This is Chet, some call him Cheddar Cheese. He is the tech guy, the graphics guy, the resident DM, and our Mr. Fix-it. He loves everyone (as close as a mortal can get, anyway), and he’s always willing to do…anything you ask him to. Truly, his devotion and generosity are unsurpassed; you can find him here anytime during his regular hours or…any other time too . It is typical for Chet to be in such high demand during school hours that School Meeting nearly codified a law which would have prohibited wandering around asking “Where’s Chet?” or chanting his name (or “Cheddar Cheese”). Where he is, though, is usually either guiding a group of eager adventurers through the moral dilemmas and fearsome obstacles of magical worlds as Dungeon Master, or designing our next badass poster, postcard, t-shirt, etc. Or (endlessly) helping a younger student sign in to a gaming portal, or download an app, or even take apart their computer to clean it, or tying their shoes, (or cleaning up their occasional vomit). He’s here to help, and he roots for all our students so, so hard. In closing, I’ll go right out on a limb here and say that Chet is a saint, insofar as a saint is a person who cares about others more than themselves. And also the minutiae of design. He cares a lot about that. Chet, you may be Chester Arthur Elliot IV, but you’ll always be the number 1 Chet in our book.
Opportunities
At Zena Democratic School, we pride ourselves on offering our students endless opportunities; they are free to pursue their interests, dabble in this and that, or to fall head over heels into a subject without interruption – for as long as the interest remains, or to follow it wherever it may lead.
But the most valuable opportunity we offer students is the time and space to discover who they are. Students at ZDS have time to be, to think, to talk, to play, to discover what they enjoy and appreciate and, equally importantly, what they don’t enjoy or appreciate. We offer an opportunity to practice crucial skills such as motivation, persistence, articulation, and humility, to be part of a democratic community, and to experience acceptance, cooperation, recognition, and celebration. This unstructured time is where the real beauty of the ZDS experience lies and where the most important learning usually takes place.
However, many people do love content and instruction, and there is plenty of organized and formal activity at school. Students often organize this on their own, or with the assistance or leadership of a Staff Member, but they may also request the Programming Clerk to facilitate whatever kind of instruction or activity they’d like to have, from basic reading instruction to skateboarding lessons to sex education; every topic under the sun is theoretically available for our students to explore and to receive instruction upon.