Invitation

Is it courage that guides you or is fear the base of your decisions? At this year's conference we would like to come together to develop an understanding about in which situations courage can be the solution for personal and sociaeal problems. How can we manage to let courage lead us throughout our lives? What is is that makes it so difficult? How and why do fears arise? How can we work on breaking them down? And then how can we manage to not look for direction in simple but often exclusive ideologies, but to let our free will guide us and search values which embrace reality in its complexity and diversity? Let us raise courage to break down old paradigms and to stand for our conversations.

What meaning does courage have for young people from all around the world? What role does it play in current times, and what influence does it have in intercultural encounters and striving of personal and societal development? How can we let courage guide us throughout our lives?

During our five-day conference in April we want to create a space of intercultural and intergenerational exchange, in which the participants will learn not only about sociological and psychological approaches regarding the question of courage and fear, but also they will have the chance to experience group dynamics and reflect on how they will develop over the five days that they will spend together with the other participants. They will be able to observe within themselves and share with each other how they individually perceive their personal development, within this group of approximately 700 young people from all around the world. Our workshop and conversation-group facilitators and keynote speakers for this conference come from a wide range of cultural backgrounds, because it is our goal to discuss the theme of courage from various perspectives.

As students from around the world, we want to celebrate the 100-year anniversary of the Waldorf school movement. We want to critically reflect on the past 100 years and also to create visions and ideas for the coming 100 years. What does the Waldorf movement need courage for? What does every individual within the movement need courage for, in order to sustain and develop Waldorf education? What are the challenges we are confronted with nowadays as Waldorf schools, and how can the new generation of students help co-create the future of the movement?

We are very excited to announce that we will have the chance to go to Basel with all participants during the conference to perform our "creative intervention" where we will be able to share our insights, ideas and questions with the public in the city center.

Also there will be a common question for every day that we will discuss about together and that will be dealt with in lectures and conversation groups so we can have a common experience and fruitful discussions also in the breaks.

In the nights there will be a night cafe with a bonfire to continue the discussions, dance, get to know each other and enjoy the togetherness, to get inspired and learn from each other and about different cultures.

We want to warmly invite all high school students in the Age of 15 to 19 years old to come and participate in our conference from April 23 to 27, 2019. For more information, registration, and scholarship possibilities have a look at our website isc19.com.

We also want to warmly invite everyone to spread this information about our conference.

Ronja Eis and Till Höffner
Youth Section at the Goetheanum and ISC 2019 team members