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Classroom Alive – Sweden to Greece â€“ was a 6-month walking studies across Europe. The studies allowed the students to take up their individual questions while bringing their search into open relationship with the diverse realities of the world they met along the route. The studies were based on the rhythm of walking. Like thousands who came before, from Goethe to the Transcendentalists, Classroom Alive recognized that walking as a medium is unique, in being both focused and open in the quality it imprints on the walkers thinking and perception. Out of the constant rhythm of walking (approx. 4 hours a day) the individual students courses of study were given a clear foundation.

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The content of studies were formed out of the individual students questions and interests. Everyone brought their own areas of study (macro-economics, phenomenology, local food-systems etc.) and engaged them however they saw fit (reading books, creating exhibitions, writing essays etc.). Throughout the journey their were different daily, weekly, and monthly structures that provided possibilities for students to deepen their research by themselves, to collaborate on questions with their peers, and to share their work with the world. These structures, as well as the journey as a whole, was stewarded by the Core Team (see below), who were in communication with students about joining the journey, and helped ensure that the decisions that were arrived at over the course of the journey best supported the health of the whole, however it was be up to all the students on the journey to hold the structures collectively.

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Throughout the walk the students shared with those that they met along the way, holding conversations, sharing meals, and staying overnight anywhere they were invited. By sharing and staying with those they encountered along the way the students were able to have honest meetings in which a free sharing of stories, questions, and dreams, was possible.

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On May 26th the open group of students departed Järna, Sweden. They arrived in Athens, Greece, on Novemember 30th 2013. There are now other Classroom Alive journies being started by other core teams. The first of which was completed in the summer of 2014 Classroom Alive: Ireland

About Classroom Alive: ~Sweden to Greece~

​​​The Classroom Alive ~Sweden to Greece~ Core Team is one Belgian and two Canadians: Mathijs Poppe, Mischa Saunders & Caleb Buchbinder. They met each other for the first time at the Youth Initiative Program (YIP) which they all attended in 2010-2011. During their time there, they worked together on various initiatives throughout the year. After YIP they each followed their own path, with Caleb booking a one-way ticket to India, Mathijs returning to Belgium to continue his film studies, and Mischa going to ​Detroit to learn about the urban agriculture movement happening there.

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​With these, and many more adventures awaiting over the coming summer, fall, and winter,  they were back in touch during the spring of 2012.  Over the following months, conversations with a group of ten individuals inspired to take their education into their own hands bubbled away, boiling down to these three students deciding in late summer to commit to a year of studies together. And so, they met up in March 2013, in Järna, Sweden, where they began the design phase of Classroom Alive.

Classroom Alive: Sweden to Greece
Core Team
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