Alvin Toffler Letter

Excerpt from a letter addressed to the
Brentwood Board of Education

from Alvin Toffler

New York City, May 19, 1975




“It is almost cliché to say that we live in a world of very rapid change.  Our families are changing, our jobs, our country, the world, our value systems, the nature of work and methods, our communities.  All these are known to be in rapid change.  In order to survive we need new ways to adapt.  We need to learn to live with change and to master it.  In order to do this I think we are going to have to develop new models of living and learning.


"I didn’t know of the existence of the Maslow-Toffler School until after it was born.  I have spoken and met with students and with staff.  I read the poems they’ve written, I listened to the tapes they produced, I talked with other people who visited the school.  I’m convinced that the Maslow-Toffler School represents a model of the future as far as education is concerned; one model of the many that we are going to need, the school from which I think educators can learn as well as the students and the staff itself.  I think we are going to see analogues of the school, or models of it, spring up in other parts of the country before long.  I think the people of Brentwood are lucky to have this school and I’m unlucky that it took so long to get going -- as I regret that my own daughter did not have the opportunity to go to a school like this one.”



(This photo of Mr. Toffler was taken in 1975 by Frank Zimmerman, then a student, during a visit to the New York City apartment of Alvin Toffler by Maslow-Toffler students and staff. Click here for more of Frank's beautiful photographs.)