The Seventies

The school begins when two concerned parents, Marcia "Rose" Loznak and Tom Hamil (a Wayne State University professor), have a talk about creating an "alternative school" in Marcia's house in Highland Park. Marcia tells Tom about a place called Upland Hills Farm where the founders, Knight and Dorothy Webster, operate a day camp during the summer. The Websters are excited by this new possibility because they had been searching for an alternative for their daughter. Phil Moore, traveling in Europe with wife Karen and daughter Nina, hears about the school from Knight and Dorothy's son Ken, a childhood friend, during a chance meeting in Malaga, Spain. Upon their return to Michigan, Karen and Phil enroll Nina, who is 6 years old, in the brand new school. Bruce and Ann Tubbs and Jerry Saterlee are the first teachers. When new staff members are hired a few months later, Phil becomes the director in February of 1972.

Recognizing the need to be away from the bustle of the farm , we build our current dome during the summer of '72, supplementing it with portable classrooms. In 1973 we build a wind generator which generates more publicity than power. Morning meetings are established and the afternoon program is created. A stable staff that includes John Yavruian, Jackie Potter, Karen Moore, Jack Kobliska and Marcia Loznak guide the school for 5 years or more.

In April 1977 the school faces its first serious challenge: a child is killed and several others seriously injured when our Dodge Maxi Van is struck by a drunk driver. We are tested as a community, but Jim Grossman reminds us that even during our darkest hour "the school needs to continue." We return to have the children perform "A Midsummer Night's Dream" outdoors in the space where our theatre currently resides. The decade ends with a strong school and the addition of a new neighbor, the Upland Hills Ecological Awareness Center.
 

Elizabeth Grossman

"I attended Upland Hills School from 1974 through 1978, beginning when I
was 8 years old. The school encouraged my curiosity and creativity in a
way which public school had not done. I was taught about fairness,
justice, and respect for diversity. I learned to protect the
environment, to appreciate the arts, and to become an advocate. I now
live in Brooklyn, New York and since 1993, I have been working as a
lawyer at the United States Equal Employment Opportunity Commission."

After leaving Upland Hills School, Elizabeth went on to the Cranbrook/Kingswood School and then the University of Michigan, where she majored in Women's Studies. . In 1991, as a student at U. of M.'s law school, she was granted the Jane L. Mixer Award for Outstanding Contributions to Social Justice. She was recently named one of the "50 Women to Watch" by the Wall Street Journal. A firm believer that discrimination still pervades plenty of industries, she has successfully tackled dozens of age, race, sex and disability bias cases since she joined the EEOC.
 

Leslie Irish Evans

Hi, I'm Leslie Irish Evans.

I attended Upland Hills from Fall 1978 - Spring 1981.

Here's a piece I recently published in my blog: www.theleslieshow.com

Saturday, February 04, 2006
Betty Friedan 1921-2006

When I was 11 years old, I marched through the halls of Congress, holding hands with Betty Friedan, to ask for an extension of the Equal Rights Amendment.

I went to this marvelous school, Upland Hills Farm School. It was (and remains) an alternative education school with a creative and nurturing curriculum that welcomes the uniqueness and creativity inherent in all children. I had some amazing experiences in my three years there, not the least of which was our Women's Class trip to Washington.

Every Wednesday morning, the older kids would go offsite to "Men's" and "Women's" Class. A simple answer would be to explain them as "sex-ed" classes, but that doesn't nearly do it justice. It was much more than rudimentary sex-ed. This was the 1970's. We talked about women's empowerment and our bodies and famous women and what we wanted to be when we grew up. It was a really cool class where we felt amazingly lucky and honored to be female.

I have no idea what the boys did. Nor did I particularly care. But I'm pretty sure their class wasn't nearly as cool as ours. Example: We took a field trip in the Fall of 1978 to attend a rally in Washington, D.C. to ask for an extension to ratify the ERA. We were all young girls between ages 9-13, our moms, and some teachers from the school. I don't remember anyone ever saying "No, you can't go." or "Why would you take young girls to this? They can't vote." Just that we were going.

We listened to the speeches, then headed to our Senator's office (Sen. Bob Griffith, from Michigan) to let him know we wanted him to support the extension. As we walked through the halls of congress (Yes, you could just walk in and head right to your senator's office in those days. Tell him what was on your mind.) we held hands in solidarity. On one side was my mother, and on the other was a short-ish, white haired woman whom I assumed was one of the mothers from our group.

"Oh my god," said my mother. "I can't believe I'm walking down the halls of Congress with Betty Friedan." I was so embarrassed. (Remember, I was 11. Everything your mother says when you're 11 is embarrassing.) But I had no idea, then, who Betty Friedan was or what she stood for. To be honest, at the time I had no idea how extraordinary my experience was. I thought everybody got on buses at some time or another and went to Washington D.C. to let their voices be heard. That pivotal even made me understand that I had a duty to let my opinion be known, and the fact that I was female didn't make my opinion any less valuable.

I thank Betty Friedan for opening that door for American women. May her soul be free.
 

Amy Nevel and her sister Bonnie were present on the first day of Upland Hills Farm School, as it was then known, and stayed through the 1975-76 school year, when she was a seventh grader.

She is now mom to 2 year old Cora and has worked as a public health policy analyst for the U.S Department of Health and Human Services in Washington, DC for the past 14 years.

"It is always hard for me to put into words the gifts I was given through my experience at Upland Hills. At 42, I still know every day I have been enriched by my 5 years at Upland Hills. But I can no longer separate the educational experience from the love, friendship and support Karen and Phil Moore have given me over the years. They have been there for me during the best and worst times of my life. The school is different now in many ways from its fledging beginnings down on the Farm, but the vision from those early days seems to have been sustained and carried it across the years thanks I am sure to the hard work and dedication of Phil Moore, the teachers, and all UHS supporters.

