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Welcome to Notes from the Field, our chance to reach out to you from our school in the heart of Bali. This is more than just a newsletter where we can list upcoming events or provide you with basic information on Green School. It’s a place to connect you with the core of what we’re doing, the people intimately involved in building, guiding, and developing our campus, curriculum, vision. It’s a place for students, parents, neighbors, visitors from here and abroad. It will link you to pictures , videos, sounds, and information about our teachers and students; building projects and gardens; our community and environment. We want you to understand why we’re different from any other school in Bali and in the world.
So come get a glimpse of life in a bamboo house. See the evolution of our Heart of School as it grows straight from the rich Balinese earth. Meet our cows. And be in touch. Do you want to attend our school? Schedule a tour or meet our staff? Teach here? Volunteer? Let us know how we can link our lives with yours. Get lit up to learn.
Highlight of the Week
Campfire Dinner at the Kul-Kul Campus
Friday, May 2nd
 Just at sunset, seventy parents and children gathered at the site of our future Learning Village to celebrate their decision to enroll their children in Green School—and to give interested families the chance to discover for themselves what makes us special. After a dinner of Balinese food and entertainment provided by two of the world’s pre-eminent fire dancers, we watched children race around in the twilight, parents speak with each other and our staff. A shared meal, a shared experience, but also the unfolding of what we hope will be one of our signature strengths: people connecting in honest, open ways to achieve a dream about what education can be. Look for more of these events coming soon.
Before and After
First Steps: The Heart of School!
 Centrally positioned near classrooms and the kindergarten, the Heart of School will serve as the hub of student activity on campus. The distinctive organic design features three spiraling forms that intertwine to create a series of continuously curving spaces. Housed inside will be a student center, library, clubs and organizations, administrative offices, meeting spaces for students and faculty, a wellness center, exhibit halls, and other areas dedicated toward providing our students with the best possible holistic education.
With its reflection pools and terraced lawns, the Heart of School will create a powerful and creative environment in which students, faculty, and staff will interact and learn. The building will be one of the largest bamboo structures in the world, with a length of 60 meters and more than 2000 square meters of floor space. We will break ground for the Heart of School building at the center of Green School campus at the end of April 2008. Stay tuned for pictures and updates.
Helping Hands
 Green School is proud to offer English classes to our local friends and neighbors. On April 10th, 80 children joined us on the Kul-Kul Campus to start the journey of learning a new language. Classes will continue twice per week throughout the spring.
Volunteer to teach English classes at Green School. Contact us at volunteer@greenschool.org.
Green People
 Johnny Ryan
Classroom Teacher
Years 3/4, 2008-2009
Johnny brings with him an enormous zest for life and an infectious curiosity for learning. From his wide experience in mainstream and alternative schools he has developed a strong belief in the importance of a purpose-filled education. Alongside rich daily lessons, Johnny has particular interest in exploring drama, performance, outdoor education and circus skills with classes, as he believes these activities integrate skills which help build healthy, active, and socially harmonious classrooms. He and his family will soon be moving to campus from New Zealand.
More about Johnny Ryan
Notes from the Bamboo Nest
 I’m writing this from the third floor of one of the most amazing houses in the world, built almost entirely of bamboo, one of the world’s greatest resources and most versatile materials. No one knows the origin of the word, but one explanation carries lovely, poetic resonance: when the plant is burned, it pops with a powerful crack, a bam, followed by another splinter of noise, a boo. Our house, where Brad, Green School's Director, and I live with our two children, is built of bamboo that's been split, curved, smoked, and sliced, has definitively cracked wide my notion of what constitutes shelter, protection, and home.
But it's more than that, too: our house has brought me closer to people and creatures that have always surrounded me--I just feel more responsible for my neighbors now. What touches them touches me, a relationship of mutual influence. Say the words 'global warming' and watch despair rise like an ugly tide in a room. But what I'm feeling here in Bali, in a small patch of jungle bound by rice fields, river, and a busy road, is energized. When you're lucky enough to watch blue butterflies travel the length of your living room, you'll do almost anything to ensure the preservation of that gorgeous, fragile dance of dust and color.
Copyright © 2008 Charlotte Bacon
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“Let children walk with Nature, let them see the beautiful blendings and communions of death and life, their joyous inseparable unity, as taught in woods and meadows, plains and mountains and streams of our blessed star..."
~John Muir
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Walking the Walk
Recent visitors to Green School:
Shiva Rea
April 2008
 Shiva Rea, one of the world’s best known yoginis, began exploring yoga at the age of fourteen as a way to understand her name, given to her by her father, a surfer and artist. She is known for bringing the roots of yoga alive for modern practitioners in creative, dynamic, and life-transforming ways and for offering the synthesis form of vinyasa flow out in the world. Shiva writes for Yoga Journal and is the author of award-winning CD's and DVD's to empower and transform yoga home practice.
Ann and Thomas L. Friedman Visit Green School
March 2008
 Pulitzer Prize winning New York Times columnist and author of the bestseller “The World is Flat” comments on the ecological initiatives being implemented by Green School.
Thomas L. Friedman on Green School
Kul-Kul Calendar
Upcoming Events:
 Green School Open House
Sunday, May 25th
Come Get Earthy. Help us build and decorate a new mud wall. Learn about our eco-friendly building techniques and our earth-centered curriculum and practices. Visit our spectacular campus embracing sustainable education and entrepreneurship. Please RSVP to (0361) 469-875 or info@greenschool.org.
 A Greener Future: Permaculture for the 21st-Century
Friday, May 30th
and Saturday, May 31st
Green School and Yayasan Kul-Kul would like to share their extensive experience as stewards for the earth through a workshop on permaculture. Participants will be directly involved in making compost, designing an organic garden, and creating a worm farm. For more information and the chance to register, visit www.greenschool.org/introduction-permaculture-workshop.
Recent Events:
Green School Open House
Sunday, April 6th 2008  Green School at the Kul-Kul Campus held its third Open House on Sunday, April 6. The informative and fun-filled event was a great success, with at least 120 people in attendance. School Director Brad Choyt and Head of Admissions Ben Macrory gave some opening remarks describing the goals of the project, which opens its doors in September for Pre-Kindergarten through Year Eight.
More about April 6th Open House
Permaculture Workshop
Monday, March 24th and Tuesday, 25th
 Green School’s first permaculture workshop introduced the system’s design principles and appropriate technologies to 30 enthusiastic participants who built compost toilets and learned about biogases.
Read more about our past Permaculture Workshop
Residents and Friends
 Bebas
Our methane-producing cow.
 Melati the Monitor Lizard
suns herself below the Kul-Kul Bridge.
 Dirga the Dragonfly
Green School’s natural mosquito control.
Campus Chorus
About Green School
 Opening in September 2008, Green School offers an International Curriculum for students from Preschool and Kindergarten through Year 8 with pending International Baccalaureate (IB) accreditation. Our beautiful eight-hectare Kul-Kul Campus is located in Sibang Kaja, Bali, fifteen minutes north of Denpasar or twenty minutes south of Ubud. Please contact our Admissions staff at admissions@greenschool.org for more information or to schedule a tour of the School. We are currently accepting applications for September 2008.
Read about What People Are Saying
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