The Education

The first Steiner Waldorf school opened in Stuttgart in 1919 for children of workers at the Waldorf-Astoria cigarette factory. The School’s benefactor was managing director, Emil Molt, who asked Dr Steiner to found and lead the School in its early stages. The idea was that children from all echelons of society should learn together.

This progressive, international schools movement has now spread to over 70 countries around the World by popular demand, with schools being set up mainly by groups of teachers and parents. It is the essence of a grassroots movement. The ideas and principles which inform the education provide a credible and thoughtful perspective to the debate on education and human development.

The School

The School was founded by a group of five people on the initiative of Daphne Olivier (first cousin to actor Laurence Olivier) after she had attended one of Rudolf Steiner’s educational conferences in Stuttgart in 1923. She approached Rudolf Steiner and a school was founded in South London and named “The New School”. It moved to Kidbrooke Park after World War II whereupon it took on the name "Michael Hall".