Now Enrolling 9th through 12th Grade
Shining Mountain Waldorf High School is where students experience the flowering of this unique education. A Waldorf high school curriculum continues in following the development of the human being from age 14 through 18, guiding students in their ability to move from the realm of the absolute to abstract thought and reasoning. The high school pedagogy is aimed at helping each student to discover meaning as well as their own unique place in the world. Equipped with all of the skills they have forged along the way, graduates step forth into the next chapter of life with a keen sense of self-knowledge, compassion, and awareness.

TO THE STUDENT

Shining Mountain offers the breadth and depth of a liberal arts education at the high school level along with extensive Outdoor Experiences which include farming, naturalist journaling, and wilderness training. Spanish is emphasized as a language to use in your day to day life. Courses are challenging and draw on all aspects of your being – artistic, intellectual, emotional, physical, scientific, mathematical, musical, creative, and spiritual. Socially, you have the best of both worlds: close friendships that span the entire student population in the High School and connections to students at other schools. 

Your relationships at Shining Mountain form life-long bonds with peers and faculty alike. Teachers will take a personal interest in you and how you are doing. If you have a special interest or talent you wish to develop, the faculty will work to support you. When you are looking ahead beyond high school, our college counselor will provide one-on-one guidance to get you to the college or university of your choice or to create an alternative career plan.

TO THE PARENT

In addition to ensuring academic rigor, Shining Mountain Waldorf High School provides a safe, healthy learning environment in which your teenager can explore the many facets of his or her personality, yearnings to contribute to the world, and peer connections.

Our High School teachers are specialists who sharpen the growing intellectual skills of the adolescent and affirm their ideals through a carefully crafted curriculum. Yearly themes engage students in a developmentally appropriate way, both in content and teaching approach.

Through community service, students experience that they can make a difference in the world and enjoy a healthy relationship to the world at large.

Practical and fine arts, drama, and music and outdoor experiences further engage adolescents in healthy activities that nurture their need for self-expression and creative contribution. Competitive sports offer opportunities for team building and provide yet another arena for our young men and women to explore their potential.

"My years at Shining Mountain made me more openly curious towards life, more philosophic, and spiritually minded. I appreciate the broader picture of everything and the sense of things being interconnected, which came with the curriculum."

Scott Coulter, Class of 1997

- Sarah Gillis, SMWS Class of 2012 and Sr. Space Operations Engineer at SpaceX

“I feel like one of the really important things that you get out of a Waldorf education is curiosity—curiosity to go and learn and explore what’s out there in the world. I fell into engineering and a path that I don’t think I would have anticipated, but having an arts background where you’re bringing creativity and imagination into problem-solving, there’s a really incredible synergy between those.”

- Sarah Gillis, SMWS Class of 2012 and Sr. Space Operations Engineer at SpaceX

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