Dear Shepherdstown area parents,

I want to introduce myself as a well-rounded, experienced teacher who wants to share Waldorf education with you in my community. I have been a teacher in many settings and levels, but I’ve been most impressed with the wholistic and rich education that Waldorf schools have been providing for 100 years. My first exposure to Waldorf education was with my three children’s preschool in Silver Spring, Md. called Acorn Hill.

Beginning in post-World War I, in 1919, Rudolf Steiner opened a school with idealistic goals intended to heal children from the trauma of war and militaristic thinking. As a free-thinker, Steiner partnered with a factory owner who wanted to provide his employees with a school for their children in hopes that they would develop a better future. Steiner lived only a few more years, and sadly was already persecuted by the incoming Nazis; his schools were closed for a time, while others opened in other countries, including the USA in 1928. That school, the Rudolf Steiner School, is still operating in New York City. Today, there are 250 schools in the USA, and 1,090 schools in 64 countries.

I have worked in the three Washington, DC area Waldorf schools, and most recently in a Waldorf charter school in Portland, Oregon. My Waldorf training has been through Nova Institute at the Washington Waldorf School and at Sound Circle in Seattle, WA. In addition, I have taken workshops and seminars at Sunbridge Institute in Spring Valley, NY and attended conferences at Cedarwood School in Portland, OR and on Zoom.

Besides my Waldorf teaching, I have taught in college, high school, middle school, elementary school, summer school, and boarding school, at both public and private institutions. I earned my MEd at George Mason University, my MA at Catholic University, and my BA at the University of Washington.

My husband who has been a performing musician and a Federal government employee (including working with Representative Harley Staggers, Jr.) is a long-time West Virginian. He is from Morgantown, and there is much to write about him in the future. He is my long-time partner in teaching, beginning with a series of folk dance classes we taught together in Seattle, bringing Appalachian clogging to the Pacific Northwest a few decades ago. Now, I am planning and working towards opening a Waldorf preschool beginning this spring, outdoors for most of the day. I am looking for a space to house it, since our town’s historic district regulations prevent in-home child care.

We are sad that COVID has delayed having a more imminent opening, but until we are physically together, I want to begin a relationship with interested families to get to know what happens in a Waldorf school, our Waldorf school, and even see if there’s enough interest to open a school that can continue past early childhood into the grades. Waldorf teachers take their pupils for 8 years, generally, which allows for deep connections with their families.

Looking forward to meeting you,

Catherine Falknor