Chapter 1: Cws Beginnings: Imagine A School

The time was 1993. Bill Clinton is president. Gas in the United States is $1.16 a gallon. In New York City, a bomb carried in a van, detonated in the Parking Garage of the World Trade Center foreshadowing active terrorist planning. Michael Jackson performs at the Super Bowl. Madonna was on tour. The European Union becomes a single market. The AIDS epidemic was highlighted on screen in Philadelphia and on stage with “Angels in America.” Something that likely didn’t make it to the headlines in the very same year, in 1993, the Children’s Workshop School (CWS) on the Lower East Side of Manhattan was conceived and created. It grew out of the energy and hopeful activism of the Progressive Small Public Schools Movement² and the vision of the New York City Department of Education District One Administrators at that time. Stepping back into time helps to frame the context of our CWS beginnings, which has now led to a 30-year journey in seeking multiracial, empowering education for all children and the role that Maria and I played.