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What does the Waldorf-movement write about this report at Wikipedia?
The Dahlin report has also been used in several newsletters and articles as a support for proving the supremacy of Waldorf education.Here is our Collected analysis of the Dahlin report
Part 1:
General observations, issues and methodological weaknesses
a) The report has been written by a group of people who are
either anthroposophists or are very favourably disposed towards the
content and form of Steiner/Waldorf education. The report does
not explain that the authors are involved in the anthroposophical
movement.
b) According to the
Rudolf Steiner
College in Järna,
Professor Bo Dahlin, who bears the main responsibility for the report,
is "the external examiner of the Intgrated Masters Programme in the
Eurythmy Masters degree."
c) Professor Bo Dahlin is also a member of the curriculum comittee at
the Masters programme at the Rudolf Steiner College in Oslo.
Bo Dahlin is known to support Waldorf education. In a text on the website of the Swedish anthroposophical information centre, for instance, Dahlin suggests that the esotericist thinking of mysticists as well as the founder of Rosicrucianism, Christian Rosenkreutz, could offer valuable lessons for modern pedagogy.
.
To help children find their way into and out of the metaphysical cave,
as described by Plato, so that they don't have to become lifetime
captives there, in their inability to meet "the unknown," there is, as
it happens, Waldorf pedagogy. Dahlin seems to suggest that this modern
inability stems from the "invisible net of conceptions and values spun
around us by global capitalism and technological advancement."
d) The co-authors of the report, Agnes Nobel and Ingrid Liljeroth, are
favourably disposed towards Waldorf pedagogy and are both quoted on
various anthroposophical sites. Agnes Nobel is the author of "Education
Through Art" (Swedish title: "The Philosopher's Button"), which purports
to be scientific but, in our view, is a manifesto promoting Waldorf/Steiner
pedagogy.
Ingrid Liljeroth,
too, entertained strong sympathies for anthroposophy and the Waldorf
movement prior to her participation in this project. She has previously
written a book about anthroposophy and curative pedagogy. Judging from
the uncritical and unquestioning attitude manifested in the 6th report
from the project (Karlstad, Sept. 2006), which was Liljeroth's main
responsibility, it is evident that she is favourably disposed towards
the tenets and doctrines of anthroposophy.
e) In the report, the connection between the financier of the
report, Kempe-Carlgrenska Fonden (The Kempe-Carlgren Foundation), and
the Waldorf/Steiner school movement remains undisclosed.
As it happens, Frans Carlgren, a member of the foundation’s
administrative board (according to the journal of the Swedish teachers'
association, see
article, is a well-recognized anthroposophist and the author of many
books on anthroposophy and Waldorf education. Frans Kempe was Frans
Carlgren's grandfather (see interview with Frans Carlgren: http://www.antroposofi.info/filosofi/antroposofi/frans_carlgren_intervju/).
Persons with the family name Kempe are still active within the Waldorf
movement in Sweden.
f) What kind of political motivational factors lie behind this
report? Another similar report, the Wood Report, has been
produced in England, the contextual circumstance being a desire to
obtain public funding for Waldorf/Steiner schools. In Norway and Sweden,
it may seem as though too much negative publicity, too many critical
viewpoints, and too many impertinent inquiries directed towards the
movement have surfaced lately. Are student numbers in decline?
Is the report part of an effort to produce purportedly scientific
documentation, in order to counter public criticism?
g) In the English excerpt of the Dahlin report, the following
reservation is stated regarding the results that are being put forth:
[that] in summaries like this many nuances and details are necessarily
omitted and only the large picture is presented. Thus, there is an
inevitable risk in drawing hasty and too general conclusions.
Why has this report, or this excerpt, been published at this point in
time, and why do academics, like Bo Dahlin, A. Nobel, and I. Liljeroth
wish to run the risk of making hasty, and possibly too general,
conclusions about matters of such importance?
h) In which other research publications or fora has this report been
published? And to what degree has the report been subjected to a
scientific discourse on the methods used, the results obtained, and the
conclusions drawn?
i) In all probability, those students, parents, or teachers who
have had negative experiences, or are very critical towards Waldorf/Steiner
schools, were not included in the study, and consequently were not able
to answer inquiries and/or participate in interviews. An
important source of information will thus be lacking in regards to
Waldorf/Steiner schools, whereas this source will be fully represented
in regards to the public schools.
j) Making comparisons between a private school and a public school is,
in many ways, like comparing apples with oranges. Because of this,
Waldorf/Steiner schools should have been compared to other private or
religious schools, in order to produce an accurate representation, and a
relevant qualitative measure, of the education.
k) In many contexts, the unique and independent role of the Waldorf/Steiner
school is emphasized. This is particularly common in those cases where a
school has acted in a deplorable manner in relation to individual
students. The movement then desires to limit the ensuing damage by
claiming it to be a matter of an individual case and insisting that
these conditions do not apply to the movement as a whole.
