Chapter 1: The Helios School – Inclusive University School in the City of Cologne

Abstract

My essay introduces the model of the Inclusive University School of Cologne, established in 2015, that intends to be a contemporary model of democratic school in the Deweyan tradition based on principles of participation and diversity under the complex life conditions of today. The text contains four components: First, I will reconstruct some elements and principles from Dewey’s Chicago Laboratory School that served as a basis for the Inclusive University School of Cologne. Secondly, I will give a comprehensive account of the inclusive concept of the Cologne school and the ways it works out in practice. Third, I will elaborate on the pedagogical program of the school formulated in ten components of inclusive learning and teaching. In a fourth step, I will give a concrete account of what “new learning” means in the context of this new school. Finally, I will discuss some main obstacles that we encountered and had to overcome in establishing the school in Cologne.