Desert Sage High School is a tuition-free, Waldorf-inspired, college preparatory, charter high school and part of a burgeoning, innovative movement to make Waldorf education accessible to the public. We are the third stand-alone public Waldorf school in the United States and the first in Southern Arizona.
Our Mission
Guided by the Principles of Public Waldorf Education, we celebrate diversity, embrace equity, and cultivate inclusion to create space for an educational experience that bridges opportunity gaps, develops students’ academic and life skills, and inspires lifelong learning.
Our Vision
We envision a world where an unwavering belief in the dignity of truth honors and celebrates each individual’s unique gifts and empowers their self-agency.
Our Values
We engage our students, their peers and families, and the larger community through:
Deep and meaningful relationships of respect and empathy
Arts-infused exploration and project-based collaboration
Community and global action that sustains the planet our students will inherit
The Seven Core Principles of
Public Waldorf Education
Desert Sage High School is an initiative member of the Alliance for Public Waldorf Education.
The Seven Core Principles of Public Waldorf Education indicated below guide our curriculum,
teaching, and relationships with students and their families.
1. Image of the Human Being
Public Waldorf education is founded on a coherent image of the developing human being. Each human being is a unique individual who brings specific gifts, creative potential, and intentions to this life.
2. Child Development
An understanding of child development guides all aspects of the educational program, to the greatest extent possible within established legal mandates. Human development proceeds in approximate 7-year phases. Each phase has characteristic physical, emotional, and cognitive dimensions and a primary learning orientation.
3. Social Change Through Education
Public Waldorf education exists to serve both the individual and society. Public Waldorf education seeks to offer the most supportive conditions possible for the development of each student’s unique capacities.
4. Human Relationships
Public Waldorf Schools foster a culture of healthy relationships. Enduring relationships — and the time needed to develop them — are central to Public Waldorf education. The teacher works with each student and class as a whole to support relationship-based learning.
5. Access and Diversity
Public Waldorf Schools work to increase diversity and access to all sectors of society. Public Waldorf schools respond to unique demands and cultures in a wide range of locations in order to provide maximum access to a diverse range of students. Schools work towards ensuring that students do not experience discrimination in admission, retention, or participation.
6. Collaborative Leadership
School leadership is conducted through shared responsibilities within established legal structures. Faculty, staff, administration and boards of a Public Waldorf school collaborate to guide and lead the school with input from stakeholder groups. To the greatest extent possible, decisions related to the educational program are the responsibility of those faculty and staff with knowledge and experience of Rudolf Steiner’s educational insights.
7. Schools as Learning Communities
Public Waldorf schools cultivate a love of lifelong learning and self-knowledge. Public Waldorf education emphasizes continuous engagement in learning and self-reflective practices that support ongoing improvement. At the individual and classroom level, teachers reflect regularly on their observations of the students and of the educational process.
Land Acknowledgment
Desert Sage High School acknowledges the original caretakers of the desert in which we dwell. The Indigenous habitation of what is known as the Tucson Basin dates back approximately 12,500 years, likely representing the oldest, continuously inhabited area in what is now the United States. Contemporary Native people who constitute our ethnographic history and present-day included the Tohono O’odham, Pascua Yaqui, and 20 other federally recognized tribes in Arizona. We encourage everyone in the Desert Sage School network to embrace this or a similarly appropriate acknowledgment as we dwell together on this land.