In this report, however, positive elements in one school are generalized
and made applicable to all Waldorf/Steiner schools, and the distinctive
Waldorf pedagogy is then suggested to be the reason behind these
positive effects. Thus, the reader’s impression is that the positive
sides apply to all schools, but when negative elements are concerned,
they apply only to the specific school in question.
l) How much effort has been made to ascertain that the teachers
responsible for the data collection were not in the position to
manipulate or instruct the children beforehand, and possibly pick and
choose the students who would participate? The number of 196 respondents
is repeatedly used, though for separate reports. When the teacher is
placed in command of administering the questionnaires, you will
invariably receive responses corresponding to what the students believed
the teacher expected. This is the case for Waldorf/Steiner schools as
well as for public schools.
m) In the report, too little emphasis is given to objective
measurements in comparison to the opinions of the students.
Hence, the outcome will to a great extent be qualitative and not
quantitative, and descriptive rather than quantifiable. It is thus easy
to find alternative interpretations of, and views on, the very same
results that the researchers bring forward and are visibly impressed by.
The interpretations the researchers choose reveal their indiscriminate
sympathies towards Waldorf pedagogy.
n) The 10 in-depth interviews that were carried out constitute,
methodically speaking, too small a number to yield any general
conclusions about a large group. There should have been at least 30
interviews to cover a wide range. Moreover, we do not know how the
interviews were carried out or how the subjects were selected for
interviews.
o) The report furthermore notes that Swedish Waldorf parents as a group
are relatively homogeneous, though there are discrepancies among Waldorf
schools. It is claimed that approximately 40% of the parents are
anthroposophists or have anthroposophical leanings. This is a very large
number. Figures from other countries suggest a rate between 10 and 15%.
What is the reason for this?
The report states that SwedishWaldorf/Steiner parents are well-educated,
middle income earners, and speak Swedish as their mother tongue. They
are employed predominantly within
the public sector,
their political opinions are on the left-green spectrum, and most have a
spiritual or religious outlook on life and oppose atheism and
materialism. They have a solidarity-based view of society and reject
competition and egotistical individualism. They have chosen a school for
their children based upon knowledge about Waldorf/Steiner educational
methods, though only 7% of them attended Waldorf/Steiner schools
themselves.
In addition to all this, we would like to know how many of the parents
have a Jewish, Asian, or African background?
p) Why does the report not call into question any of the
problems inherent in the foundation of the so-called alternative
pedagogy that is practiced at Waldorf/Steiner schools?
Reincarnation, karma laws, eurythmy, spiritual science, Atlantis,
spiritual evolution, rejection of Darwin's theory of evolution,
hierarchies of angels are a few of these tenets.
q) Why are the racist assertions of Rudolf Steiner not
problematized in the report? Within the teacher training, what
attitude is taken towards these ideas, and how are they dealt with in
practice within the Waldorf/Steiner school system? In the equivalent
British report, those issues are mentioned, although they are left
unanswered.
r) The English excerpt contains the following passage:
Our findings indicate that the Waldorf schools to a great extent seem to
produce active, responsible, democratic and humane citizens. This is in
all probability a consequence of both the special teaching methods of
the Waldorf schools and the Waldorf pupils' specific social and cultural
backgrounds in the form of their parents' values and social commitment.
Which of these two factors plays the greatest role is naturally
impossible to say, but the teaching methods are certainly of no little
importance.
This statement lacks a tenable foundation and can only be read as
unadulterated propaganda for Waldorf/Steiner schools. What do
these specific teaching methods of Waldorf/Steiner schools amount to?
And why are they considered an alternative to what takes place within
other educational contexts?
Part 2:
Special considerations of the report's specific conclusions
a) A result of the study: Compared to public school students, 15% fewer
of Waldorf/Steiner students move on to university/college immediately
after their 12 years in school. Bo Dahlin et al. claim: To a larger
degree, Waldorf/Steiner school students postpone going to university or
college, and instead they prefer to work, travel or attend Folk
high-schools.
