The “Hippie” School 

I crawled out of my tent as the sun creeped over the horizon. My legs were covered in bruises, scraps, bug bites, and not to mention insanely sore because the day before I biked 53 miles up and over a mountain. I was 14 years old, and this was a normal day at school for me. Last year I graduated from an experimental/ outdoor education school, Santa Barbara Middle School. Overall, we were out of the classroom for over 30 days of the school year from backpacking in Catalina Island to biking through dust storms in Arizona to swimming in the lakes in Oregon. It was the best thing for a kid growing up to experience, being pushed mentally and physically in a loving community of people of support who you are.

We got the reputation as the “Hippie School” just cause the teachers didn’t believe in conforming to the “norms”. Why should we when there is a whole world out there to explore and learn from? Let’s go back in time starting from the 1970s  to see how this school became a close community of learners and how they taught me to  Carpe Diem.

The year was 1976. Some people came together, as the school’s website (sbms.org) puts it, “…sought to create a school that would combine an innovative, challenging academic program with an environment responsive to the many needs of adolescent students.” Their wishes came true with hard work. The crazy thing is these people who had this dream of creating this school and made it happened, were some of my teachers, 35 years later. The first picture of the four people taken in Yosemite in 1988, on the far left, is Whitney. Whitney is still the Director of Admissions, and the lady who accepted me into the school 3/4 of the way into the school year. A true savior. I came from another school that was not a good fit for me. SBMS instantly felt like home and even when I go back and visit it feels like I never felt.

Two from the right in the picture, was my math and science teacher, Russ. I am very lucky to have had him as a teacher. I have never witness a teacher to love the subject they were teaching as much as Russ does. I remember he told our class to read the Physics textbook for the fun of it because thought it was an interesting. As I may disagree with him, I do respect his passion for teaching math and science, and also for teaching me to notice small, intricate things nature can create like leaves that can be so beautiful.

As this is hard to wrap up, since I have so many stories and things to say about my experiences of biking, backpacking, and camping with this school, I would like to finish with the quote I said at graduation that sums up most of my experience (also one of my favorite quotes):

” Peace comes from within, do not seek without.” -Buddha

Think about that quote. What does it mean to you?

Much Love and Peace,

Charlotte

♥︎

*All pictures are taken by SBMS alumni (www.sbms.org)*