City School (Vancouver)

City School is Vancouver’s longest-running public alternative school. It was created as “a non-graded, continuous progress school in which students take responsibility for their own learning and which tries to use the city as its classroom.”

In 1970, the Director of Instruction for secondary schools in Vancouver was Alfred Clinton. He wrote “A Proposal for an Ungraded Continuous Progress School (City School)” and in it referenced the Metropolitan Learning Center in Portland, Oregon as well as the now extinct Parkway Program in Philadelphia as “similar projects.”

Other philosophical influences were A. S. Neill's Summerhill School in Suffolk, England, and the S.E.E.D. (Shared Experience Exploration and Discovery) School founded in Toronto, Ontario in 1968.

Dr. Clinton’s vision closely paralleled the project-based learning methods now being adopted by innovative educators in many schools. “This approach will be radically different from that practised in conventional classrooms... For example, rather than engaging in systematic study of the various disciplines, the student will focus on the solution of problems more relevant to his needs.”. Rules and regulations would be few: “Students will be asked to work together congenially, to follow agreed procedures of daily accountability in developing and working out their individual programs, to record and evaluate their learning experience and to attend on a regular basis.”

As per Dr. Clinton’s proposal, City School opened its first set of doors at 550 West 10th Avenue on September 7, 1971. Some ninety students were enrolled in Grades 4 to 10 in the initial year, with a faculty of four teachers and a staff assistant.

Marilyn J. Reid studied the progress of this education experiment in its first year and reported to the Vancouver Board of School Trustees, “At the core of City School is the involvement on an equal (in most instances) basis of everyone, students and teachers alike. Students have votes of equal status in matters of policy, organization, discipline and rules. This ‘democracy’ extends to the choice of subjects offered. If a student wants to pursue a particular interest with other students and staff, he is expected to initiate the activity himself.”

She wrote: “The objectives of City School are:

Reid surveyed students and parents on a School Sentiment Index and in her summary, noted, “Many students and parents felt that one of the school's greatest handicaps was the inadequacy of its buildings and equipment. The facilities were designed for children at the primary level and are, not surprisingly, unsuitable in some ways for older children.”

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