Quakers ourselves have engaged in a centuries long conversation about the meaning and purpose of each of our animating practices. We expect that conversation will not end. Rather, it will continue to invite all members of our community to join—to help us to change and grow more fully into what is right and true in the world. Quaker schools invite a similar conversation. Although we’re not expecting our students to become Quakers, we do expect that this continuing conversation is one way in which they will find a place for themselves—in the lead on some occasions, listening deeply in others. In all cases, on the pathway of building respect for one another and the truth.

From Friends Council’s Quaker Self-Study and Member Renewal Process

As we welcome our students back to school, the world’s tragedies and troubles—violence, war, racism, religious bigotry, climate change, to name just a few—continue to worsen at an alarming pace. In our roles as administrators, teachers, guides, coaches, and mentors, we must meet both our students and the world as they and it present themselves to us. At Friends Council, we imagine the question, “Where to begin?” has crossed your mind more than once as you begin this particular school year.

For Quaker schools, the answer to this question is as it has always been—the faith and practice of Quakers. If there was ever a year during which to rededicate ourselves to the Quaker practices of peace, integrity, equality, community, simplicity, and stewardship, it is this year. These practices look different for students at different developmental stages, but in the end, they will help each student develop a sense of agency and self-worth, and prepare them to connect with the world and the people in it with a sense of optimism, hope, and purpose that contributes to the world’s transformation.

While we share common Quaker practices across our school communities, each student arrives at school with their own identity shaped by their own story. We seek to honor each story even as we expect that a Way will open for interdependent connection as we help students build a shared understanding of the world. Every one of our students should feel a deep sense of inclusion in their Quaker school community, and that it is evident to each that their story and their individual gifts and talents matter.

Our Peace Testimony calls for our schools to engage students in critical investigations of the causes of war and violence, and to model the myriad ways to resolve conflict restoratively. In a nation that is dividing itself more and more, our schools should be shining examples of the Community Testimony, modeling how our diverse identities and perspectives can create a community of truth seekers willing to develop and share new understandings of themselves and their world. As we see some of the most important tenets of education under scrutiny and attack, the  Equality Testimony calls us to lean into the idea that diversity makes us stronger and that truth—no matter how difficult—is the ultimate pursuit. We must hold tightly to the testimony of Integrity as we remain true to our Quaker missions and values. 

As we all lean into Quaker practices for another academic year, it is important to stay nimble. Friends Council is honored to be your partner in this journey to fully live into the spirit George Fox described in 1656 in that we will “walk cheerfully over the Earth, answering to that of God in everyone.”

John Lester, founding Executive Director of Friends Council on Education in a 1931 address, is still feeling timely in 2025:

Now amid discussions of the educational sociologists about what kind of civilization it is desirable to aim at, how the atmosphere is clarified, how the problems defined, when the church can say to the schools it has founded, here are some of our traditional doctrines and attitudes, testified to over hundreds of years, which need emphasizing and interpreting now as they have never needed it in the whole history of the race: For standing out clearly for solution in the lifetime of our boys and girls now in school are three problems.

First, the abolition of war. 
Second, the problem of social justice. 
Third, the problem of social international and interracial understanding.

The persons to influence are our youth: the place for emphasis is the school.

Read the more of the address here: https://www.friendscouncil.org/about/history