Mission
The Chicago Waldorf School offers a transformative education in an inclusive environment that challenges students while protecting their well-being. Equipped with self-knowledge, experience, and a love for learning, our students meet the world ready to contribute and succeed.
core values
Excellence
We weave academic and artistic excellence with social engagement and moral awareness into an integrated whole. We work with educational principles established by Rudolf Steiner to encourage imagination, flexibility in thinking and a love of learning.
Respect & Reverence
We work in respect and reverence for the gifts and destinies of our students. We encourage in them the same respect and reverence for the wonders of the world, for their own humanity, and for the human dignity of others.
Wholeness
We protect the experience of childhood and appropriately introduce challenge, rigor and risk as students grow. We encourage the development of self-direction in our students and support achievement and wellness.
Belonging
We respect the dignity of each person and aspire to be a diverse, healthy, inclusive, and collaborative community. Waldorf education embodies a living set of principles, which grow to be relevant to our time and place, to inspire our students to reach out to the world with engaged inquiry, service, and a vision for justice.
Whether they’re designing sports stadiums, founding dance companies, designing couture fashion, starting non-profit animal shelters, building rockets, making independent films, or becoming educators themselves, CWS students bring their senses of curiosity, creativity, and courage wherever they go. After years of challenging themselves, experimenting academically and artistically, and growing into their identity, they are truly
