Other Dreams, Other Schools: Folk Colleges in Social and Ethnic Movements.

The book presents 13 articles which examine objectives, practices, sociocultural influences, and limitations of folk high schools in Northern Europe and North America from 1800 to the 1970s. Folk high schools are residential education institutions for young adults which are based upon heightening individual consciousness and commitment to a particular, often ethnically-related, goal for social change. Cases studied are the Danish Rural Movement, the Norwegian Cultural Nationalist Movement, the Swedish Folk Movement, and the U.S. Labor and Civil Rights Movements. The document is presented in four major parts. Part I presents a rationale, discusses a theoretical framework and a methodology for studying folk colleges, and examines the role of education in social movements. Parts II and III describe folk school movements in Denmark, Norway, Sweden, Finland, Lapland, and the United States. Information is presented on conditions under which social-movement education programs were created, conditions influencing the pedagogical effectiveness of folk schools, and relative effectiveness of movement-education to goal attainment. General findings indicate that alternative education programs have been most successful when they are tolerated by dominant elites, possess clear educational objectives, and offer students an awareness of new roles which they will play in changing communities. Part IV identifies limits on alternative non-formal education, including unqualified teachers, lack of standard entrance requirements, and weak economic support.