The first thing you notice about Green School is the sound. Birdsong, laughter, the hum of curiosity. No fluorescent lights, no buzz of air-conditioning, just the music of life. Bamboo creaks in the breeze, roosters crow, and laughter carries through the trees. The entire campus breathes. And you read that correctly, there is no air-con.
The school sits beside the Ayung River, in a jungle of bamboo surrounded by the village of Sibang Kaja, nearly equidistant between the polar opposites that are Desa (village) Canggu and Desa Ubud, on the magic island that is Bali.
The buildings here curve and twist, living sculptures of imagination and balance. You cannot walk through Green School without feeling its energy. Ley lines and vortexes were built in. Proof that design, when aligned with nature, shapes behavior and awakens wonder.
I arrived during the pandemic, a decision made from instinct more than plan. A pivot. A deep inhale, an exhale too. At first, it felt like an experiment, a pause from the treadmill of Western education and life in Los Angeles. But it became something larger, a philosophy, a community, a return to learning that is dynamic.
Green School’s curriculum grows beyond textbooks. It takes new shapes based on curiosity. It shifts with the seasons, the students, and the world. Here, physics means building catapults on the football field, inspired by Angry Birds. Literature means reading climate fiction (cli-fi) or contemporary Balinese poetry within the shelter of the copper building, a bamboo-and-copper den of imagination. Comparative cosmologies and the study of world religions share time with projects on renewable energy, permaculture, and design for the future.
And as students grow, so does the complexity of their learning. In high school, innovation has depth. The Mycelium Lab explores regenerative systems through the study of fungi and the circular economy. A new Biomimicry Lab rises beside it, inviting students to look to nature as their teachers too. From the structure of seaweed to the rhythm of tides, everything becomes a lesson. To learn here is to remember that intelligence exists everywhere, in coral, in soil, in human imagination, and in reverence for the other-than-human world.
Even us parents have a classroom at Green School. The Bridge, one of the newest buildings on campus, was co-designed by students with Jonathan Mizzi of Mizzi Studio (London and Valletta, Malta), and has been celebrated by Dezeen for its architectural power and it’s heart. Daily programs invite parents to learn, reflect, and connect. Talks on leadership, regeneration and sustainability, mindfulness, and the messy grace of expatriate life fill the calendar. Writing circles, reading clubs, Balinese immersion programs, it is a school within a school, where curiosity continues long after drop-off.
Education here asks for humility and patience. Parents let go of everything they once thought they knew about “school.” Grades and test scores take a back seat to inquiry and exploration. Learning happens through making, observing, failing, and trying again. True scientific process. It can feel choppy, but it’s steady progress.
I have two sons in two completely different educational programs, on opposite sides of the world, each thriving. One spends his days in metalsmithing and environmental science, physics and creative writing. The other attends a demanding, traditional all-boys college-prep high school in Los Angeles. To see them grow into their individuality is the greatest joy. Our separate lives are heartbreaking and, at times, unbearable. But knowing they are learning in places that honor who they are makes the ache slightly easier to hold.
Last week, Green School hosted Bamboopalooza, our version of International Day. Forty-nine countries represented. Flags, drums, dancing, and food from every continent. The United States took the spirit award as usual, because, of course (there’s no spirit award, I just love us Americans when we get together).
Green School is more than a campus. It is a living curriculum, an ecosystem of possibility. Education that can regenerate the world, just as the world regenerates itself when given the opportunity.
Some days, I stand on the bridge over the river and think about that first leap of faith, the move abroad, the fear, the unknown, what has been gained - and what has been lost. This place, this life, has cracked me open. Green School is a reminder that what is real, is radiant.
Learning is not always about chasing the future. It is about remembering that life, right now, is the lesson.
There is a crack in everything. That’s how the light gets in.
— Leonard Cohen
