the situation is! I just found out about the crisis this week. On Monday AERO wired $2000 in emergency funds to them. Also many of the children there are now getting COVID, including Ramchandra, even though he was able to get them one shot of Johnson and Johnson. When the earthquake hit Nepal and destroyed some of their buildings, AERO’s members raised over $10,000 for them so they could survive this. This week we hope to raise a similar about or more so they can survive this new crisis for the next three months. Make a generous donation to the Ashram/orphanage fund HERE All donations are tax-deductible and will go directly to the orphanage. Note: they will go to AERO’s donation page but all will go to the Ashram).