Alum Corner with Mariella Costanzi
My advice to this year’s graduates is simple: travel, experience new things, and enjoy all the world has to offer. Now is the time to do it.
After graduating from the Vancouver Waldorf School, I did a seven-month solo trip through Australia and Europe. When I returned to Vancouver, I completed the Arts and Entertainment Management program at Capilano University.
In 2006, I moved to Cancun for what I thought would be “two years,” but ended up staying for twelve years, working in Vacation Sales. During my second year in Cancun, I got married and welcomed a wonderful child, who is now eleven years old.
When he was in his second year of Kindergarten, I realized I wasn’t happy with the local, traditional school system in Cancun and began searching for a Waldorf school. I found one 45 minutes away, and we commuted there for a year and a half.
Through this small school, I met a group of parents who shared my feelings about the long commute. Together, we launched a Waldorf initiative in Cancun. It was an intense but rewarding experience, and we opened the Del Mar Waldorf Initiative Cancun within one year, starting with two Kindergartens and Grades One and Two. Since then, it has grown to include one preschool, three Kindergartens, and Grades 1 through 6.
It was an amazing experience, not just starting a school but also creating a community from such diverse family backgrounds, united by the common goal of giving children an education that supports their creativity and development in a more holistic way.
Last year, I moved back to BC with my son, excited to begin a new chapter and return to my roots.
There are so many memories from my time at VWS to choose from: the camping trips, Greek games, and the lasting connections and friendships all bring back wonderful memories.
Waldorf education’s true impact became clear once I had my son and was searching for an appropriate school for him. You don’t realize how unique and holistic Waldorf education is until you struggle to find something similar and witness the adverse effects of early academic stimulation on young children. Stress affects adults, but in children, it can be even more harmful. I truly appreciate the creativity and freedom we were given to express ideas and opinions at Waldorf rather than simply regurgitating information. It’s far more important to demonstrate genuine understanding than to repeat memorized facts.
*Del Mar Waldorf Initiative Cancun
Interview date: May 2019 Ronaye Ireland, for Development
The Vancouver Waldorf School provides an experiential, age-appropriate approach to education based on the insights of Rudolf Steiner that inspires students to love learning, to be creative, open-minded, and compassionate. With a curriculum that integrates all academics with the arts and social learning, Waldorf Education develops not only the left and right hemispheres of the brain but the whole human being. A child’s social, emotional, physical and intellectual development is considered equally, supporting a conscious unfolding of the individuality within each student. Waldorf graduates possess capacities for empathy and clear, creative and independent thinking that enables them to carry out a chosen course of action with moral courage and social responsibility.
