Melia: I had known for a long time that I needed a change from running a nonprofit organization. I had thought about traveling, in order to figure out what I truly wanted to do.

After the holidays, I took a four-day retreat to the California coast, just me in a hostel, and lots of books. I was reading “Eat, Pray, Love” and it just hit me that I could take a year for a journey of self-discovery.

I knew that my core issue was around making peace with my education. I’d always felt this pull back to my old schools — when I was home for the holidays, I’d go and walk around my old schoolyard, remembering what happened there and in the classrooms.

So the idea just came to me — I’d always wanted to go back and re-do my education, so why not?

Rick: Wow. Sounds like you were pretty self aware about the issues you had with your education. How would you describe your feelings toward your education since college?

Melia: I had a lot of regret and resentment about my schooling. I didn’t blame anyone in particular. I had just become aware of the ways in which the system was broken, and how it had broken me in a sense.
Rick: So, it’s not just about fixing a broken system, but helping people who have been “broken” by the system — to borrow a term that you just used. And, you wanted to start with yourself.

Melia: Exactly. I wanted to show people that we can heal our school wounds, and then we can fix the system…or even better, create a new vision for how education. Ideally, education will help people become who they’re meant to be. People will succeed because of, not in spite of, their education.

Melia: I’m co-founding a nonprofit organization called IDEA (the Institute for Democratic Education in America).

I’m focusing on the bigger picture: policy, sharing resources and organizing around positive educational change. IDEA is trying to bridge the disconnect between the democracy our country is founded on and the undemocratic way we educate our citizens. My role is Board Member and Communications Coordinator.

We’ll be working with all kinds of stakeholders in education: youth, parents, educators, administrators, policy makers, and community members.

Through IDEA, I’ll be able to continue to help adults with reschooling — by blogging on a larger scale, for example, and potentially running workshops on how to reschool yourself.

I’m happy to be working on a macro level now, as I did several years on the micro level. It’s important that both work together.

Rick: What’s some of the things your working on with IDEA?

Melia: Right now I’m helping build the website, which I believe will be the most comprehensive resource for democratic education ever to exist. There’s a lot of good information out there, but it’s not all in once place, and there isn’t a way for people to network with each other easily and take action together.

I’m also helping to develop a viral video that will introduce people to democratic education, show people what traditional education is really doing to kids, and lay out our vision for what education could look like.

Rick: You described Democratic Ed in our original interview. How does it differ Montessori schools?

Melia: Montessori falls within the spectrum of democratic education. Democratic education gives people of all ages power over decisions that affect them. Students have a lot of choice over what they learn and how they learn it. The way this looks day to day varies widely. It can be homeschooling or unschooling, a project-based learning classroom, or a group where decisions are made truly democratically. To paraphrase educator Matt Hern, IDEA isn’t recommending one “mass solution,” but rather “a mass of solutions.” That way, kids can have an education that suits their unique interests, personalities, and learning styles.

It’s really the best way for kids to practice being democratic citizens before they have a legal vote. It’s absurd to think that they would turn 18 and suddenly know how to make decisions wisely, if they haven’t had meaningful ways to do so as young people. Usually, youth and adults govern a group, classroom, etc., by vote. The issues voted on can range from the types of activities that take place, to the rules of the school, to the hiring of teachers.

We have plans to share resources throughout our network and develop our own. To start, we’ll be directing people to books and curriculum that we’ve seen work, and creating content like “Top 10 Ways to Make Your Classroom More Democratic.”
The site is www.democraticeducation.org. There’s a placeholder there now with just the basic information, but the site should be launching in the next month or two.

Melia: The Bay Area runs at a much faster pace. I’m still working on my need for over-achievement, yes. I’m doing a lot more things that I like to do, regardless of how impressive they are to other people. I watch a lot more TV shows now. I do yoga, and I play guitar at home.

I actually learned guitar basics last fall through an after-school program at my elementary school called Little Kids Rock. It was me and a bunch of 8-year-olds learning basic chords together. Humbling for sure, but definitely my speed in the beginning!

Guitar was something that I actually thought I’d never learn because I expected it would take a big investment of money and time. It really didn’t. I just kind of stumbled into it. My mom bought me a $99 guitar for Christmas, and the class was free, so it didn’t cost much. And timewise, I was playing basic songs pretty much immediately. ♦