How does Bo Dahlin know this? Does he have any empirical evidence to
back it up? To what extent do these students catch up on school subjects
at other private high schools, as a consequence of their not having
achieved the required educational standards?
b) Dahlin's interpretation of Waldorf/Steiner school students
consciously choosing to postpone their transition to universities and
colleges is his own assumption. Are there statistics or reports to
support his private opinions?
c) The report does not include numbers showing how many of the public
school students intend to enter university or college education in the
future, and consequently the number of Waldorf students with this
intention (42%) becomes meaningless and stands without comparison.
d) One interesting point is that the researchers implicitly
acknowledge the connection between anthroposophy and Waldorf/Steiner
schools. We are told that very few students decide on an
anthroposophical education at the end of their 12 years in Waldorf/Steiner
schools.
The report does not mention, however, how many students get involved in
other operations within the Steiner movement, from biodynamic farming,
the Camphill movement, or as untrained teachers or staff at Waldorf/Steiner
schools. Unquestionably, there are more people who enter the movement as
untrained labour than who choose an anthroposophical education and enter
the movement as professionals.
f) Waldorf pupils seem to have a different style of studying
Former Waldorf pupils generally seem to have a somewhat different style
of studying compared with other students. They are somewhat less
instrumental and somewhat more deeply involved in their studies, i.e.,
their studying is based more on a personal interest in the subject than
on improved job opportunities. They appear also to be less worried about
exams and do not use mechanically reproductive learning methods ("learning
by heart") to the same extent.
Are these vague, general formulations and statements something we simply
have to accept without questioning, or does Dahlin have evidence to
present for any of them? Where, in that case, is the data?
It ought to be a piece of cake for a researcher to present quantifiable
results to use in a comparison between the final examination results of
previous Waldorf students and those of students coming from public
schools. Has this been done?
g) Regarding report 3: Waldorf schools and civic moral competency.
The report reads:
To compare the Waldorf pupils' ability to take a stand on complex social
and moral issues with that of pupils from the municipal school, a
questionnaire was used from a project that was part of the National
Agency for Education's national evaluation in 1998.
Were no Waldorf/Steiner schools represented in the national evalution in
1998, so that a direct comparison between the Waldorf schools and the
public schools could be obtained?
h) Regarding:
The first comparative study - the pupils' civic moral competency. The
questionnaire was sent out during the spring term of 2003 to the
teachers of social studies in the 9th and 12th grades of the
participating Waldorf schools. The teachers were asked to administer the
collection of questionnaires themselves.
This is hardly a satisfactory manner of collecting data and will
naturally yield results we cannot consider reliable.
i) The response rate was 77% representing 325 pupils.
This is a high rate of return when participation is voluntary, but a
relatively low rate considering participation was obligatory. It would
not be unreasonable to question whether those collecting and
administering the survey may have undertaken a deliberate selection of
responses.
j) The comparison group from the National Agency for Education's
evaluation in 1998 consisted of 407 pupils from the 9th grade and year
III of upper secondary school from a total of 19 municipal schools.
The moral questions and matters on which students were asked to express
their opinions were to a dissimilar degree present in the public debate
in 1998 (when the public schools participated in the investigation) as
compared to 2003 (when the Waldorf schools students participated in the
same investigation). The questions were related to the flourishing of
neo-Nazi environments, the possible use of adequate violent force in
specific situations, the limits of free speech in a democratic society,
and the bio-technological quandaries connected to
k) How do Waldorf/Steiner schools deal with the racist statements of
Steiner himself?
l) Comments on the comparative study 2: Attitudes towards school,
teachers and parents
The questionnaire was sent out to nine of the participating Waldorf
schools during the spring term of 2003. The number of respondents was
196 pupils. The National Agency for Education sent out a total of 6788
questionnaires to the municipal schools and the number of respondents
was 5941.
The latter yields a response rate of 87,5 %, which must be considered
very high. Either the survey was obligatory, or participation must have
been rewarded greatly. As for the Waldorf schools, the only
specification is that of 196 student responses, but no response rate is
given. Does this imply a very low response rate?
Earlier in the report (p. 9), Dahlin states that 422 students from 11
schools were included in the target group, from which 325 student
responses yielded a response rate of 77 %. Here we have only 9 schools.
