History
Waldorf History
Waldorf schools, also known as Steiner schools (mostly in Europe), are based upon the educational approach founded by Rudolf Steiner in response to a request by industrialist Emil Molt, who in 1919 wished to start a school for the children of employees of his Waldorf-Astoria cigarette factory in Stuttgart, Germany. There are now more than 1,000 accredited Waldorf schools and nearly 2,000 Kindergartens in more than 50 countries, making Waldorf education the world's largest independent and nondenominational school system. There are also about 500 additional schools providing education for children with special needs using Waldorf principles; many of these are within the Camphill movement.
Three-quarters of the independent Waldorf schools today are located in Europe; the movement is growing especially quickly in Eastern Europe, where communist regimes forbade Waldorf schools until their overthrow in 1989. In the English-speaking world, there are about 170 schools in the United States, 100 in Australia, 40 in Great Britain, and 30 in Canada; there are also many schools in New Zealand and South Africa.
Schools that use substantial portions of the methodology of Waldorf education but are not independent refer to themselves as Waldorf-method or Waldorf-inspired schools; these are primarily found as charter or magnet schools which are part of the public school system in the United States and, as government schools, are not included in the statistics above.