This summer my Upland Hills experience came full circle. Jacklyn (Jackie) Potter, a teacher from the early days, lives here in Washington, DC. I run into her every few years at poetry readings. Bonnie and I were both students in Literary Club when she was the teacher. Each June and July, Jacklyn organizes an outdoor poetry reading series. This year Bonnie applied and was accepted to read her poetry on July 5 (I am told that Jacklyn was not one of the judges!). In her introduction Jacklyn talked about teaching us at Upland Hills. It was amazing what she remembered and recounted about her experience as our teacher and us as students. This was the first time I had heard the poetry that Bonnie's been writing and it was inspiring to hear what my little sister has been up to. It was a very special evening for us all."
 

Original folk-rock songwriter Kelley Clute attended UHS 1974-1981.

In 1987, Kelley Clute began his migration in Detroit with a five piece ensemble by the name of Davenport Blue. Later he joined a trio called the Pleasure Heads. After feeling that his progression as a musician had somehow halted, Clute took off for an island off the coast of Maine where he realized that the only footsteps he needed to follow were his own.

Valerie Sherwood Sowa

"I went to UHS the 2nd year of its existence, which I think is 1972, and I attended until 1977. I graduated from Michigan State University with a dual major; recreation therapy & psychology. After working in many settings and wanting to be an at-home mom, I settled on having my own business with Discovery Toys. I am a National Sales Director and have been with them for the past 11 years. www.discoverytoyslink.com/ValerieSowa. I am married to Hendryk and we have 2 boys, Schuyler (11), Kurt (8), a dog, 2 cats, a tarantula & 2 Madagascar hissing cockroaches and we live in a little town, River Falls, Wisconsin - just outside of Minneapolis-St. Paul.

The photo that you are using on the website was taken while vacationing with my brother, Rich, in the Czech Republic and it is the castle where the upcoming film, The Grimm Brothers was filmed."

By Valerie Sherwood Sowa (fall 2005)

I was 10 and believed I could do anything. Phil Moore amazed me. He could play the guitar like no one else I'd ever heard. In fact, I didn't know anyone who played the guitar. To be able to play guitar like him, well…that was my dream. Every Friday, he belted out the Beatles to open up the All School Meeting. The air in the dome was chilly in the winter months but he got us all singing along to "Rocky Raccoon" and somehow we all felt warm inside. He'd take requests from the crowd and sometimes we'd be so involved in singing, he had to cut the agenda short. It was so much fun!

I made it my mission to convince Phil to teach me guitar. Never mind that there was not a guitar class and never mind that I did not own a guitar nor had any idea how to get one, I was determined. Everyday I asked him the same question, "When will you teach me to play the guitar?" I wore him down. He gave me a Buffy Saint Marie record album to listen to. I fell in love. I wore that record out - in fact, I still own it. I played it over and over in my bedroom and memorized all the lyrics in a week. Did he ever know that? The power of a gift.
Finally, he said he'd teach me, IF I got a guitar. Money was tight at my house. It was the 70s - fuel shortages, 4 kids and my mom worked her heart out to pay for tuition for all of us to go to UHFS. At a yard sale, we spied an old used guitar with chipped veneer. It was too big for me, but I was in heaven!

I remember marching to school the next day and proudly declaring for Phil to hear that I now had a guitar and so now he had to teach me. I had him trapped.

There were three of us to start with. Myself, burning with desire, my friend, Linda Tedesco, and Phil. It was really slow going. Somehow my dream didn't match the reality of sore finger tips and developing my out-of-tune ear. My mom got me a book with chords so that I could work on my own at home. Our little guitar class only met once a week. We'd spend the first part of the class tuning our guitars to each other - an impossibility for me. Try as I might, I couldn't hear the subtle differences that allowed 2 strings to sound exactly alike. Phil would always grab the guitars at some point and tune them himself so we could move on in the lesson. It was really challenging to practice at home on an out-of-tune guitar - which mine always was, being old with new strings.

A defining moment came when Linda was able to tune her guitar and I was not. They left me in the middle of our class to sort it out for myself - alone in the dome. It was an empowering moment, although not at first. At first I was MAD at both of them for abandoning me to a task that seemed impossible. Then I cried a lot, feeling sorry for myself. Then realizing that another class would be coming in at some point I rallied myself together and decided to try. Suddenly it all came together for me. The discernment of the notes, the precise sound of in tune strings. I GOT IT!

What happened after that? I got a new guitar that Christmas - a child-sized one that I kept through lots of moving and several states, all through college and now 30 years later it sits proudly in my living room. I could never bear to sell it. I know my parents sacrificed to get it for me and just looking at it takes me back on a journey through time.. I learned to play all sorts of terrific songs like You Are My Sunshine and The Big Mac Song about the Mackinac Bridge. As a kid, I even wrote a lot of songs myself and found them just recently in a box, like treasure that has been newly discovered. This past year, my own son, Schuyler begged to learn to play at the same age as me - 10. I hope I can teach it to him. I hope that he has that defining moment of realizing that within himself, he has the power to do anything he sets his mind to.

I hope Phil knows that he first taught that to me.

Steve Bhaerman, author, humorist and educator taught at Upland Hills School from 1973 to 1974. He has spent the past 16 years as a comedian and teacher of healing humor in the guise of the comic Swami Beyondananda, Steve has entertained millions with his comedy disguised as wisdom – or is it wisdom disguised as comedy?