What Does "Democratic" Mean?
In a democratic space such as Passages, we understand that everyone needs to be supported to have their voices heard and valued. This means the choice to work on projects that are meaningful to each person, choice to come to the space or not, choice to work without coercion or manipulation with bribes. Youth come to our centre because they want freedom. That can mean working on one thing for months or flitting from topic to topic, grazing the surface. It could mean using the space as a social time. There’s no judgement or rules on how to use your time at Passages. Much like when we go to a public library, the Librarian does not judge how you use the space (as long as you’re not disrupting others), and they don’t judge the book topics you chose to look at or check out. Our attitude in the centre is the same. There is no extra value placed on certain topics.
Like the library, we are a shared space, which means we make sure that decisions related to our shared space and resources are a discussion brought to our weekly community meeting. Throughout the week, youth are encouraged to write on the whiteboard anything they wish to discuss at our weekly meeting. One recent discussion we had was related to music in the main room. Throughout the day, we had music playing of various genres. One youth mentioned that background music would be better than actual music with lyrics; another added that maybe theme music such as ethereal video game music. We discussed that having something playing in the background was better than silence but nothing that relied on having to work on tuning it out. As a group, we agreed that music with lyrics is for headphones unless the group in the space decided they wanted to play music together as a group.
This is a small example of how youth can voice their needs in the space, but that process repeated over each shared resource eventually creates a culture and understanding. During the meeting, everyone needed to listen and take into consideration each person’s perspective and needs. They also had to voice their needs, which took thinking and introspection.
The difference at Passages compared to many other democratic schools is that we aim not to vote. Voting ultimately means someone has to lose out that the majority can rule. That the loudest voices get their needs met. Through creativity and honouring each voice, we believe there has to be a way to meet everyone’s needs if everyone has arrived at the discussion in good faith. It can be a long process of discussion and listening. Decisions made one-week need to be upheld even if a few change their mind mid-week once the decision is in action. Suggested changes would then need to be brought to the next weekly meeting and discussed there.
The meetings are not mandatory (because we do not force youth to participate if they don’t want to); however, the understanding then is that if they decide not to join the meeting then they follow the group’s decisions for the space until they bring their concerns to the next meeting for discussion.
And around and around we go. Slowly building and reconsidering the foundations and beliefs of ourselves and our centre. As we see this week, democracy can be messy, take time, and try our patience but ultimately, the skills and learnings are worth it.