Which schools are excluded, and why? In any case, this is either a
technical weakness, or perhaps an attempt to conceal something?
m) More Waldorf pupils thought their social studies teaching was
interesting and good. The comparison showed that the Waldorf pupils in
the 12th grade thought that the school's social studies teaching was
interesting and good to a greater extent than the municipal school
pupils in the same grade. Furthermore, more Waldorf pupils in this grade
thought they were good at social studies, compared with the municipal
pupils.
Once again, this manner of collecting data inspires very little
confidence. The responses from these questionnaires, which were
distributed by the teacher at the Waldorf school, are supposed to
express open criticism of the teacher, while most students will be very
unwilling to deliver that.
n) What does this have to do with moral competence and maturity?
o) In the report it is asserted that fewer Waldorf/Steiner school
students feel they are being bullied or unjustly treated, as compared to
students in public schools. They also feel that the teachers, or other
adults, quickly interfere if a student is being bullied.
This bears the sign of a commissioned work. A conspicuous point of
criticism, emanating from many separate quarters over a period of
several years, is the passivity of Waldorf/Steiner schools in reaction
to bullying. So many individual and separate sources tell - on the
Waldorf Survivors group (WASSO) - of the anthroposophical teachers’
marked passivity, when confronted with bullying occurring in the open,
that it is impossible for this to be a coincidence.
Or could it be that Swedish Waldorf schools are significantly better at
dealing with bullying than are their English-speaking counterparts?
Another probability, which has been mentioned earlier, is that students
who feel bullied at Waldorf/Steiner schools decide to leave, because
their problems are not responded to and attempts are not made to solve
them. These students are no longer at hand; thus their responses will
not emerge from the data collection.
Or is there perhaps a fear of criticizing the passive teachers, who are
the ones to collect and process the returned questionnaires?
Or do the responses, as well as the low return rate, indicate that a
selection has been undertaken by the teachers?
p) A greater number of blank, ironic or destructive answers from the
Waldorf pupils (in the Rosenberg test). Behind these answers there may
be a certain distrust of, or rebellious attitude to, established social
or political institutions.
Could it simply be that while the other questionnaires were scrutinized
by the teachers, in the Rosenberg test they were not, and that this made
the students feel they could respond more independently there?
From report 4: Knowledge of Swedish, English and Mathematics, and
attitudes to the teaching.
q) The first two questions were investigated by having the pupils in
nine of the eleven participating Waldorf schools answer parts of the
questionnaires that were included in the National Agency for Education's
national evaluation in 2003 (NU03). The selection of questions, in the
form of a questionnaire, was sent out during the spring term of 2003 to
the class teachers, who were asked to administer the collection of the
questionnaires themselves. The number of Waldorf students who answered
was 196.
According to the report, there are small differences in the level of
factual knowledge.
Quote: Only small differences between the Waldorf pupils and the
municipal school pupils in their Swedish, English and Mathematics marks.
This, too, is the same number of responding students that has been
stated before (196 students). Where does this number come from?
Accordingly, these replies were administered and collected by the
teachers at the Waldorf/Steiner school. Thus, they were not returned
anonymously, in prepaid envelopes, and as such delivered to a
registration unit that would have guaranteed that the responses retained
their anonymous status and were not censored.
In the report, a number of conclusions of a very ambitious character
emerge.
For example:
- The Waldorf pupils were generally happier at school
- The Waldorf pupils had a more positive picture of their schoolwork
- The Waldorf pupils to a lesser extent only worked with their school
subjects in order to pass the tests
- The working environment in the lessons was generally perceived as
quieter and pleasanter in the Waldorf schools
- The Waldorf pupils had a more positive attitude to Mathematics
- The Waldorf pupils found Swedish a less difficult subject
- The Waldorf pupils were less sure of their ability to cope with
concrete tasks
Compared to other sources - for example, the Waldorf Survivor group
(WASSO) – where corresponding negative experiences of Waldorf/Steiner
schools emerge, those conclusions express, at best, wishful thinking
with a very weak foundation.
Dahlin also writes:
Here, however, an uncertainty in the results is created by a higher
drop-out rate amongst the Waldorf pupils in group 2.
Taking into consideration the parents’ conscious decisions and strong
motivation in their choice of Waldorf education for their children, this
high drop-out rate deserves a lot more attention than a mere mention in
passing. Why do so many drop out of Waldorf schools, despite all the
positive aspects Bo Dahlin and his research team find in their
investigations.
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