page_title: Anarchism and education
section_title: Francesc Ferrer i Guàrdia and the Modern schools
hierarchical_section_title: Anarchism and education / The Early 20th century / Francesc Ferrer i Guàrdia and the Modern schools
context_page_description: Anarchism has had a special interest on the issue of education from the works of William Godwin and Max Stirner onwards.
  A wide diversity of issues related to education have gained the attention of anarchist theorists and activists. They have included the role of education in social control and socialization, the rights and liberties of youth and children within educational contexts, the inequalities encouraged by current educational systems, the influence of state and religious ideologies in the education of people, the division between social and manual work and its relationship with education, sex education and art education.
  Various alternatives to contemporary mainstream educational systems and their problems have been proposed by anarchists which have gone from alternative education systems and environments, self-education, advocacy of youth and children rights, and freethought activism.
context_section_description: In 1901, Catalan anarchist and free-thinker Francesc Ferrer established "modern" or progressive schools in Barcelona in defiance of an educational system controlled by the Catholic Church. The schools' stated goal was to "educate the working class in a rational, secular and non-coercive setting". Fiercely anti-clerical, Ferrer believed in "freedom in education", education free from the authority of church and state. Murray Bookchin wrote: "This period [1890s] was the heyday of libertarian schools and pedagogical projects in all areas of the country where Anarchists exercised some degree of influence. Perhaps the best-known effort in this field was Francisco Ferrer's Modern School (Escuela Moderna), a project which exercised a considerable influence on Catalan education and on experimental techniques of teaching generally." La Escuela Moderna, and Ferrer's ideas generally, formed the inspiration for a series of Modern Schools in the United States, Cuba, South America and London. The first of these was started in New York City in 1911. It also inspired the Italian newspaper Università popolare, founded in 1901.
  Ferrer wrote an extensive work on education and on his educational experiments called The Origin and Ideals of the Modern School.
caption: Francesc Ferrer i Guàrdia, Catalan anarchist pedagogue
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