This free event explores alternative and anarchist approaches to education, featuring a screening of the documentary Approaching the Elephant followed by a talk from Professor Judith Suissa. Approaching the Elephant offers an intimate look at the Teddy McArdle Free School, an institution without a curriculum or set rules. This documentary serves as a catalyst for discussions on children's agency and radical, democratic or alternative educational models.

Professor Suissa, an expert in the philosophy of education, will reflect on themes raised by the film. Her work challenges traditional views on state schooling and explores alternative pedagogical relationships and educational experiments.

The evening concludes with a Q&A session, providing an opportunity to engage with these alternative models for knowledge creation. 

Dr Judith Suissa is Professor Emerita of Philosophy of Education at UCL Institute of Education. Professor Suissa has expertise in the intersection between political ideas and educational practice. She is particularly concerned to challenge the narrow focus on state schooling characteristic of so much educational philosophy, theory and research, and to explore the underlying political and moral assumptions of pedagogical relationships outside institutional forms of education. These include parent-child relationships, educational experiments that challenge the state system, and social movements.

Her books include Anarchism and Education; A Philosophical Perspective (Routledge 2006) and among her recent papers, she wrote ‘Education and non-domination: reflections from the radical tradition’ published in Studies in Philosophy and Education in 2019.