Cynthia Cross, 'A community for maladjusted children',
Peace News, March 20, 1964, p. 10
There are many people in the peace movement who feel that alongside the anti war campaign, there should be a positive effort towards peace-building. A group of people who feel this are forming a trust, to be known as the Homer Lane Trust. The aim of the trust is to establish a community for the care, treatment, and education of emotionally and socially disturbed children and young people, to be run on the principles of Homer Lane and those who have developed his ideas. The most well-known of the men influenced by Homer Lane's methods are Mr Lyward, A. S. Neill and W. David Wills. David Wills has successfully experimented with these methods in a number of situations involving a large age range of maladjusted children and young people.
Many conflicts between adults in our society spring from the unresolved and unchannelled aggressions of our children. The treatment of “naughty” children has greatly improved in the last thirty years. In many cases corporal punishment and other punitive deterrents have been replaced by attempts at understanding, but there is still very little positive therapeutic work taking place in residential settings. There are outstanding people working in this field, but there is still a great need for people with ideals to work them out practically and try to make a contribution to theory and research in some of the neglected areas.
The most important aspect of the community which the trust is endeavouring to establish, is that it will be a therapeutically planned environment in which personal relationships can be used positively. This will be facilitated by the system of shared responsibility, which removes the punitive element from the group, and avoids the need for the adult always to appear in an authoritarian role. It also constantly provides opportunities for interaction between group members, and the development of insight both on a personal and group level. It is hoped that a high degree of co-operation will be achieved between staff, with frequent frank discussion of community problems. Social work with families, and adequate after-care, will be considered exceedingly important. Educationally, there will be opportunities for creative achievements, and timetables will be planned to meet individual needs.
The community envisaged by the trust will be very flexible. It is hoped that it will be able to contain children from about nine years old until school leaving age, and when necessary a small number of working children. It will give preference to the admission of children with a good chance of being rehabilitated to their own or a substitute family.
Once the community is operating, children will be selected according to their estimated capacity to integrate with, and receive something from, the existing group, which should not exceed thirty. It is felt that some children should be educated on the premises, whilst others would benefit by attending outside schools.
The trust sees the adult role in the community as vital. Tremendous possibilities are seen in a situation where there are, in addition to the nucleus of staff working with the children, adults who pursue their own occupations outside the community, but contribute socially and economically by living there, and therapeutically by forming relationships with the children. A limited number of students and visitors would be welcomed in the hope that their stay would be of mutual benefit.
The trust has already about £1,000 and a nucleus of people who could partially staff the community. Those concerned are prepared to work hard, and plough back a proportion of their income in order to see their ideas and aims realised. It still needs capital to buy a house; this should if possible have sufficient grounds to contain a smallholding or similar project, which would be a financial and therapeutic asset.
Your interest, support and contributions, however small, will be much appreciated.
